tibvavy of t:Ke t:heolo5ical ^tminavy 
 
 PRINCETON • 
 
 NEW JERSEY 
 
 STUART FUND 
 
 BSi 
 
 .K5 
 
 60b 
 
 3 
 
"^klph ^tm rf CDminentarici 
 
 KING ON JONAH 
 
 AND 
 
 EAINOLDS ON OBADIAH AND HAGGAL 
 
COUNCIL OF PUBLICATION. 
 
 W. LINDSAY ALEXANDER, D.D., Professor of Theology, Congregational Union, Edinburgh. 
 
 JAMES BEGG, D.D., Jlinister of Newington Free Church, Edinburgli. 
 
 THOMAS J. CRAWFORD, D.D., S.T.P., Professor of Divinity, Univor.-ity, Edinburgh. 
 
 D. T. K. DRUMMOND, M.A., Minister of St Thomas's Episcopal Church, Edinburgh. 
 
 WILLIAM 11. GOOLD, D.D., Professor of Biblical Literature and Church History, Reformed 
 Presbyterian Church, Edinburgh. 
 
 ANDREW THOMSON, D.D., Minister of BrougLton Place United Presbyterian Church, Edinburgh. 
 
 ^tncral (L-biior. 
 
 REV. THOMAS SMITH, M.A., Edi.vdurgii. 
 
LECTURES UPON JONAH. 
 
 DELIVERED AT YORK, 
 IN THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1594. 
 
 \/ 
 
 JOHN KING, 
 
 AFTERWARDS LORD BISHOP OF LONDON. 
 
 SEP -: 1987 
 
 EDINBURGH : JAMES NICHOL. 
 LONDON : JAMES NISBET AND CO. DUBLIN : G. HERBERT. 
 
 M-DCCCLXIV. 
 
EDINBUKOn : 
 
 FEINTED BY JOHN GKEIO AND SON, 
 
 OLD PHYSIC GAKDENS. 
 
JOHN KING, D.D., 
 
 BISHOP OF LONDON. 
 
 OO '^ g g g^OO 
 
 THE author of the quaint and rich ' Lectures ' on the Book of Jonah, now reprinted after a 
 long interval of comparative neglect — John King — is one of those elder Worthies whose 
 present obscurity contrasts with their contemporary veneration and renown. 
 
 Those who love our old literature assign a near-hand place in the shelf of choice books to 
 the antique, various-editioned quarto — usually found done up daintily in fair white vellum, with 
 ties, and touched with faded gold — which enshrines the ripe wisdom, the learning, not ' a mere 
 hoard of gold,'* the sinewy wit, the nimble fancies, the dexterous home-thrusts, the well-put 
 axioms, passing away occasionally into quiet mirth, now of a saw and now of a pun, and the 
 racy common sense — finest and most uncommon of all sense — expressed not seldom weightily 
 and memorably, of these ' Lectui-es' ; while his rarely occurring single ' Sermons,' delivered at 
 ' St Paul's Crosse,' and elsewhere, cause the genuine Bibliomaniac's heart to rejoice over them as 
 one who ' findcth great spoil. '-f- But, as with Dr Airay and others, his book is his one memorial. 
 Of the man himself — emphatically, 'a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith' (Acts 
 xi. 24), — mournfully little is known. 
 
 The name — King — suggests regal descent ; and the family of our Bishop were not slow to 
 assert the claim. His son Henry, bishop of Chichester, and a 'sweet singer' among the minor 
 poets of England, in his 'Elegy' upon his father, thus boa.sts : — 
 
 ' from ancostoi's thou came, 
 
 Old as the Heptarchy, great as thy name.'X 
 
 The ' Herald's College ' furnishes an elaborate pedigree, paternally and maternally, the root of 
 which reaches back to the stock- — as the descendants of our good bishop were fond of supposing — 
 of the old West-Saxon king.s. ' It is very possible,' says Hannah, ' that this tradition may have 
 originated in the accidental meaning of their name ; but the later members of the family enter- 
 tained no doubts upon the subject of their royal ancestry ; for we meet with both ' the ancient 
 kings of Devonshire,' and the arms of King on all their monuments, although even these latter, 
 which are undoubtedly authentic, do not appear to have had any such jDrominence till they 
 were painted by the sons of Bishop John King on the windows of Christ Church. '§ From 
 
 * 2 Henry IV., iv. 3. 
 
 t For a list of these see Watt, Bib. Brit. ; Wootl, A. O. 
 ii. pp. 295, 206 ; Hannah as below, page xci. 
 
 X Poems and Psalms by Henry King, D.D., &c., edited by 
 the Kev. J. Hannah, 1843, 12mo, page 53. 
 
 ? As ante, J, page ii. We take this opportunity of acknow- 
 ledging our obligations throughout to this erudite hut pro- 
 vokingly fragmentary edition of a true poet. For many of 
 the facts in our Memoir, our chief authority is Hannah : 
 hut in every case we have gone to the original sources. 
 
VI 
 
 JOHN KING, D.D. 
 
 Eyshc,* and Wood.-f- and Munday.J and Fuller, § and others, the same industrious biographer 
 of Bishop Henry has compiled super-abundant details. Thither the curious in such things are 
 referred. II 
 
 Whatever may be the truth of their descent, the family was certainly in possession of very 
 considerable wealth and influence before the middle of the sixteenth century. At the time of 
 the dissolution of the monasteries, Robert (the brother of William) Kynge, who had been abbot 
 of Osney, w!is advanced to the newly created see of Oxford, ia September 1542, and 'left a great 
 personal estate.' William Kynge married a daughter of Sir John Williams of Burfield, in 
 Berkshire, whose second son was created Viscount Williams of Thame, Apr. 5 : 1 Mar. 1554. 
 This connection will explain the removal of the family to the borders of Oxfordshire and Buck- 
 inghamshire, where two of the sons of William King were settled, at the villages of Shabington 
 and Worminghall. One of these, PhiliiJ King of Worminghall, was educated under the super- 
 vision of his two uncles. Sir John (afterwards Lord) Williams, and the Bishop of Oxford ; and 
 was page in his youth to King Henry VIII. Though a younger son, he was wealthy, having 
 inherited the estates of Bishop Robert Kynge. About the year 1553 or 1554, he married Eliza- 
 beth Conquest, of Houghton-Conquest, in Bedfordshire, by whom he had no fewer than twelve 
 children. The most famous of them was our bishop, who was born 'about 1559,' in Worming- 
 hall, 'commonly called,' says Anthony a- Wood, ' Wornal, near to Brill in Bucks.'^ A very fair- 
 faced pleasant village is this Worminghall still. Leafy lanes, that load out to green fields, 
 odorous of kiue, and fertile downs, brightened with the gleam of rivulets singing beneath the 
 alders, and many a 'sweet meadow,' overshadowed with skirting woods, that surround 'manors' 
 all bright with lustrous memories, make it a covetable birth-place. 
 
 Of the childhood of Master John nothing seems to have come down. Probably he attended 
 first of all the village school ; but while a mere boy he was removed to London, and there ' was 
 educated in grammar learning in Westminster school.'** From thence he was sent to Oxford. 
 The following table presents his progress there : — 
 
 1. Student of Christ Church (from Westminster), 1570. 
 
 2. Pas.sed B.A., January 26. 1579-80. 
 
 3. Commenced M.A., February 15. 1582-3. 
 
 4. Proctor of the University, April 29. loSO.ff 
 
 When young King proceeded to Oxford in his seventeenth year, there were various 'exiles 
 for religion,' from France and elsewhere, resident in the university. Anthony a- Wood enume- 
 rates several, as Petrus Regius, Giles Gualter, Petrus Lozillerius Villerius, and Peter Baro, D.D., 
 of Cambridge. The last appears to have come to Oxford in tho same year, 157G, in wliich 
 King joined ; and it is just po.ssible, and therefore to be noted, that inasn)uch as Baro's notorious 
 ' Comment on Jonah ' originated the keen controversy with Chadertou and man}' other divines, 
 our ' Lecturer ' on the same prophet may have had his attention turned to that book by his 
 early acquaintance with Baro, and necessary interest in the long debate thereupon. 
 
 The more famous of his contemporaries were John Doderidgc, afterwards Sir John, the dis- 
 
 * Visit of Su.sspx, l(;62-8. 
 
 t Athena; B.\\A Fasti, sub nomine, a,\so his Autiq. O.xoii. iii. 
 400 (eii. Gutcli). 
 
 t in liis edition of Stowe's Survey of London, 1GS3, 
 p. 775. § Cliurcli History, b. x. page 30. 
 
 II As an^f, t, pft^os Ixxxiii-ciii. Cf. also pp. ii, iii, whence 
 thu above details are drawn. 
 
 % A. O. ii. 'Z\)i. It 13 said that Henry, tho eldest son 
 
 of our Bishop (afterwards Bishop of Chii'hcstor, and of 
 whom more anon), was born in the same chamber wlicro 
 his father also had been born. See Fuller, ' Woithies' 
 of Bucks, p. 132. Hannah, p. i. ♦* Ibid. 
 
 tt From Wood, in A. O., and FiLsti, J!;J annis, and relativo 
 notes of Kennet and Bliss. Cf. also Hannah as before, 
 pp. Ixxxii, xc. 
 
JOHK KING, D.D. VU 
 
 tinguished judge, and ancestor of tlie saintly Philip Doddridge of Northampton ; * Miles Smith, 
 subsequently bishop) of Gloucester, and whose 'Sermons' much resemble King's ; "I- Walter 
 Travers, ' Lecturer in the Temple,' and who came into collision with Richard Hooker ; Erasmus 
 Dreyden, George Peele, the poet and dramatist ; Richard Hooker, who proceeded M.A. in Christ 
 Church on March 29. 1577 ; Nicholas Bownde, D.D., a delightful old writer, and the vindicator 
 by pre-eminence of the Sabbatli ; Giles Lawrence, a great Grecian ; William Wliittaker, clavura 
 et venerabile nomen ; Gervase Babington, afterwards bishop of three sees successively ; Robert 
 Abbot, subsequently bishop of Salisbury ; Henry Cuffe, like Lawrence, ' renowned for Greek ; ' 
 and last, not least, Lancelot Andre wes, one of the most illustrious of the bishops. J Altogether, 
 Kiug had to fight his way to honours against no common men. It is pity that all our 
 searching in their extant writings and 'Memoirs' has fiiiled to shed light upon his college friend- 
 ships and companionships. This further table gives his further progress : — 
 
 1. Archdeacon of Nottingham, August 12. 1590. 
 
 2. Proceeded B.D., July 2. 1591. 
 
 3. Married before this time Joane, daughter of Henry Freeman, who seems to have come 
 
 originally from Staff(jrdshire, but who afterwards settled at Henley-upon-Tiiames. 
 
 4. Eldest son, Henry, 'the Psalmi.st,' born January 1591-92. 
 
 5. Presented by the queen [Elizabetli] to the living of St Andrew's, Holborn, May 10. 1597. 
 
 6. Preb. of Sneating, cathedral of St Paul's, October IG. 1599. 
 
 7. Degree of D.D., December 17. 1601. 
 
 8. Dean of Christ Church — his own college — August 4. 1605. 
 
 9. Vice-Chancellor, July 17- 1607 (continued for four years). 
 
 10. Preb. of Miltou- Manor, cathedral of Lincoln, December IH. 1010. 
 
 11. Consecrated Bishop of Loudon, Sejijtember 8. 1G11.§ and \\ 
 
 We must return upon these dates and honours. At the time of his advancement to the 
 Archdeaconry of Nottingham, our worthy was a ' preacher in the city of York.' There his 
 ' Lectures on Jonah ' were delivered. While in York, he was chaplain to the archbishop, 
 Piers, whose funeral sermon — and a very striking one it is, having many Shakespearean words 
 and subtle touches, if over-loaded with learning, — he preached, November 17. 1594, the year 
 in which his 'Lectures' were given. The birth-places of his children shew that he was occa- 
 sionally resident in Yorkshire for some years subseipient to 1594. But he soon became one of the 
 chaplains of Elizabeth, who, as tabulated, herself presented him to the rectory of St Andrew's, 
 Holborn, London, and two years afterwards, he received the additional preferment of a prebendal 
 stall in the cathedral of St Paul's. His advancement from this time in the church was markedly 
 rapid. ' He was,' says Thomas Fuller, 'chaplain to Queen Elizabeth ; and as he was appointed 
 l)y her Council to preach the first Sermon at Court when her body lay inhcarsed in the Chappcl 
 of White-Hall, so was he designed for the first sermon to her successor. King James, at Charter- 
 House, when he entered London, then sworn his first chaplain, who commonly called him the 
 King of Preachers.'^ He was one of the only two clergymen below the rank of deans and 
 
 * Stougliton's' Philip Doddridge ;lii3Life and Labours,' 1 Wood's A. 0., ii. 295, 207. Le Keve's Fasti, p. 181 
 1851, p. 34. ! Hnnnali, as before, p. viii, foot-note " 
 
 t Folio, 1G32. 
 
 X We haveselected these from the Fasti, sub annis. Wood 
 gives interesting details. 
 
 § Cf Hannah as before, pp. Ixxxix, xc, and see before %. 
 
 II Election confirmed, Sept. 7 ; Consecrated, Sept. 8 ; 
 Temporalities restored, Sejjt. 18. See Dugdale's St Paul's, 
 by KUis, pp. 222, 402 ; Newcourt Kepertorium, i. 29 ; 
 
 1 This pun, wliich is very characteristic of James, is 
 further illustrated by Hannah from Argall, Farley, and 
 Howel. See pp. v foot-note t, and 177. We may adij here 
 another upon the name of the holy ' ejected' Jolm King of 
 Ahbot's-Langlcy, a collateral descendant and equal to any 
 of the Family. lu an incdited tractate in the British 
 Museum, entitled, ' A True Picture of the much honoured 
 
■\111 
 
 JOHN KING, D.D. 
 
 bishojjs who were called to attend at the Hampton Court Conference in January 1603-Oi, on 
 the ecclesiastical as distinguished from the puritan side ; and he was afterwards appointed, with 
 three others, to preach before the Scotch clergy at Hampton Court in 1606.* One is relieved to 
 find no base adulation of the king, no hungering after advancement, and no brow-beating of 
 the opposite side associated with King, either now or hereafter. 
 
 A very remarkable testimony was rendered to him in 1604. In this year, Dr Ravis being about 
 to be removed from the deanery of Christ Church, by his elevation to the see of Gloucester, a 
 petition was drawn up and signed by thirty-two of the students, in the name of the rest, for the 
 purpose of requesting King James to bestow the vacant deanery upon our King, whom they 
 describe as cla7-issimum lumen Anglicanw Ecclesice — that he who had been their chosen com- 
 panion miglit now be their leader and guide. We present below the interesting document, which 
 was preserved among Anthony a- Wood's papers.-f- As already stated, the request was granted, 
 and he was installed Dean of Christ Chui-ch on the 4th of August. ' It was therefore,' observes 
 Hannah, 'under the happiest auspices that his sons (Henry and John) were admitted into the 
 university, of which their father was vice-chancellor, as members of a college over which he had 
 been thus honourably appointed to preside.^ 
 
 During the term of his vice-chancellor.ship of the university, 1607-10, there were many-after- 
 wards eminent men in attendance, as students, or for advanced degrees, as well of the 
 nobility of genius as of rank. In 1607, there were Tomkins, the distinguished pupil of Wil- 
 liam Bird, whose 'Anthems' are still remembered; Hugh Robinson, John Reading, Roger Man- 
 waring, Giles Widdowes, all names of mark. Then yet more illustrious, Thomas Hobbes (of 
 Malmesbury), Robert Sanderson, and Richard Capell, and Robert Abbot. Besides these, and 
 
 and revered Mr John King (sometimes minister of Abbofs- 
 Langley, Hertfordshire), for the closets of his friends 
 [1680] 11, 626 c.,' occurs the following play upon the 
 name : — 
 
 ' Will he that diggs up rugged stone direct, 
 Or the rough mason venture to erect 
 A royal tomb f Yot I, unskilful I, 
 Am call'd to strain my nature in an elegy 
 On a good Kiny.' 
 Fuller, Church History, b. x. p. 91. Bisihop Henry 
 King alludes to the ' first sworn chaplaiucy' in his ' Sermon' 
 •on the death of his father, of which mure onwards. Cf. 
 Epistle Dedicatory to Prince Charles, subsequently Charles 
 I. See also for above facts I^e Neve's Arch, of York, p. 79. 
 * Spotiswood, Hist, of the Scotch Cluirch, p. 497. Cf. 
 also Collier, ii, 691. Quoted in Hannali as before, p. v. 
 
 t This ' Petition,' which is quoted by Wood (A. 0. ii. 
 p. 295), is jjrinted entire by Hannah from the original. 
 See Appendix A. § iii. We take it from thence : — 
 
 ' Ex prajclaris.^imis illis virtutibns, quibus regale tuum 
 pectus cumulatissime stipatur, Pntcutissime Princeps, eam 
 si non priniam, ccrte quidcm inter primas e.sse censemus, 
 qubd litoraruni studia sunimopore colas, et literatos viros 
 ad amplissimas dignitatos promovpas. Cujus praistanlis- 
 simto virtutis fructum, nos Alumni Celsitudinis vestrte, et 
 non mediocrem jam percepimus, quod Ecclesiaj Christi 
 ct vcstra) Decanus, vir vita atquo eruditione spcctatissimus, 
 ad Episcopalem Sedem designatus sit, et uberiorem otiam 
 sperantes, consenliontibus et aniniis, et voeibus, a Maiestato 
 vestra contendimus universi, vt Decanatus istius quando- 
 eunquo vacatur munus in ejusmodi dennun Virum, qui 
 ct in huius Aidia gremio educatus, et de eadem optirnfi 
 meritus fuerit, conferatur. Talem autem et fuisse hactenus 
 cxperti sumus, & futurum in postcrum nobis pollicemur. 
 
 Johannem Kinge, Theologije Doctorem, tuas Maiestati a 
 sacris, quondam alumnum huius ^Edis, nunc clarissimum 
 lumen .\n^dicana; Ecclesi.-e; qui olim proespus ea praicepta 
 doctriua: ad omnium institutionem tradidit, ea oxempla 
 vita; ad omnium imitationem proposuit, ut qui foelioes no3 
 ipsi putavimus hoc studiorum nostrorum socio tantum atqua 
 comite, eodera studiorum duce ac prteside foelici-ssimos 
 futuros arbitraremur. Nee vel dubitare possumus (modo 
 nos optati nostri compotes faciat Maiestas vestra), quin et 
 luec Ecclesia, quem filium semper sensit peramantem, 
 eum parentem sit sensura araenissimum ; et nos, quem 
 vidimus optime paruisse, eundem summa sua cum laudo, 
 nostro cum fructu pra^rsse visuri simus. Virum igitur 
 huuc, suo et nomine et dotibus commendatissimum, et 
 nostro qualiqualieunquetestimonionequaquamindigeutem, 
 Maiestati vestra), eumque nobi.s nostrisque studiis, secun- 
 dum doum, summd & solum tutelarem, regum Kegi Deo 
 Opt. Max. humillime, & (vt officii nostri est) devotia- 
 sim6 commcudamus. Dat : ex JEde Christi Idibus Octob. 
 anno salutis leO-t. Sercuissima; Maieslatis tua3 
 Humillimi servi, & 
 Fidelissimi subditi.' 
 Then follow the names of tldrty-two students, ' cum reli- 
 quis studentibus in Ainie Christi." The paper from which 
 above is transcribed — in Wood's MSS. in Ashm. F. 28, fol. 
 171— appears to be the original document, as it has evi- 
 dently been sealed and sent. It is addressed on tho 
 outer page, ' Serenissimo potontissimoq.; Monarchje Jacobo 
 Anglia;, Scotia), Francioe, & Hiberniaj Regi.' Hannah 
 as before, pp. xe, xci. 
 
 I As before, p. vi. Sic : but Henry and John King did 
 not proceed to B.A. until June 19. 1611, the year after 
 their father's vice-chauccUorship. Cf. Wood's Fasti, i. 
 342 (ed. by Bliss). 
 
JOHN KING, D.D. IX 
 
 others of lesser uote, there was William Seymour, afterwards Duke of Somerset. lu 1G08, there 
 were William Stonard, the co-equal of Tomkins ; Richard Gove, whose precious little books 
 remain as a 'garden of nuts,' yea, of 'spices;' Gilbert Ironside, Edward Bagshaw, Isaac Colfe, 
 Samuel Smith, William Greenhill, Richard Eedes, Accepted Frewcn, John Ball, John Ley, 
 Sebastian Benefield, Christopher Sutton, John Williams, afterwards archbishop and lord chan- 
 cellor, John Squire, and John Preston— each a name of renown. In 1609, there were Edward 
 Littleton, Brian Dupjia, Christopher Wren, John Hales, Thomas Sutton, Thomas Goodwin, 
 Robert Bolton, William Gouge, and one of the greatest of earlier Scotchmen, William Forbes, 
 afterwards Principal of Marischall College, Aberdeen — each again severally noted. In 1610 — 
 Richard Bancroft, aixhbishop of Canterbury, chancellor — on the letters authorising re-election 
 being read, ' 'twas ordered that tlie heads of colleges and halls should at all times be ready and 
 diligent to assist the vice-chancellor in his government of the university, esi)ccially in matters of 
 religion, for the suppressing of popery and faction.'* It is suggestive that Laud proceeded D.D. 
 in 1G08. The last year of King's vice-chancellorship furnishes Richard Deering, Christopher 
 Potter, Nathanael Carpenter, William Strode, Humphrey Sydenham, Jasper Fisher, Edward 
 Chaloner, George Hakewill, Tliomas Jackson, Henry Mason, and a noble trio, John Donne, 
 Ralph Cudwortli, and John Norton.'t It was no light honour to preside over the university, and 
 to win, as tlie vice-chancellor did, universal regard, with such a 'cloud ' aboi't him of young, 
 eager, inquisitive minds, in the fresh enthusiasm of their first studies. To have thus touched so 
 many and various intellects in their young spring-time, to have given direction, under finest 
 opportunitie.s, to the whole after-voyage of lives so influential in the world, is what has been 
 given to few ; but John King was equal to the demand. He is never mentioned sub.sequently 
 by his ' students ' without an epithet of reverence or of love. 
 
 Consecrated ' Bishop of Loudon ' on September 8. 1611, our Worthy threw his whole energies 
 into his duties. ' When he was advanced,' says Fuller, ' to the sec of London, he endeavoured 
 to let the world know that that place did not cause him to forget his oi3fice in the pulpit, shew- 
 ing by his example that a bishop might govern and pi'each too. In which office he was so 
 frequent, that unless hindered by want of health, he omitted no Sunday whereon he did not 
 visit some pulpit in or near London.' J More fully, and with characteristic quaintncs.s, his son 
 Henry thus j^uts it, in repelling the popish slanders of his conversion to them, of which more 
 anon: 'Sir, I hope,' says he, 'with modesty I may use Saint Hierora's words, Advcrsus oh- 
 trectatorum libidinem pugnat oneriti magnitudo: he had deserved better rank in your estima- 
 tions than so [to need clearance of papist ' deftimation ']. For did he so long run his course 
 through this church's zodiac, and as a true Diocesan visit each pulpit within your city (some of 
 them oftener) and not only taught within it, but -/.at)' 'iXrig rng Tiii^jjoov (Luke iv. 14) in all the 
 adjoining villages where he lived . . . never allowing his numerous affairs so much as a Sabbath 
 or Sunday's rest, whilst he was able ? So, by his unwearied industry telling the world that 
 they which for gain or ease, or for ambition, aimed at bishopricks, mistook that weighty calling ; 
 since that (as Theophylact speaks) Minhtcriv/in riffert, non facit domimnn ; when Christ made 
 his apostles bishops and superintendents of his Church he appointed them not so much to lord 
 the flock as to feed it. Did he all this, and with that zealous care, that as a torch he con- 
 sumed himself to light others ? and when himself should fail, provided, so far as in him lay, 
 for a succession in his blood to set hand to the same plough, having dedicated (in his de.sire) all 
 his sons (in act two) to the ministry of this Church, and by no means willing to hear of 
 
 * Wood's Fasti, as before, i. p. 337. 
 
 t These names are selected from the Fasti, compared with their respective Memoirs. 
 
 t Wood, A. 0. ii. 295. 
 
JOHN KING, D.D. 
 
 any other course (though otherwise invited by generous offers for some of them in particular) to 
 be undertaken by them save that function alone? And can it be conceived he should, after all 
 this, turn a shifter of his religion ?' * Of his ' preaching,' Dr William Hull observes : ' Deun 
 bone, quam cunora vox, vultua coiniiositus, verba seleda, yrandcs sentcnticc J AUiclniur ovmes 
 lepore verborum, susjyendimur gravitate sententiarum , orationis impetu et viribus jlectimur! \ 
 Of his eloquence, Sir Edward Coke — no mean judge — has left this testimony, that ' he was the 
 best speaker in Star-Chamber in his time.' X In everything he was in earnest : yet was his 
 the fervour of a noble soul flaming with zeal, not fierce with passion. There are no dark entries 
 in the Records of the Protestant Inquisition-Chamber in association with his name, no ensnaring 
 questioning, no audacious oppression, no unholy scorn. His consuming earnestness is the more 
 remarkable, in that for many years he was a martyr to an excruciating disease, to which his son 
 refers in the celebrated defensive ' Sermon ' already mentioned. ' From the first beginning of 
 his sickness,' he says, ' he was indued with such a Spartana 2>atle)iiia, well-knit patience, 
 that some of his reverend brethren coming purposely to comfort him, jirofessed they found 
 more comfort from him than they could bring : and though he might truly say with David " J 
 am weaiy of my groanings," and "every night wash I my bed with tears," yet never did any 
 impatient murmur (it was a religious boast in the Lord uttered by himself) break from his lips 
 against that higli hand which had so long humbled him : neither did that petra, rock -stony 
 disease grow so fast within him but his Christian resolution hai'deued as fast, and his faith built 
 as firmly on the true Rock of his salvation Christ Jesus.' § The same Sermon gives a pathetic 
 and tender narrative of his last illness and death ; nor is there more to delay us from ' the end.' 
 Having partaken of ' the Communion,' eating with grateful devoutness ' the sacred bread,' and 
 drinking of the memorial 'cup of salvation,' he 'gave thanks to God that be had lived to finish 
 that blessed work (it was his own speech), and after a short prayer, conceived by himself, he 
 dismissed the company.' Then the narrative continues, 'Such was his devout preparation, and 
 so long did he observe the tedious vigils before the festival of his dismission ; his day of rest was 
 now come, which, as if reserved by God's favour, was that very day liis Saviour died on. Good 
 Friday: and that time of the day when our whole Church was exercised in prayer, according 
 to the custom of that day (near eleven of the clock in the forenoon), as if he had stayed to 
 take the help and advantage of good men's devotion to set him forward : a day which might in- 
 cite prophets and patriarchs to desire to end in, being truly dies mcus (as Christ said), " My 
 Day " : a good and blessed day, and of all others most proper to crown and dignify the end of 
 good men. Drawing now fast to his end, and ready to hoist sail for another world, he requests 
 the valediction of our prayers at the parting. Our obedience forthwith actuated his will, straight 
 was his bed iucompassed with mournful clients ready to offer uj) a religious violence to heaven 
 for his sake. But he expressly causeth his chaplain, and his ghostly father, to read the con- 
 fession and absolution according to the ordinary form of Common Prayer in our Liturgy. 
 Which ended, and our prayers having taken a short truce as awaiting somewhat now from him, 
 he bids the curtains to be quite thrown open, and whilst we kneeled, not unmind.ul of his 
 Episcopal office, to show he was not so exhausted but he had yet one blessing in store, he 
 distributes a benediction round about to every one of us there present ; so that his bed was now 
 
 * A Sermon preached at Pavl's Crosse the 25. of No- 
 vcnihcr l(i21. Upon occasion of that false and scandalous 
 Rciioit (lately printed) touching tlie supposed apostasic of 
 the right Kcucrend Father in God, lohn King, late Lord 
 Bishop of London. liy Henry King, his eldest Sonne. 
 Wliereunto is anne.ted the Kxaniination and Answere of 
 Thomas I'reston, J. P., taken before uiy Lords Grace of 
 
 Canterbury, touching this Scandalo. Published by autho- 
 rity. At London, Imprinted by Felix Kyngstou for Wil- 
 liam Ilarret, 1C21, 4 to, jip. C2, G3. 
 
 ■\f F.pistle Hcdicatoryof liis 'llarbourIes3Guest,'lC14,4to. 
 
 t Fuller, Cluircli U'istcry, b. x. p. 9L 
 
 § Sermon, as before, pp. CC, 67. Cf. also Godwin de 
 rra<3 , p. I'M. 
 
JOHN KING, D.D. 
 
 XI 
 
 like the Mount Gerizzim, from each corner whereof a blessing resounded. His speech here felt 
 a stop ; but neither our prayers nor his understanding ; for testimony whereof, desired by his 
 chaplain to make some sign his heart went along with us, and took the same course our 
 prayers pointed out ; with a most speedy hasted elevation of hands he expressed that his heart, 
 like Elias before the chariot, yet kept pace with us, though his tongue could not : and though 
 he wanted organs to ejacidate his prayers, the ejaculation of his eyes darted up to heaven, and 
 supplied that want. There they got fixed, as if either he had with Stephen belield the heavens 
 opening for his admittance, or meant to make that place whither his soul now bended, or else 
 that his body was emulous to have gone along with it. For we might perceive that like the 
 two disciples that ran to the sepulchre, they both ran to seek Christ ; but that other disciple 
 outran Peter : ccJiima antecessit corporis moram, the soul too swift for the body left it be- 
 hind.' * And so 'he died' on March 30. 1621, aged 62-63, asking 'to be buried in the 
 Cathedral Church of St Paul without any pomp or solemnities,' and that the one word 
 ' Resurgam' might be in.scribed upon his ' tomb-stone.' f 
 
 Those familiar with the history of the period need not to be informed, that immediately after 
 the death of our saintly Bishop it was reported by the papists that he had sent for a Romish 
 priest during his illness, and had died in communion with the Church of Rome. It were to 
 disobey the Divine charge not ' to take up an evil report,' to revive the old mendacious slander. 
 We place below the authorities bearing upon the matter, J and dismiss it with two quotations from 
 the already cited ' Sermon.' Having in a manly and yet becomingly softened way, and with 
 superabundant disproof, repelled the malicious wrong, the son gathers up all thus : ' What can 
 I say ? What proportion will words hold against peremptory assertions ? I have nothing to 
 convince them but a plain unglossed denial, Pctilianus dicit, ego nego. They say it is so, I 
 I:no^u it is not ; and in a just case it is rhetoric enough.' Then, after many details in refutation, 
 he observes : ' Let no man doubt or waver or tliink the worse of religion for that so noted a 
 professor is traduced. These are stale tricks with our adversaries, since it hath been long their 
 practice, like the lunatic in Athenaus, ever wont to stand upon the quay of the city, if any 
 fair .ship of rich burthen (any noted 'Sxiuoc, UXoyij; (Acts ix. 1.5) vessel fraught with know- 
 ledge and true profe.ssor of the gospel) had made to the haven to crie " It is theirs, it is theirs." 
 Again, Let no man be confirmed that this scandal is true because they so peremptorily believe 
 it. Such is their impious credulity that it is grown a maxim among them to believe any thing 
 were it never so false, were it contradiction, so it made any way for them : For those very 
 tongues which out of malice gave out in time of his sickness, that through impatience he had 
 offered violence to himself; those very same, after his death, out of the al)undance of their 
 Romish charity, would persuade the world he died reconciled unto their Synagogue, for I may 
 
 * As before, pp. 68-71. 
 t Uid. p. 72. 
 
 5 Those wishing to get at the whole facts must consult 
 authorities/>ro and con. Asserting the charge are these : — 
 
 1. ' English Protestant's Plea and Petition for English 
 
 Priesis and Papists.' 1621. 
 
 2. ' The Bishop of London His Legacy. Or Certaina 
 
 Motives of Dr King, late Bishop of London, for his 
 change of Religion and dying in the Catholike and 
 Koman Church, with a Conclusion to his Brethren,' 
 &c. (1621, 4to), written by (iregory Fisher, alias 
 Musket, a Jesuit : and of which there were at least 
 three impressions. 
 
 3. ' Tlie Church History of England,' commonly called 
 
 Dodd's, sub nomine. Letters of Broughton to Kellison 
 are herein given. Then contra, 
 
 4. Bishop Henry King's ' Sermon,' quoted in our Memoir 
 
 above. 
 
 5. The Bishop's own 'Sermons:' (1.) Of Public Thanks- 
 
 giving. Pr. Apr. 11. 1019, p. 38 ; (2.) Proaclied before 
 the King on behalf of St Paul's Church, March 26. 
 1620, pp. 14, 15, &c. 
 
 6. On the ' Sermons' specified in 5, see Chamberlain's 
 
 Letter in Nichol's Progress of James 1., iii. 533-34, 
 and iii. 602. Dugdalo's St Paul. p. 102, ed. by Ellis. 
 
 7. Gee's 'Foot out of the Snare,' 1624. 
 
 8. Hannah as before, pp. xvi-xxii, and relative notes and 
 
 footnotes. 
 
Xll JOHN KING, D.D. 
 
 not call it Church, unless it be Ecclesia malignantium, Ecclesia maledicentiujn. Nor let 
 this lie prove more authentic because printed: that rather discredits and weakens it, and 
 you have now more cause to suspect it than before. It is a ground in their Religion that " un- 
 written traditions have more authority than written Scriptures." And if so, why should not we 
 take them at their word and make as slight and scornful reckoning of their wi'itings as they 
 of God's ? Lastly, that none may wonder or be perplexed, or through a nice misprision suspect 
 there could not but be some ground for their far-blown calumny, let him " Remember the 
 word that Christ said," and what He suffered, and then all wonder will end in satisfaction. For 
 who caa think it strange that Christ's .servants are slandered when lie their Lord and Master 
 could not avoid the poisoned breath of slander?'* More than enough of this impudent libel. 
 It speedily vanished into ' thin air.' The Bishop was cherished lovingly for many years in the 
 nation's memory : and as his sons grew into a fame that over-shadowed his own. Churchmen and 
 Puritan alike deemed it highest praise to designate them ' worthy of such a father.' ' AA^hat 
 man,' adds Gauden, ' had more of the majesty of goodness and beauty of holiness than Bishop 
 John King?'! Associated in life with Donoe and Isaac Walton, he shares that mellowed 
 light of love which must ever illumine their names. J 
 
 ALEXANDER B. GROSART. 
 Kinross. 
 
 * Sermon as before, pp. 74, 75. I J Cf. Hannah, as before, pp. xxv, sxvi-xxxii. 
 
 t Ecd. Angl. Susp., pp. G13, 615 (1659). | 
 
, TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE 
 
 SIR THOMAS EGERTON, KNIGHT, 
 
 LORD KEEPER OF THE GREAT SEAL, 
 
 My very singular good Lord, such honour and happiness in this world as may undoubtedly be 
 accompanied with the happiness and honour of Saints in the world to come ! 
 
 RIGHT Honourable, in this prodigal and intem- 
 perate age of the world, wherein every man 
 writeth more than need is, and chooseth such patron- 
 age to his wiitings as his heart fancieth, if I have 
 taken the hke hberty to myself, both of setting my 
 labom's openly in the eyes of men, and your honour's 
 eyes espociallj- over my labours, I hojje, because it is 
 not my private fault, your Lordship will either forget 
 to espy or not narrowly examine it. The number 
 of books written in these daj's without number, I say 
 not more than the world can hold (for it even emptieth 
 itself of reason and moderation to give place to this 
 bookish folh', and serveth under the vanity thereof), 
 but more than well use, the titles whereof but to have 
 read or seen, were the sufficient labour of our un- 
 sufficient lives,* did eamestl}' treiit with me to give 
 some rest to the reader, and not to divide him into 
 more choice of books, the plenty whereof hath akeady 
 rather hurt than furthered him, and kept him barer of 
 knowledge. t For ' much reading is but a weariness to 
 the flesh, and there is no end of making ' or perusing 
 ' many books,' Eccl. sii. 12. For mine own part, I could 
 have been well content not to have added more ful- 
 ness to the sea, nor to have trained the credulous 
 reader along with the hope of a new seeming book, 
 which in name, and edition, and fashion, because the 
 file hath a little otherwise been drawn over it, may so 
 be, but touching the substance, that of the preacher, 
 Eccles. i., was long since true, and together with the 
 gi'owth of the world receivcth daily more strength, 
 ' That that is, hath been, and there is no new thing 
 under the sim.' But as we all ^Tite, J learned and 
 unlearaed, crow-poets and pie-poetesses, though but 
 our own follies and ignorances, and to purchase the 
 credit of ^witers, some as mad as the sea, foam out 
 their own shame and imcurable reproach, whose un- 
 honcst treatises, fitter for the fu-e than the books of 
 Protagoras, presses are daily oppressed with, the 
 
 * Vix tota vita indices. — Senec. 
 
 t Oneiat discentem turLa, nou instruit. 
 
 X Scribimus iudocti doctique. — Fen. 
 
 Li. 
 
 world burdened, and the patience of modest and re- 
 ligious cars implacably offended ; so the ambitious 
 curiosity of readers for their parts calling forth books, as 
 the hardness of the Jewish hearts occasioned the libel 
 of divorce, and a kind of Athenian humour. Acts xvii., 
 both in learned and unlearned, of hearkening after the 
 mart, and asking of the stationers ' what new things '? ' 
 thereby threatening as it were continually to give over 
 reading, if there want variety to feed and draw them on, 
 made me the more willing to go with the stream of the 
 time, and to set them some later task, wherein, if their 
 pleasm-e be, their idler hours may be occupied. 
 
 My end and puqjose therein, if charity interpret for 
 me, will be found nothing less than vain* ostentation. 
 Because I have spoken at times, and may hereafter 
 again, if God give leave and grace, the meditations of 
 my heart to as many and as chosen ears almost as 
 these books can distract them unto ; and these which 
 I now pubhsh were public enough before, if the best 
 day of the seven, frequent concourse of people, and 
 the most intelligent auditory of the place wherein I 
 then lived, may gain them that credit. So as this 
 further promulgation of^them is not much more than 
 (as the gentiles besought Paul in the Acts, chap, siii.), 
 ' the preaching of the same words another Sabbath- 
 day,' and some testimony of my desire (if the will of 
 God so be) to do a double good -nith my single and 
 simple labours, in that ' it gi-ieveth me not to write 
 and repeat the same things.' And to adjoin one 
 reason more, I shall never be unwilling to profess, 
 that I even owed the everlasting fi'uit of these un- 
 worthy travails to my former auditors, who, when I 
 first sowed this seed amongst them, did the oflice of 
 good and thankful ground, and received it with much 
 gladness. To whom since I went aside for a time far 
 from the native place both of my birth and breed, as 
 Jonah went to Nineveh to preach the preachings of 
 the Lord, or into the belly of the fish out of his pro- 
 per and natural element to make his song, so I to 
 deliver these ordinaiy and weekly exorcises amongst 
 * Tliat :'8 'an. -hiig ratlitT than.'— Ed. 
 
 A 
 
EPISTLE DEDICATORV. 
 
 them, the providence of God not snfl'ering me to 
 fasten the cords of mine often removed tabernacle in 
 those northward parts, but sending me home again ; 
 let it receive favourable interpretation with all sorts 
 of men, that I send them back that labour which 
 they paid for, and therein the presence of my spirit, 
 pledge of mine heart, and an epistle of that deserved 
 love and affection which I justly bear them. I trust 
 no man shall take hurt hereby, either nearer or 
 farther off, except myself, who have changed my 
 tongue into a pen, and whereas I spake before with 
 gesture and countenance of a living man, have now 
 buried myself in a dead letter of less effectual per- 
 suasion.* But of myself nothing on either part. I 
 have taken the counsel of the wise, neither to praise 
 nor dispraise mine own doings. The one, he saith, 
 is vanity, the other folly, f Thousands will be 
 ready enough to ease me of that pains, the uncer- 
 tainty of whose judgment I have now put my poor 
 estimation upon, either to stand or fall before them. 
 Howbeit I wiU not spare to acknowledge that I have 
 done little herein without good guides. And, as 
 Justus Lipsius spake of his politic centons, in one 
 sense all may be mine, in another not much rore 
 than nothing. J For if ever I liked the waters of other 
 men's wells, I di-ank of them deeply, and what I added 
 of mine own, either of teaching or exhortation, I com- 
 mend it to the good acceptance of the world, with 
 none other condition than the emperor commended 
 his sons, si promerchiiiiter, if it shall deserve it. 
 
 Now the reasons which moved me to offer these my 
 fii'st fruits unto your good Lordship may soon be pre- 
 sumed, though I name them not. 1. For when ' the 
 eye that seeth you blesseth you,' and all tongues give 
 witness to your righteous dealing, should mine be 
 silent ? Yea, blessed be the God of heaven, that 
 hath placed you upon the seat of justice to displace 
 falsehood and wrong. 2. The vine of our English 
 Church spreadcth her branches with more cheerful- 
 ness, through the care which your honour hath over 
 her. You give her milk without silver, and bread with- 
 out money, which not many other patrons do. 3. In 
 this unprofitable generation of ours, wherein learn- 
 ing is praised, and goeth naked, men wondering at 
 Bcholcira, III pucri Junonis aveni,^, and scholars wondering 
 more at men that they do so Kttle for them, leiirning 
 never dcparteth ashamed and discontented from your 
 face. 4. I add with most zealous and thankful com- 
 memoration, in behalf of my mother and all the 
 children at her knees, your love to our university ; 
 of whose age and nativity, which others have been 
 careful to set down, I dispute not. But whether she 
 
 i'Solot accoptior ease eornio vivug quuin ."scriiitus. — Ber- 
 nard. A morlua pello ad lioiniiiem vivum rcciirrc. — Gret/or. 
 
 t li-audaro so, vani ; vituperaro, stulti— w^mioZ. apud Valcr. 
 Max. lib. vii. cap. ii. 
 
 X Nihil egi sine Thcsois, ct nihil nostrum et omnia. 
 
 § Juvenal. 
 
 be the elder sister, it seemeth by that neglect wherein 
 she now standeth, that she hath lost the honour and 
 inheritance of her birthright ; or whether the younger, 
 your Lordship hath not many companions to join with 
 you in compassion, and say in these days, soror est 
 nobis parva, ' we have a little sister, and she hath no 
 breasts,' or rather hath not suceom- to fill out her 
 breasts, ' what shall we do for her ? ' How many 
 common respects, to let private alone awhile, have 
 natm'ally borne me to the centre and point of your 
 honour's only patronage ! 
 
 I deny not, when, at my coming from the north, it 
 fii'st came into my head to divulge these readings, 
 my purpose was to have made the chief founders and 
 procurers thereof (my two deceased Lords) the chief 
 patrons also ; that as ' the rivers run to the place from 
 whence they come,' so these tokens of my grateful 
 mind might return to the principal authors. Wherein 
 the world might justly have censured me with the 
 words of the prophet, ' What ! from the living to the 
 dead?' contrary to the use and fashion of all other 
 men ? But so I mean ; both to avoid the suspicion 
 of a fault which the world labourcth of (flattering of 
 gi'eat personages), who was, and am content that all 
 mine expectations in any respect from them or theirs 
 be laid in the same dust wherein their bones lie, and 
 to shew that ' love is stronger than death,' and that 
 the inexorable bars of the gi-ave cannot forbid a 
 man to continue that affection to the memory of the 
 dead which he carried to the living. For which cause, 
 as others provided spices and balms, and monuments 
 of stone or brass to preserve their bodies, so I intended 
 a monument of paper, and such other preservatives as 
 I could, to keep their names in life, which the violence 
 of time cannot so quickly injure as the fatal ungi-ate- 
 fulness of these latter days. 
 
 But your Lordship's most undeseiTcd and unlooked- 
 for bounty towards me hath altered that meaning. In 
 whose countenance and speech evermore, from the first 
 hour that I came into yora- honourable presence, there 
 dwelt such plentiful comforts and encouragements to 
 make me hope for better times, that I never went away 
 but with more fatness to my bones. And now the world 
 can ■nitness with me how largely yoii have opened your 
 hand, and sealed up that care, in freely bestowing upon 
 me, not Leah, but Rachel, even the daughter of your 
 strength, the best that your honour had to bestow,* I 
 say not for my semce of twice seven years, but being 
 yet to begin my first hour's attendance ; which more 
 than credible benignity, my right hand were worthy to 
 forget her cunning if she took not the first occasion to 
 wTito and report ^^•ith the best skill she hath. 
 
 Notwithstanding, I have been bold thus far, after the 
 trees shaken and the vintage gathered to your honour's 
 use, to leave, as it were, a ben-y or two in the utmost 
 boughs to my fin-mor Lords ; and by making srimo 
 little mention of their happy memories, both to testify 
 * I suppose, the Bisliopric of London. — Ed. 
 
EPISTLE DEDICATORY. 
 
 mine ancient duty towards them, and to deliver them, 
 what I might, from the night of forgetfuhiess, who were 
 the shining lamps of the north in their lifetime. Such 
 a Moses and such an Aaron, such a Joshua to lead 
 the people, and such a priest to bear the ark, such a 
 Zerubbabol, and such a Jehozadak, such a centurion in 
 Capeniaum to rule the country, and such a Jairus to 
 govern the synagogue, when the Lord shall send to- 
 gether again, I will then say he hath restored his 
 blessing amongst them. To this pm-pose I have 
 added two sermons more to these lectm'es upon Jonah, 
 the one preached at the funerals of my former lord the 
 late Archbishop of York ; the other, no way pertinent 
 to the latter, the right noble Earl of Huntingdon, 
 except because he commanded it, and it was not many 
 weeks before liis death, and the subject was so agree- 
 able to his most faithful and unstained heart. For if 
 the sound of the tongue and applause of the hands 
 may persuade for him, be never beheld the light of 
 
 heaven within this land that more honoured the hght 
 of England. Long may it sparkle and flame amongst 
 us according to his hearty wishes. Let neither dis- 
 tempered humours within quench it, nor all the waters 
 of the sea betwixt Spain and us bring rage and hos- 
 tihty enough to put it out ; but let the light of God's 
 own most blessed countenance for ever and ever shine 
 upon it. 
 
 It now remaineth that, in the humblest manner I 
 can, I wholly resign myself and the course of my life 
 to yom" honourable both protection and disposition, 
 asldng pardon for my boldness, and defence for these 
 my simple endeavours; and beseeching the God of 
 heaven and earth to multiply his richest blessings 
 upon your honour, your lady, and your children, 
 whether within or without the land. 
 
 Your Lordship's most bounden and dutiful Chap- 
 lain, 
 
 John King. 
 
KING ON JONAH. 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 Tlif uord of the Lord came nho unto Jonah the son of Amittai, siaying, Arhe, and go to Nineveh, ((■€.■■ 
 
 "Jonah I." 1, 2. 
 
 /|p(OMPARISOXS betwixt scripture and scripture are 
 'Xj both odious and dangerous. In other sorts of 
 'things, whatsoever is commendable may either be 
 matched or preferred accortling to the worth of them. 
 I will not make myself so skilful in the orders of 
 heaven, as to advance angel above angel,* but I am 
 sure ' one star difiereth from another in glory ;' and 
 God bath given the rule of the day to the sun, of the 
 night to the moon, because they diifer in beauty. The 
 ■ captains of the sons of Gad, without otfence, might 
 •bear an unequal report : ' One of the least could resist 
 an hundred, and the greatest a thousand,' 1 Chron. 
 :xii., because their prowess and acts were not equal. 
 There was no wrong done in the anthem which the 
 women sung from all the cities of Israel, ' Saul hath 
 slain his thousand, and David his ten thousand,' 1 Sam. 
 xviii. The unlike deserts of these two princes 'might 
 justly admit an unhke commendation. One Cato may 
 be -of more price thanhnndi'ed thousands of vulgar men, 
 and Plato may stand for all.f Our Saviour, in the 
 Gospel, Luke v. 39, prefeireth old wine before new ; 
 and Aristotle liketh better of the wine of Lesbos than 
 the wine of Rhodes : he aflirmeth both to be good, but 
 the Lesbian the more pleasant, alluding under that 
 parable to the successor of his school, and noting his 
 choice rather of Theophrastus, bom at Lesbos, than 
 Menedemus, at Rhodes. | But ' the whole scripture 
 is given by inspiration of God,' neither in his great 
 house of wTitten counsels is there any vessel more or 
 less in honom- than the rest are. Moses is no better 
 than Samuel ; Samuel than David ; David a king than 
 Amos an herdman j John Baptist more than a prophet, 
 
 * Quid sint, dicant qui possuut, dummodo quod dicunt 
 probare valeant. — August. Enchirid. cap. xxxviii. 
 
 t Unus Cato mihi pro centum millibus ; Pinto insttir 
 ■ omnium. 
 
 X Aul. Gell. Noct. Attic, xiii. .5. 
 
 not more than a prophet in his authority ; Peter or 
 Andrew, the first that was chosen, not better than 
 Paul, that was bom out of due time. The four beasts 
 in the Revelation, chap, iv., have eyes aUke, ' before 
 and behind ;' and the apostles' names are evenly 
 placed in the writings of the holy foundation, Rev. 
 xxi. 12. Solomon, the wisest king that ever was in 
 Jerosalem, perceived right well that wheresoever the 
 uncreated \\-isdom of God spake, it spake of ' excellent 
 things, even things seemly for princes,' Prov. viii. ; 
 David, his princely father before him, had so high a 
 conceit of these ordinances of the Most High, that 
 where he defineth anythmg, he esteemeth them, for 
 value, above great spoils, and thousands of gold and 
 silver, yea, all manner of riches ; and for sweetness, 
 above the honey, and the honeycomb, Ps. xix. ; and 
 where he leaveth to define, he breaketh off with 
 admiration : ' Wonderful are thy testimonies ;' ' I have 
 seen an end of all perfection, but thy commandment 
 is exceeding broad,' meaning thereby, not less than 
 infinite. 
 
 The Jews acknowledge the Old Testament, abhor 
 the New ; the Tiu-ks disclaim ; Julian, atheists, and 
 scorners deride ; Grecians have stumbled at both Old 
 and New ; papists enlarge the Old with apoci-yiihal 
 writings ; some of the ancient heretics renounce some 
 prophets, others added to the number of evangelists ; 
 but, as the disciples of Christ had but ' one Master,' 
 or teacher in heaven, ' and they were all brethren,' 
 Mat. xxiii. so one was the author of these holy writs 
 in heaven, and they are aU sisters and companions ; 
 and with an unpartial respect have the children of 
 Christ's family from time to time received, reverenced, 
 and embraced" the whole and entire volume of them. 
 They know that >'nc Lord was the original fountam of 
 them all, who being supremely good, wrought and 
 spake perfect goodness. One word and wisdom of 
 
^ 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 God revealed these words to the sons of men, himself 
 the subject and scope of them;* one Holy Ghost indited 
 them ; one blood of the lamb sealed and confirmed 
 the contents of them ; one measure of inspiration was 
 given to the penmen and actuaries that set them do'n'ii ; 
 one spouse and beloved of Christ, as gages of his 
 eternal love, hath received them all in keeping. Arid 
 sm-ely she hath kept them as the apple of her eye ; 
 and rather than any maim or rent should be made iu 
 their sacred body, she hath sont iheV children 'into ,■ 
 heaven maimed in their own bodies, and spoiled of 
 their dearest blood they had, thinking it a crown of 
 joy unto them, to lay down their lives in the cause of 
 truth. And therefore, as branches of the same vine 
 that bare om- predecessors, to whom by devolution 
 these sacred statutes are come, we esteem them all for 
 God's most royal and celestial testament, the oracles . 
 of his heavenly sanctuary, the only key unto us of his 
 revealed counsels, milk from his saered breasts, the 
 earnest and pledge of his favour to his church, the 
 light of our feet, joy of our hearts, breath of our 
 nofrtrils, pillar of our faith, anchor of our hope, gi-ound 
 , of oui' love, evidences and deeds of :our future-blessed- 
 ness ; pronouncing of the whole book; with, every 
 setiedule and scroll therein contained, as hef did of a 
 ■ book that Sextius wrote, but upon far- better groimds, 
 viiiit, ciijet, liber est, supni hoiiiiiion csl ; it is a book 
 of life, a book of Uvelihood, a book indeed, savouring 
 - of more than the wit of man. ■ Notwithstanding, as 
 I the parcels of this book were , pubhshed and delivered 
 by divers notaries, the instruments of God's own lips, 
 .:in divers ages, divers places, upon divers occasions, 
 iiand neither the argument nor the style, nor the end 
 and puiijose the same in them all;* some recounting 
 : things forepast ; some foreseeing things to come; 
 .some singing of mercy; some of judgment;- some 
 shallow for the lamb to wade in ; some deep enough 
 to bear and drown the ele|)hant ; some meat that must 
 ! be broken and chewed with painful exposition ;§ some 
 drink that at the fu'st sight may be supped and 
 swallowed down ; somewhat in some or other part 
 that may please all humours, as the Jews imagine of 
 their manna, that it relished not to all ahke, but to 
 I , ,every man seemed to taste accordingly as his heart 
 lusted ;] so, though they wore all wTitteu fur our 
 .learning and comfort, yet some may accord at times, 
 and lend application unto us for their matter and use, 
 ;more than others. Of all the fowls of the au', I mean 
 the prophets of the Lord, flying from heaven with the 
 wings of divine inspiration, I have chosen the clove, 
 (for so the name of Jonah importeth, and Jerome so 
 rcndcreth it to Pauliuus), to be the subject of my 
 labour and travel undertaken amoug.st you ; who, 
 under the typo of his shipwreck and escajjc, figuring 
 the passion and resurrection of the Son of God, and 
 
 * Verba innunierabilia, et unnin tanti\m vsrbUm omnia. 
 —Uuyo de area JVoe. t Seneca. 
 
 J Gregor. prolegom. in moral. § IbiJ. || llioroii. 
 
 coming from the sea of Tarshish, as that dove of 
 Noah's ark came from the waters of the flood, with an 
 olive branch in his lips in sign of peace, preacheth 
 to Nineveh, to the gentiles, to the whole world, the 
 unreserved goodness of God towai'ds repentant sinners. 
 For if you will know in brief what the argument of 
 this prophet is, it is abridged in that sentence of the 
 psalm : ' The Lord is merciful and gracious, of long- 
 sutieriug,, and .of great goodness,' Ps. cxlv. He is 
 merciful, in tlie first part of the prophecy, to the 
 mariners ; gi-acious, in the second, to Jonah ; long- 
 suffering, in the third, to the Niuevites ; and of gi'eat 
 goodness, in the fourth, in pleading the rightfulness 
 of his mercy, and yielding a reason of his fact to him 
 which had no reason to demand it. So from the four 
 chapters of Jonah, as fi-om the four winds, is sent a 
 comfortable breath and gale of most abundant mercies. 
 And as the four streams in paradise, flowing from one 
 head, .were the same wiiter iu four divisions, so the 
 fom- chapters or sections of this treatise are but quad- 
 ruple mercy, or mercy iu four parts ; and so much 
 the rather to be hearkened unto, as ah action of meroy 
 ■ is more gi-ateful unto us than the contemplation, the 
 use than the knowledge, the example than the promise ; 
 and it is sweeter to our taste, being experienced by 
 proof, than when it is but taught and discoursed. 
 You hear the .principal matter- of the prophecy ; but 
 i£ you would know besides what riches it ofl'ercth unto 
 you, it is a. spiritual library, as Cassiodore noted of 
 the psalms, of most kinds of doctrine fit for medita- 
 tion ; or as Isidore spake of the Lord's prayer and 
 the creed, the whole breadth of Scriptm-e, umnis Inti- 
 ttido seriptuninim, may hither be reduced. Here you 
 have Genesis, iu the sudden-. and uihaculous creation 
 of a gourd, Moses and the law in denimciatiou of 
 judgment, Chronicle iu the relation of an history, 
 prophecy in prefigiu-ing the resurrection of . Christ, 
 psalmody in the song that Jonah composed, and finally 
 gospel in the remission of sin mightily and etl'ectually 
 demonstrated. - 
 
 The duties of princes, pastors, people, all estates ; 
 the nature of fear, force of prayer, wages of disobedi- 
 ence, fruit of repentance, are herein comprised. And 
 as the liners of silver and gold make use not only 
 of the wedge, bnt even of the smallest foil or rays 
 that their metal casteth,* so in this little mammal 
 which I have in hand, besides the i)lenty and store of 
 the deeper matters, there is not the least jot and tittlo 
 therein, but may minister grace to attentive hciu'ers. 
 
 The substance of the chapter presently to be handled 
 and examined, speudeth itself about two persons, 
 Jonah and the mariners. In the one, opening his 
 commission, transgression, apprehension, execution ;f 
 in the other, their fear, and consctiueut behaviour, 
 
 * Non tautiim auri masaa-s tollunt, veruni et bracteolas 
 parvas. — -Chrys. liom. i., ad pop. Aniio. chap. i. 
 
 t Pra'co mittitur, missus coulonmit, c-ontomneus fugit, 
 fugiens doi-mit, &c. — Isidor. lib. de palrib. vU lestumcnt. 
 
Ver. 1, 2.] 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 ■which I leave to their order. The words ah'ead}- pro- 
 posed, otl'ur unto us these particulars to be discussed : 
 
 1. First, a warrant, charge, or commission : ' The 
 word of the Lord also came.' 
 
 2. Secondly, the person charged : ' to Jonah the son 
 of Amittai.' 
 
 3. Thirdly, the matter or contents of his commis- 
 sion : ' Ai-ise, and go to Nineveh, that great city.' 
 
 1. In the commission I refer j-ou to these few and 
 short collections. 
 
 (1.) The particle of connection, and or also : either 
 it joiueth Jonah with other prophets, or Nineveh with 
 other countries, or the business here related with other 
 aflairs incident to those times. It seemeth to begin 
 a book without beginning, and rather to continue a 
 course of some precedent deaUngs ; but soothly it 
 implieth unto us, that he who is Alpha and Omenta in 
 himself, is also first and last to his church, the author 
 and finisher of his good works ; who as he sent his 
 word to other prophets, so also to Jonah ; and as for 
 Israel, so also for Nineveh ; and as he furnished that 
 age of the world with other memorable occuiTences, 
 so with this also among the rest, that Jonah was sent 
 to Nineveh, and that thus it fell out. 
 
 (2.) The nature of the commission. It is vcrhuin, 
 a word ; that is, a purpose, decree, determination, 
 edict, advised, pronounced, ratified, and not to be 
 frustrated ; according to the sentence of the psalm, 
 ' Thy word, Lord, endureth for ever in heaven,' 
 Ps. cxix. 
 
 (3.) The author is the Lord, the ocean that filled 
 all these earthly springs, who ' sjiake by the mouth of 
 all the prophets which have been since the world be- 
 gan,' Luke i. 
 
 (4.) The dii'ection or suggestion thereof. It came ; 
 that is, it was not a phantasy or invention of Jonah, 
 but he had his motion and inspii'ation thereunto. 
 
 The first sheweth the continuance of God's gi-aces 
 in his church, how everlasting they are, and without 
 repentance, in that he sendeth line upon line unto it, 
 and prophets after prophets (for do the prophets live 
 forever? Zech. i.), and spreadeth his saving health 
 from the east to the west, and leaveth no generation 
 of man empty and bare of profitable examples. 
 
 The second sheweth the stability of his ordinances. 
 
 For with God neither doth his word disagree fi'om his 
 
 . intention, because he is truth ; nor his deed from his 
 
 word, because he is power.* Hath he spoken, and 
 
 shall he not perform it ? 
 
 The third sheweth the majesty and credit of the 
 prophecies. ' For no prophecy of old time came by 
 the will of man ; but holy men of God spake as they 
 were moved by the Holy Ghost,' 2 Peter i. 21. 
 
 The fourth declareth his ordinary and necessary 
 course in disclosing his will, which is too excellent a 
 knowledge for flesh and blood to attain unto without 
 
 * Nee verbum ab intentione, quia Veritas, nee factum k 
 verbo, quia virtus est. — Bern, homil. 4 super Missus est. 
 
 his revelation. For ' who hath known the mind of 
 the Lord, or who hath been his comisellor at any 
 time '?' Rom. xi. 34. 
 
 The commission in general is most requisite to be 
 weighed, that we may discern the priests of the sanc- 
 tuary from Jeroboam's priests, of whom we read that 
 ' whosoever would, might consecrate himself,' 2 liings 
 xiii. 33 ; lawful ambassadors from erratical and wan- 
 dering messengers, such as run when none hath sent 
 them ; stars in the right hand of Clu-ist, fixed in their 
 stations, from planets and planers of an uncertain 
 motion ; shepherds from hirehngs, and thieves that 
 steal in by the window ; prophets from intruders (for 
 even the woman Jezebel calleth herself a prophetess. 
 Rev. ii.) ; seers from seducers, enforced to confess 
 from a guilty conscience, as their forerunner some- 
 times did, of whom Zechariah maketh mention, ' I am 
 no prophet, I am an husbandman,' Zech. xiii. ; Aaron 
 from Abiram ; Simon Peter from Simon Magus ; Paul, 
 a doctor of the Gentiles, from Saul, a persecutor of 
 the Chi'istians ; Cephas from Caiaphas ; Jude from 
 Judas ; Christ from antichrist ; apostles from apos- 
 tates, backsliders, revolters, who, though they bear 
 the name of apostles, are found hars, Rev. ii. ; and 
 finally, faithful dispensers from merchandisers of the 
 word of God, and pmioiners of his mysteries. Who 
 ever intruded himself mth impunity, and without dan- 
 gerous arrogancy, into this function '? The proceed- 
 ing of God in this case is excellently set down in the 
 Epistle to the Romans, wherein, chap, x., as the 
 thi'one of Solomon was mounted unto by six stafrs, so 
 the perfection and consummation of man ariseth by 
 six degi'ees. The highest and happiest stafr is this : 
 ' He that shall call upon the name of the Lord shall 
 be saved.' ' But how shall they call upon him on 
 whom they have not believed ? or how shall they be- 
 heve on him of whom the,y have not heard '? or how 
 shall they hear without a preacher '? or how shall they 
 preach except they be sent '? ' 
 
 A singular and compendious' gradation, wherein you 
 have 1, sending; 2, preaching; 3, hearing; 4, be- 
 lieving ; .5, invocating ; 6, saving. ' For no man 
 taketh this honom- unto him, but he that is called of 
 God, as was Aaron,' Heb. v. The apostle's rule is 
 imiversal, and exempteth not the lawgiver himself. 
 For ' Chi-ist took not this honour to himself, to be 
 made the high priest, but he that said unto him. Thou 
 art my Son, this day have I begotten thee,' gave it 
 him. The fu'st question that God moveth touching 
 this ministration is, ' \\T2om shall I send, and who 
 shall go for us ? ' Isa. vi. The devil could easily espy 
 the want of commission in the sons of Sceva, when 
 they adjured him by the name of Jesus, whom Paul 
 preached ; ' Jesus I acknowledge, and Paul I know ; 
 but who are ye '? ' Acts six. Your warrant is not 
 good, youi' counterfeit charms are not strong enough 
 to remove me. There are no chains of authority, no 
 links of iron to bind the nobles and the prmces of the 
 
KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 earth, and to restrain devils, but in those tongues which 
 God hath armed from above, and enabled to his ser\icc. 
 What was the reason that IMicaiah was so confident 
 with Ahab king of Israel, 1 Kings sxii., and Zedekiah 
 the king's prophet, or rather his parasite, who taunted 
 him with contumely, and smote him on the face, that 
 3'et, notwithstanding, he neither spared the prophet 
 nor dissembled with the king his final doom ? Only 
 this, ho had his commission sealed from the Lord, 
 Zedekiah had none. What other reason made Elisha, 
 a worm of the earth (in comparison'), so plain with 
 Jehoram ? 2 Kings iii. 13, ' What have I to do with 
 fhee ? get thee to the prophets of thy father, and to 
 the prophets of thy mother,' &c. ; see his further pro- 
 testation. Had he nothing to do wi'.li the king, when 
 the king had so much to do with him ? Did he not 
 fear the wrath of the lion, who could have said to the 
 basest miuister^that ate the salt of iiu; court. Take his 
 head fi-om his shoulders, and he would have taken it '? 
 But his commission was his brazen wall to secure 
 him, and that Jehoshaphat the king of Judah witnessed, 
 saying, ver. 12, ' The word of the Lord is with him.' 
 This is the fortress and rock that Jeremiah standeth 
 upon before the priests, prophets, and people of Judah : 
 chap. xxvi. 15, 'If ye put me to death, ye shall bring 
 innocent blood upon yourselves ; for of a truth the 
 Lord hath sent me unto you to speak all these words 
 in your ears.' Yea, the princes and people upon that 
 ground made his apology : vor. IG, ' This^man is not 
 ■worthy to die, for he hath spoken unto us in the name 
 of the Lord our God.' To spare my pains in examples, 
 fearful are the woes, and not milder than wormwood, 
 and the water of gall (for under these terms I find 
 them shadowed, and but shadowed bj' the prophets), 
 ■which he denounceth in the com-se of that prophecy 
 ■against false prophets, that spake the ' visions of their 
 own hearts,' and said, ' The Lord saith thus and thus; 
 that were not sent, yet ran ; were not spoken unto, 
 yet prophesied ; that cried, I have dreamed, I have 
 dreamed,' when they were but di-eams indeed, Jcr. 
 xxiii. They are given to understand, that their sweet 
 tongues will bring them a sour recompense, and that 
 the Lord will come against them, for their lies, 
 flatteries, chaff, stealth of his word (as they are 
 tenned), and other such impieties. Their cup is 
 tempered by Ezckiel with no less bitterness, Ezck. 
 siii., for following their own spirits, playing the foxes, 
 seeing of vanity, divining of lies, building and daubing 
 up walls with uutcmpcrcd mortar. The head and 
 foot of their curso arc both full of uuhappincss. Their 
 first entertainment is a woo, rw j^mphclis ; and their 
 farewell an anathema, a cursed excommunication : 
 ' They shall not bo accounted in the assembly of my 
 people, neither shall thoy be written in the writings 
 of the house of Israel.' 
 
 To end this point ; let their commission bo well 
 scanned that come from the scniinaiies of Rome 
 and liheims, to sow seeds in this field of our.s, 
 
 whether, as Jonah had a word for Nineveh, so 
 these for England and other nations, j-ea or no ; 
 whether from the Lord (for that they pretend, as Ehud 
 did to Eglon, Judges iii.), or from Balak of Rome, 
 who hath hired them to curse the people of God ; 
 whether to cry "openly against sin, or to lay their 
 mouths in the dust, and to murmur rebellion ; whether 
 of zeal to the God of the Hebrews, or to the great 
 idol of the Romans, as they to the great Diana of the 
 Ephcsians, to continue fheir craft, as Demetrius there 
 did, and lest their state should be subverted. Acts 
 xis. ; wiietucr to come like prophets with their open 
 faces, or in disguised attii'e, ' strange apparel,' Zeph. 
 i. 8 (in regard of their profession), a rough garment 
 to deceive with, as the fiilse prophet in Zechariah, 
 chap. xiii. ; whether their sweet tongues have not the 
 venom of asps under them, and in their colourable 
 and jDlausible notes oi pence, peace, there he any peace, 
 either to the weal public, amidst theu' nefarious and 
 bloody conspiracies, or to the private conscience of 
 any man, in his reconciliation to their luu'econciled 
 church, formal and counterfeit absolution of sins, 
 hearing, or rather seeing, histrionieal masses, visiting 
 the shrines and relics of the dead, numbering of pater 
 iw.sters, invocation of saints, adoration of images, and 
 a thousand such forgeries ; whether they build up the 
 walls of God's house with the weU-tempercd mortar 
 of his written ordinances, or daub up the walls of 
 their antichristian synagogue with the untempered 
 mortar of their un^mitten traditions ; whethei- they 
 come ambassadors fi-om God, and in stead of Christ 
 seek a reconcihation between God and us, and not 
 rather to set the mark of the beast in our foreheads, 
 to make us then- proselytes, and the children of error 
 as deeply as themselves. If this be the word they 
 bring, a dispensation from a foreign power, to resist 
 the powers that God hath ordained, and instead of 
 planting faith and allegiance, to sow sedition, and not 
 to convert our country to the truth, but to subvert the 
 policy and state thereof, to poison our souls, and to 
 dig graves for our bodies against their expected day, 
 to invade the dominions, alienate the crowns, assault 
 the lives of lawful and natural princes, to blow the 
 trampet of Sheba in our laud, ' Ye have no part in 
 David, nor inheritance in the son of Jesse,' 2 Sam. 
 XX., no part in Elizabeth, nor inheritance in the 
 daughter of king Henry, every man to your tents, O 
 England ; let them reap the wages of false prophets 
 even to the death, as the law hath designed, Deut. 
 xviii. ; and let that eye want sight that pitieth them, 
 and that heart be destitute of comfort that crioth at 
 their downfall. Alas ! for those men. Their bloody 
 and peremptory practices call for greater tortui'e than 
 they usually endure, and deserve that their flesh should 
 be grated, and their bones rent asunder with saws and 
 harrows of iron (as Ralibah was dealt with, 2 Sam. 
 xii.), for their traitorous and unnatural stratagems. 
 I know they ju.'?tify their cause and calling, as if 
 
Vek. 1, 2.] 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 9 
 
 innoccDcy itself came to the bar ,to plead her upright- 
 ness : and they are willing to make the world believe, 
 that they come amongst their own people and nation, 
 not only Iambs amongst wolves, but lambs of the 
 me.:liest spirit, amongst wolves of the fiercest disposi- 
 tion, whose delight is in bloodshed ; making us odious, 
 far more than Scythian cruelty, as far as our names 
 are heard of, and stretching the joints of our English 
 persecutions upon the rack of excessive speech, more 
 than ever they felt in the joints of their own bodies. 
 They remember not the meanwhile how much more 
 justly they fill the mouths of men with arguments 
 against themselves, for raising a far sorer persecution 
 than they have cause to complain of. They persecute 
 the liberty of the gospel amongst us, and labour to 
 bring it into bonds again ; they persecute our peace 
 and tranquillity, which by a prescription of many 
 years ye begin to challenge for your own ; they per- 
 secute the woman with the crown upon her_ head, 
 Rev. xii., whom they have wished and watched to 
 destroy, and long ago had they undone her life, but 
 that a cunning baud above hath ' bound it up in the 
 bundle of life,' and enclosed it in a maze of his mercies 
 past their finding out ; whom because they could not 
 reach with their hand of mischief, they have sought 
 to overtake with ' floods of waters,' floods of excom- 
 munications, floods of intestine rebellions, foreign 
 invasions, practised conspiracies, imprinted defama- 
 tory libels, that one way or other they might do her 
 barm. So long as there shall be a chronicler in the 
 world to wTite the legend of the French Jacobin, I 
 shall ever have in jealousy the coming of these emis- 
 saries and spies from their unholy fraternities into 
 princes' courts. They persecute the infant in his 
 mother's belly, and the child yet unborn, whom'they 
 seek to dispossess of their father's and grandfather's 
 ancient inheritances. How" gladly would they see an 
 universal alteration of things ! Israel cast out, and 
 the Jebusite brought in ; crying in our houses, com- 
 plaining in our streets, leading into captiNity through- 
 out all quarters, themselves as it were the hands and 
 members to this bod}-, and yet playing the fii-st un- 
 natural part, and studying to cut the throat of it. 
 Now v.-hat comparison is there betwixt quenching a 
 sparkle of wild-iii-e, here and there flying up and down 
 to burn our country, and quenching the light of 
 Israel ? betwixt the incision of a vein, now and then 
 to let out rank blood, and choldngthe breath of Israel '? 
 betwixt destroying one and one at times, and destroy- 
 ing that unity wherein the whole consisteth ? for such 
 is our persecution, and such are theu-s. 
 
 2. The person to wliom the commission was directed 
 is Jonah, the son of Amittai, wherein you have, ] , his 
 name, Jonah; 2, his parentage, the son of Amittai; 3, 
 you may add his country from the ninth verse, an 
 Hebrew ; 4, his dwelhng place, from the 2d Ivings 
 xiv. 2.5, Gath-hepher (for there was another Gath of 
 the PhilLstines) ; .'5, the time of his life and prophecy, 
 
 from the same book, under the reign of Jeroboam the 
 Second, or not far ofl'; G, the tribe whereof he was, 
 namely, a Zebulonite, for that Gath appcrtaineth to 
 the tribe of Zebulon ; you have as much of the person 
 as is necdfid to be known. The opinion of the He- 
 brews is, and some of our Christian expositors follow- 
 ing their steps aflirm, that Jonah was son to the 
 widow of Sarepta, and that he is called the son of 
 Amittai, not from a proper person, his father that 
 begat him, but fi-om an event that happened. For 
 after Elias had restored him to lii'e, 1 lungs xvii. 
 17-24, the mother brake forth into this speech, ' Now 
 I perceive that thou art the man of God, and that the 
 word of the Lord in thy mouth is true.' Therehence, 
 they say, he was named the son of Amittai, that is, 
 the son of truth, by reason of that miracle truly 
 accomphshed. Surely the word of the Lord, that 
 gave a commission to Jonah to go to Nineveh, giveth 
 no commission to us to go to such foreign and uu- 
 proper interpretations. So long as we hear it but iu 
 our own country, as the Queen of the South spake, 
 of those that are flesh and blood like ourselves, and 
 interpreters, perhaps, not so much of the counsels of 
 God as their own conjectures, we are at liberty to 
 refuse them ; where we hear it from the mouth of 
 Solomon, or Jonah, or one that is more than them 
 both, we are ready to give credit. Our bounds are 
 set which we must not pass ; we may not turn to 
 the right hand nor to the left, and neither add nor 
 diminish, nor alter anything of God's testimonies. It 
 is a zealous contention that God maketh in Jeremiah, 
 chap. xhv. 29, ' They shall know whose word shall 
 stand, mine or theu-s.' ' Who hath instructed the 
 Spirit of the Lord, or was his counsellor, or hath 
 taught him ? ' Isa si. Shall wc correct, or rather 
 corrupt, falsify, and deprave the wisdom of God iu 
 spcakiug, who is far wiser than men, who made the 
 mouth and the tongue, openeth the lips and instilleth 
 gi-ace and knowledge unto them ? Let it sufiice us, 
 that the Spirit of truth, and the very finger of God, in 
 setting down his mind, hath eased us of these fruitless 
 and godless troubles, and expressed this prophet to 
 be an Hebrew, and not a Gentile ; his dwelling-place 
 to be Gath-hepher, in the possessions of Zebulon, not 
 Sarepta, a city of Sidon, Luke iv. And as it is the 
 manner of the Scripture, where the prophets are 
 named, there to reckon withal the names of their 
 fathers, as Isaiah the son of Amos, Jeremiah of Hil- 
 kiah, Ezekiel of Buzi, &c., so there is uo likelihood 
 to the contrary but the father of Jonah is meant when 
 he is called the sou of Amittai. But it is the manner 
 of some to languish about words, and in seeking 
 deeply after nothing, to lose not only their time, travel, 
 and thanks, but then- wits also. sVich hath been the 
 sickness of the allegorists, for the most part, both of 
 the former and latter times (I except not Origen, their 
 prince and original patron), who, not contenting them- 
 selves with the literal and genuine sense of the Scrip- 
 
.N- 
 
 10 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 ture, but making some mystery of the plainest bistoiy 
 that ever was delivered, and darkening the evident 
 pm-posG of the Holy Ghost with the busy fancies of 
 their own heads, as if one should cast clouds and 
 smoke upon the sunbeams, have left the Scripture in 
 many places no more like itself than Miehal's imago 
 in the bed upon a pillow of goat's hair-, 1 Sam. six., 
 was like David. How forward have om- schoolmen 
 been in this rankness of wit ! How have they doated 
 and even died upon superfluous questions ; how have 
 they defoced the precious word of God, finer than the 
 gold of Ophir, with the dross of their own inventions, 
 setting a pearl above value in lead, and burning the 
 richest treasm'e that the world knoweth in theu' 
 affected obscm-ities ! For, not to speak of their 
 changing the style of the Holy Ghost into such bar- 
 barous and desert terms, as that if the apostles now 
 lived (as Erasmus* noteth), they must speak with 
 another spirit, and in another language, to encounter 
 them. How many knots have they made in divinity, 
 subtilties without the circle and_compass of the world, 
 and such as Chrysippus never thought upon,t to as 
 little purpose as if they had thrown dust in the air or 
 hunted theii' shadows ! They had done more service 
 to the church of God if thej' had laid then- hands (a 
 gi-eat number of them) upon their mouths, and kept 
 silence. Kupertus Gallus likeneth them to one that 
 cametb manchet at his back, and fcedeth upon flint 
 stones ; for these rejecting the bread of life, the simple 
 word of God and the power thereof, macerate and 
 star^-e themselves ^^^th frivolous sophistications. 
 
 One of then- questions, for a test, or rather, as 
 Melchior Cane ; termeth them, their monsters and 
 chimeras, is, whether an ass may drink baptism ? It 
 is noi unlike another in that kind, whether a mouse 
 may cat the body of the Lord '? More tolerable a 
 great deal were the questions which Albutius the 
 mooter proposed in a controversy : Why, if a cup fell 
 down, it brake ; if a sponge, it brake not ? Cestius 
 as scornfully censured him : To-morrow he will de- 
 claim why thrushes lly, and gourds fly not ? These 
 are the mists of God's judgment upon the heai'ts of 
 such men, who, having manna from heaven, prefer 
 acorns before it, and leave the bread in then- father's 
 house, to eat the husks of beans, and cannot be satis- 
 fied with the pure and uudefiled word of God convert- 
 ing then- souls; but being called out of darkness into 
 a marvellous light, they call themselves out of light 
 into a marvellous darkness again. What is this but 
 to feel for a wall at noonday, as Job speaketh ? chap. v. , 
 that is, when the dearest light of the gospel of Christ 
 shineth in the gi'catest brightness and perfection thereof, 
 to wrap it up in the darkness of such disputatious as 
 bring no profit. You see the occasion of my speech, 
 the indiscretion and abuse of those men, who take the 
 
 * In Morise Encomio. 
 
 t Subtilitatea plusqunni Cliysiiipr.ie et ultra-muiulana'. 
 —Id. X Loo. TUeol. xii. 5. 
 
 Scriptures, as it were, by the neck, and writhe them 
 from the aim and intention of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 3. The substance of the commission followeth, 
 ' Ai'ise, and go to Nineveh, that gi-eat city,' &c. 
 Evei-y word in the charge is weighty and important. 
 
 Arise. In eflect, the same commandment which 
 was given to Jeremiah, ' Truss up thy loins, arise, 
 and speak to them,' Jer. i. ; the same which to 
 Ezekiel, ' Son of man, stand upon thy feet,' Ezek. ii. ; 
 that is, set thyself in a readiness for a chargeable 
 seiwice, sit not in Vay chair, lie not upon thy couch, 
 say not to thy soul. Take thine ease; arise. It craveth 
 the preparation and forwai'dness not only of the body, 
 but also of the mind and spii-it of Jonah. 
 
 Go. When thou art up, keep not thy tabernacle ; 
 stand not in the market-place, nor in the gates of 
 Jerusalem, nor in the courts of the Lord's house; but 
 gird up thy reins, put thy sandals about thy feet, 
 take thy stafl' in thine hand ; thou hast a journey and 
 voyage to be undertaken. Go. 
 
 To Nineveh. Not to thine own countr}-, where thou 
 wast born and bred, and art familiarly acquainted, 
 linked with thy kindred and friends, and hast often 
 prophesied, but to a foreign nation, whose language 
 will be riddles unto thee, to the children of Asshur, the 
 rod and scourge of Israel ; Go to Nineveh. 
 
 To Nineveh, a citij, &c. No hamlet nor private vil- 
 lage, but a place of fi-equency and concourse, proud of 
 her walls and bulwarks, plentifully flowing with wealth, 
 her people multiplied as the sands of the river ; and 
 the more populous it is, the more to be feared and 
 suspected, if thy message please them not. The fii'st 
 that ever built a city was Cain, Gen. iv. ; and it is 
 noted by some divines, that his purpose therem was 
 to environ himself with human strength, the better to 
 avoid the curse of God. 
 
 A i/veut citij. Large and spacious, which had ' mul- 
 tiplied her merchants above the stars of heaven, and 
 her princes as grasshoppers, Nab. iii. ; the emperor's 
 court, the golden head of the picture, the lady of the 
 earth, the seat of the monarch, the mother city and 
 head of the whole land. 
 
 Cry. When thou art come to Nineveh, keep not 
 silence, smother not the fii-e within thy bones, make 
 not thy head a fountain of tears to weep ui secret for 
 the sins of that nation, wite not the burden in tables, 
 whisper not m their ears, neither speak in thy usual 
 and accustomed strength of speech, but cry ; lift up 
 thy voice Uko a trumpet, charm the deafest adder iu 
 Nineveh, let thy voice be heard in their streets, and 
 thy sound upon the tops of their houses. 
 
 Ai/eiinst it. Thou mightest have thought it sufficient 
 to hiive cried within the city of Nineveh ; it would have 
 drawn the wonder of the people upon thee, to have 
 seen a matter so insolent and seldom used ; but thou 
 must cry against it, even denounce my vengeance, and 
 preach tiro and brimstone upon then' heads if they re- 
 pent not. 
 
Ver. 1, 2.] 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 11 
 
 For their wickedness, &c. But the reason sLall be 
 haudled iu the proper place thereof. 
 
 For brevity's sake, I will reduce the whole unto 
 three heads. 
 
 1. The place which the prophet is sent unto. Aiise 
 andgo to Nineveh. 
 , 2. V, nat he is to do in Nineveh. Cry against it. 
 
 1-. For what cause. For their wickedness is come 
 i.p before me. 
 
 1. Arise and (JO. These two former words, difl'ering 
 somewhat iu degree, the one calling up Jonah, as it 
 were from sleep, Arise, the other sotting him forward 
 in his way, Go ; and the one haply belonging to the 
 inward, the other to the outward man ; as they im- 
 port a duhiess and security in us, without God's in- 
 stigation and furtherance : so they require a forward- 
 ness and sedulity of every servant he hath, in his 
 several calling. Our life is a warfare upon the earth, 
 saith Job, chap, vii., the condition whereof is still to 
 be exercised. Jacob the patriarch, after his long ex- 
 perience of an hundi-ed and thirty wearisome winters, 
 called it 'a pilgrimage of few and evil days,' Gen. 
 xlvii., therefore no rest to be taken in it. They that 
 account it a pastime shew that their heart is ashes, 
 and their hope more vile than the earth we walk upon. 
 We must ' awake from sleep, and stand up fi-om the 
 dead,' (for idleness is a very grave unto us), that 
 ' Christ may give us light ;' we are called into a vine- 
 yard, some one or other vocation of life, and Cluis- 
 tianity, the universal vineyard common to us all. 
 Shall we stand to see and to be seen, as in a market- 
 place, and do nothing ? Are we now to learn that the 
 penny of eternal bliss is reserved for workmen ? and 
 the difl'erence between the hiring of God and the devil 
 is, that God requireth the labour before he paycth the 
 yages ; the devil payeth the wages beforehand, that so 
 he may dull oiu' edge unto labour,* and nurse us in 
 idleness, for pains to come. When we hear the mes- 
 sengers of God return with these unwelcome tidings 
 unto him, ' We have gone through the whole world, 
 and, behold, it sitteth still, and is at rest,' Zech. i., 
 can we be ignorant what echo resounds unto it ? for 
 • when they shall say. Peace and safety, then shall 
 come upon them sudden destruction, as travail upon a 
 woman with child; and they shall not escape,' 1 'Thes. 
 V. 3. Have we not read that idleness and security 
 was one of the sins that overthrew Sodom and her 
 daughters ? that although themselves slept and snorted 
 in pleasure, yet their damnation slept not ? And 
 what else is an idle man, but a city without defence ? 
 which, when the enemy of the soul hath destroyed, he 
 saith, as that other enemy in Ezekie), ' I will go up to 
 the land that hath no walled towers ; I will go to them 
 that are at rest, and dwell in safety, which dwell 
 all without walls, and have neither bars nor gates,' 
 chap, sxxviii. 11. The fodder, the whip, and the 
 
 * Vulgo dictum, pretio ac pecuniis datis, brachia eft'racta 
 sunt. 
 
 burden belong to the ass ; meat, correction, and work 
 unto thy servant : send him to labom- that he gi-ow 
 not idle, for idleness bringeth much evil ; it is the 
 counsel of the son of Sirach, Ecclus. xxxiii ; happy 
 is that man that ordereth his servant according to that 
 counsel ; I mean, that saith unto his flesh. Arise, and 
 it ariseth ; Go, and it gooth ; as the centurion in the 
 Gospel said to his soldier. Do this, and he did it. 
 
 Augustus, the emperor, hearing that a gentleman of 
 Rome, notwithstandmg a great bm-theu of debt where- 
 with he was oppressed, slept quietly, and took his 
 ease, desired to buy the pallet that he lodged upon ; 
 his servants marvelling thereat, he gave them this 
 answer, that it seemed unto him some wonderful bed, 
 and worth the buying, whereon a man could sleep that 
 was so deeply indebted. Surely if we consider with 
 ourselves the duty and debt we owe to God and man, 
 to our country, to our family, to home-bom, to stran- 
 gers, that is, both to Israel and to Nineveh, and most 
 especially to those of the household of faith ; that as 
 it was tlie law of God before the law, that we should 
 ' eat our bread in the sweat of our face,' Gen. iii., so 
 it is the law of the gospol also, that ' he that laboureth 
 not should not eat,' 2 Thes. iii. ; that the blessed Son 
 of God ate his bread, not only in the sweat, but in the 
 blood, of his brows ; rather he ate not, but it was his 
 ' meat to do his Father's will, and to finish his work,' 
 John iv. ; that even in the state of innocency, Adam 
 was put into the garden to dress it. Gen. ii. ; that 
 albeit all labom-ers are not chosen, yet none are chosen 
 but labom-ers ; that the fig-tree was blasted by the 
 breath of God's own lips with an everlasting curse, 
 because it bare but leaves ; and the axe of heavy dis- 
 pleasure is ' laid unto the root of every tree ' that is 
 barren of good fruits, and if it be once dead in natural 
 vegetation, it shall be twice dead in spiritual maledic- 
 tion, and plucked up by the root ; it would make us 
 vow with ourselves, ' I will not sufl'er mine eyelids to 
 slumber, nor the temples of my head to take any rest,' 
 until I have finished that charge whereunto I am 
 appointed. Jacob's apologf}- to Laban may be a mu-- 
 ror to us all, not to neglect our accounts to a higher 
 master than ever Laban was : ' These twenty years 
 have I been in thy house ; I was in the day consumed 
 with heat, and with frost in the night, and the sleep 
 departed from mine eyes,' Gen. xxxi. ; so industrious 
 was Jacob to discharge the duties of his place, and 
 careful to make his reckoning straight with his master 
 upon the earth. But I speak of an heavier reckoning, 
 to an heavier lord, that wiU ask an account of every 
 idle word, much more of an idle habit ; and therefore 
 let them foresee that heat, and that fi-ost to come, those 
 restless eyes, the hire of then- fore-passed di-owsiness, 
 for days, for nights, for everlasting generations, that 
 are ever framing an excuse. It is either hot or cold 
 that I cannot work ; there is a lion in the street, or a 
 bear in the way, Prov. xsvi., that I dare not go forth ; 
 that being called to an oflice,aud having their tasks 
 
12 
 
 KING ON JO.VAIl. 
 
 [CiiAV. 
 
 laid forth unto tliem, say not with Samuul at the call 
 of the Lord, ' Hpeak, Lord, thy servant hcareth,' 1 Sam. 
 iii., hut in a stubborn and perverse vein. Speak and 
 command, Lord, and appoint my order wherein I shall 
 walk, but I neither hear thy voice, neither shall my 
 heart go after thy commandments. ' I passed by the 
 field of the slothful,' saith Solomon, Prov. xxiv., 'and 
 by the vineyard of the man destitute of miderstanding, 
 and lo, it was all gi-own over with thorns, and nettles 
 had covered the face thereof.' Peruse the rest of that 
 scripture. The wise king behekl, and considered it 
 well, and received instruction by it, that a little sleep 
 brought a great deal of poverty, and a little slumber 
 a great deal of necessit.y. And surely as the field of 
 the slothful is covered with nettles and thorns, so shaU 
 bis body be overgrown with infirmities, his mind with 
 vices, his conscience shall want a good testimony to 
 itself, and his soul shall be empty of that hope here- 
 after which might have rejoiced it. I cud this point. 
 Jonah his Arise and go to XiiicveJi giveth a warning 
 to us all, for we have all a Nineveh to go unto. 
 Magistrates, arise and go to the gate, to execute God's 
 judgments. Ministers, arise and go to the gospel, to 
 do the works of evangelists. People, arise and go to 
 your trades, to eat the labours of yom- hands ; eye, 
 to thy seeing ; foot, to thy walking ; Peter, to thy nets ; 
 Paul, to thy tents; merchant, to thy shipping; smith, 
 to thy anvil ; potter, to thy wheel ; women, to your 
 •wherns and spindles ; let not your candle go out, that 
 jour works may praise you in the gates. Yoni- voca- 
 tions of life are God's sanctions, be ordained them to 
 mankind, he blcsseth them presently' at bis audit, he 
 will cro\Mi them, if, when he calleth for an account 
 of your fore-passed stewardships, you be able to say, 
 in the uprightness of your soul, ' I have run my race ;' 
 and as the master of the house assigned mc, so by his 
 «raee and assistance, I have fulfilled my office. 
 
 But why to Nineveh '? Nineveh of the Gentiles, 
 nncircumcised Nineveh ; Nineveh of the Assyrians, 
 imperious, insolent, intolerable Nineveh ; Nineveh 
 swollen with pride, and her eyes standing out of her 
 head with fatness ; * Nineveh settled upon her lees 
 not less than a tliousand three hundred years ; Nineveh 
 infamous for idolatry with Nisroch, her abomination, 
 2 Kings xix. ; Nineveh with idleness so unnaturally 
 ctfcminated, and her joints dissolved under Sardana- 
 palus, as some |- conceive, their thirtj'-cighth monarch, 
 who sat and span amongst women ; that as it was the 
 wonder and by-word of the earth, so the heavens above 
 could not but abhor it. 
 
 Four reasons are alleged, why Jonah was sent to 
 Nineveh : first, God will not smite a city or town 
 without warning, according to the nde of his own law, 
 that no city bo destroyed before peace hath been 
 ofl'crcd unto it, Deut. xx. The woman of Abel in her 
 wisdom objected this law unto Joab, when he had cast 
 up a mount against Abel, where she dwelt : ' They 
 •■' Ou alter in Jon. f Ar. i'ont. 
 
 spake in old time, and said, They should ask of Abel ; 
 and thus have they continued,' 2 Sam. xx. 18 ; that 
 is, first, they should call a parley and open their griefs, 
 before they used hostility against it. The sword of 
 the Lord assuredly is ever c&awn and burnished, his 
 bow bent, his arrows prepared, bis instruments of 
 death made ready, his cup mingled ; yet he seldom 
 poui'eth do^Ti his plagues, but there is a shower of 
 mercy before them, to make his people take heed. 
 I'n.v domui hide, peace be unto this house, Luke x. 5, 
 was sounded to everj' door where the apostles entered ; 
 but if that house were not worthy of peace and bene- 
 diction, it returned back unto them. Virtues were 
 wrought in Chorazin and Bethsaida, before the woe 
 took hold upon them. Noah was sent to the old 
 world. Lot to Sodom, Moses and Aaron to the Egyp- 
 tians, prophets from time to time to the children of 
 Israel, John Baptist, and Christ and the apostles, 
 together with signs in the host of heaven, tokens in 
 the elements, to Jerusalem, before it was destroyed. 
 Chrysostom, upon the first to Timoth}',* giveth the 
 reason hereof, that God, by threatening plagues, 
 sheweth us how to avoid plagues, and feareth us with 
 hell beforehand, that we may learn to eschew it. 
 And it was his usual speech (as he there confesseth) 
 that the commination of hell fire doth no less com- 
 mend the providence of God towards man, than the 
 promise of bis kingdom ; the terror of the one, and 
 sweetness of the other, working together, like oil and 
 wine, to make man wise to his salvation. Nineveh 
 had not stood a longer time, if Jonah had not said 
 before, ' Nineveh shall be overthrox^Ti,' the message 
 of their overthrow, overthrew the message ; the pro- 
 phecy fell, and the city fell not, because her fall was 
 prophesied. O new and admirable thing ! saith he in 
 a| homily to the people of Antioeh,f the denunciation 
 of ilcath bath brought fi)rth life, the sentence of de- 
 struction bath made a nullity in the sentence, &c. 
 It was a snare, it became their fortress ; it was their 
 gulf, it became then- tower of defence ; they heard 
 that their houses should fall, and they forsook not 
 their houses, but themselves, and their ancient wicked 
 ways. 
 
 Secondly, He sendcth him to Nineveh, to make the 
 conversion thereof, as it were, of his first-fruits, a 
 figure and tyjie of the conversion of other the Gentiles, 
 and to shew to the people afar olf (far from the seat 
 of Judca, and farther from the covenant), that the 
 days drew on, wherein they should be called by the 
 names of sons and daughters, though they were now 
 strangers. And as ten men in Nineveh took hold of 
 the skirt of one Jonah an Hebrew, and said. We will 
 go with thee, for we now liear that God is with you, 
 
 * Ilomil. 1.'). Nisi gchcnna intoiitata esset, omncs in 
 golicnnani labereimn'. Non ergo minus, qnod semper dico, 
 dei providentiam gelienna commcndat, qnam promissio 
 rcgni. 
 
 t IJomil. 5, ad I'njK Aulioch. 
 
Ver. 1, 2.] 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 10 
 o 
 
 Zecli. viii., so ten and ton millions of men, out of all 
 languages, should join themselves to the Jews in the 
 worship of that Lord whom they adored. A glimpse 
 of this overspreading light had now and then opened 
 itself in some singular persons, aliens from the com- 
 monwealth of Israel, as in Mclchisedec king of Salem, 
 Kaamau the S3Tian, Job in the land of Uz, in Thamar, 
 Rahab, and Ruth, inserted into the pedigree of Christ, 
 Mat. i., to shew, amongst other reasons, that as ho came 
 of the Gentiles, so for the Gentiles too; and that 'the 
 waters of life' (as Zechariah termeth them), chap, xiv., 
 ' should flow from Jerusalem ' (farther than to the 
 river of Tigris, whereon Nineveh stood), ' half of them 
 towards the east sea, and half of them towards the 
 uttermost sea,' that both ends of the earth might be 
 watered therewith. 
 
 Thirdly, He seudeth him to Nineveh, as he sent 
 Josepli into Egypt, to provide a remedy against a 
 mischief not far off ; Joseph to prepare bread for his 
 father's house, in the famine ; Jonah to prepare a 
 place lor the Lord's exiles in the captivity. This 
 carefulness of their well-doing herein appeareth unto 
 us, in a charge given to JMoab in the prophecy of 
 Isaiah: chap. xvi. 8, 4, 'Hide them that are chased 
 out ; bewray not him that is fled ; let my banished dwell 
 with thee, Moab ; be thou their covert from the face of 
 the destroyer.' The time was to come when the sons 
 of Jacob should go captives into Assyria, righteous 
 and unrighteous, clean and unclean, those whom he 
 tendered as the apple of his own eye, with their un- 
 gi'ateful and ungracious brethren ; yet such was his pro- 
 vident foresight towards his little remnant, grovv'ing as 
 thin among the rest as olive berries upon the tree after 
 the vintage, a berry here and there in the outmost 
 boughs, that though they bear their part of thraldom 
 in a strange land, yet they should meet with some of 
 mild and tractable spirits, whose hearts had been 
 mollified before by the preaching of Jonah. 
 
 Lastly, He seudeth him to Nineveh (which I rather 
 fasten upon), to provoke his people of the Jews, with 
 those that were not a people, to upbraid their con- 
 tempt, defy their frowardness, and to shew that his 
 soul loatheth, abhorreth, abominateth their incorri- 
 gible rebellions ; whom he had girt to himself, as a 
 girdle to one's reins, and married in everlasting kind- 
 ness; to whom he bad risen early, and stretched out 
 his hand all the day long, and cried upon them all, 
 ' Hearken, O Israel, and I will protest unto thee. Thou 
 shalt be my people, and I will be thy God ;' whom he 
 had chidden or not chidden, with so fatherly a spirit, 
 and such oblesting protestations, that they seem to be 
 angi-y without anger, ' As I Uve, I would not your 
 deaths ; ' ' Why will ye die, house of Israel ? wilt 
 thou not be made clean ? when shall it once be ? ' 
 Lastly, to whom he had appealed, though men of un- 
 equal judgments, yet not so fai^ from equality as to 
 condemn his ways : ' "WTieroin have I gi'ieved thee ? 
 testify against me ; ' these he giveth to understand, 
 
 that, at the preaching of one prophet, — when they had 
 precept upon precept, — a stranger among strangers, 
 a man of an unknown tongue, the whole people of 
 Nineveh, though heathenish and idolatrous, should be 
 won to repentance. ' Ai-ise, Jonah, go to Nineveh ;' 
 sanctify a people unto me, where I had no people ; 
 fetch me sous and daughters from far ; let the barren 
 bear children, and let the married be barren. I have 
 been served with the sins of Israel for a long time, I 
 am wearj' of their backsliding ; let them henceforth he 
 and rot in their iniquity, go thou to Nineveh. Many 
 the like angi-y and opprobrious comparisons hath the 
 mouth of the Lord uttered with much indignity * in 
 other places : In the eighteenth of Jeremiah, ' Ask now 
 amongst the heathen. Who hath heard such things ? 
 the vu-gin of Israel hath done very filthily ; ' strumpets 
 and brothels had done but their kind, but in the vu-gin 
 of Israel who would have thought it '? In the first of 
 Hosea, ' Go, take thee a wife of fornicatiou ; ' the 
 meaning of the type is this, I will find more faithful- 
 ness in a land inured to whoredoms, than one which 
 I tenderly loved as mine own mfe. Christ in the 
 Gospel justifieth this collection against the evil and 
 adulterous generation of that time : Mat. xii., ' The 
 men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this 
 generation, and condemn it : for they repented at the 
 preaching of Jonah ; and, behold, a greater than 
 Jonah is here.' And in the same evangehst, chap, xxi., 
 he rateth them in parables, for despising the doctrine 
 of John : ' Publicans and harlots shall go before yon 
 into the kingdom of God, for they beheved him ; and 
 ye, though ye saw it, were not moved to repentance.' 
 The argument briefly thus standeth : the people of 
 Nineveh shall condemn the people of Israel, for they 
 will repent at the preaching of one Jonah : the others 
 repent not at the preaching of many hundi-eds of 
 prophets. 
 
 It is a curse of all curses, the very bottom of the 
 vial, and dregs of the vengeance of God, when pro- 
 phets are willed to relinquish their accustomed llocks, 
 and their message is translated to foreigners and 
 strangers ; the dust of whose feet but shaken against 
 a city or town, or the lap of their garment emptied, 
 the least remembrance, 1 mean, and watchword in the 
 world, between God and his servants, that here or 
 there they have been, dehvered their errand in his 
 name, and were not accepted, shall witness (with a 
 witness) their disobedience in the day of his visitation. 
 So the disciples of Christ were willed to proclaim iu 
 every city of the earth, where they were not received, 
 even in the streets and thoroughfares thereof, Luke x., 
 ' The very dust of your city which cleaveth unto us, 
 we wipe otf against you : notwithstanding, know this, 
 that the kingdom of God was come near imto you.' 
 You see the scourge of those places from which the 
 disci[)les arc enforced to go for want of entertainment ; 
 the kingdom of God goeth with them. And if that 
 * Th\t is ' indignation.' — Ed. 
 
u 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. 1. 
 
 kingdom be once gone, their joy goeth with it ; all the 
 empires and dominions in the world subdued, all 
 sceptres and crowns heaped together, cannot bless 
 them. Paul and Barnabas, Acts xiii., observed the 
 direction of their master to the Jews at Antioch, both 
 in gesture and speech ; for they first shook ofl' the 
 dust of theii- feet against those that despised them, 
 and then went to Iconium ; but they had told them 
 before their going (which, if they had any sense, was 
 as the wounding of penknives and razors unto their 
 hearts), ' It was necessary that the word of God should 
 first have been spoken unto you,' because the law must 
 come out of Zion, and the gospel begin at Jerusalem; 
 ' but seeing you put it from you, and judge yourselves 
 unworthy everlasting life, behold, we turn to the Gen- 
 tiles.' Gospel and everlasting life, you hear, are 
 joined together. And therefore the judgment of God 
 was 'sharper against them there pronounced, than if 
 they had brought them tidings ; — Behold, the Romans 
 are" come to take away your kingdom, to fire your 
 towns, iTiinate yom- houses, ravish yom- wives and 
 daughters, to dash your infants against the stones in 
 the streets, to pull your eycs from out your heads, and 
 your bowels fi-om out your bodies. ' Behold, we 
 turn to the Gentiles,' wild, unnatural, and neglected 
 branches ; and herein behold the full measure of your 
 miseries, behold the dispersion and dissipation of your 
 persons upon the face of the earth, behold the desola- 
 tion and waste of your country, behold the detestation 
 of your names, the hissing and clapping at yourdo-mifall 
 amongst all nations. The loss of the word of God 
 hath lost you credit, liberty, peace, prosperity, salva- 
 tion, both in your own days and in the days of your 
 children's children. In the eighteenth of the Acts, 
 when the Jews at Corinth resisted and blasphemed the 
 doctrine of Paul, ' testifying unto them, that Jesus 
 was that Christ,' he shook his raiment as before, and 
 loosed his tongue with much boldness against them : 
 ' Your blood be upon your own heads, I am clean ; 
 from henceforth I will go to the Gentiles. ' As if he had 
 said, I found you the children of death, and so I leave 
 you; gi-ow in yom- filth iness and unrighteousness till 
 you have fulfilled the measure of your forefathers ; for 
 mine own part, I wash my hands in innocency, I can 
 free my soul in the sight of God, I w^as careful to 
 apply my cure to the hurts of Corinth, but you were 
 not healed. 
 
 Lastly, at Rome, in the last of the Acts, he made 
 an open proclamation to the unbelieving Jews, ' Bo it 
 known unto you that the salvation of God is sent to 
 the Gentiles," and they shall hear it.' And so be it 
 known unto us (my brethren) that the meaning of the 
 Holy Ghost in these terms of promulgation, know and 
 be it known, VivJigx-tTi, Ijuke x., Yviaarov "nsru, Acts xx., 
 was to make these dcspisers of Antioch, Corinth, and 
 Rome, examples to all posterity, especially to us, on 
 whom the ends of the world are come, and with the 
 end of the world an end of all goodness, that if we 
 
 take not warning hereby, as we plough the like dis- 
 obedience, so we shall reap the like WTetchedness. 
 
 If ever the like transgi-ession be found in this land 
 of om's (I will sooner wish it a wilderness for serpents 
 and dragons to dwell in) that as Jordan went back and 
 tm-ned his course, so the gospel go back and turn his 
 passage ; and as it was said to, a. prophet in Israel, 
 ' Arise, and go to Nineveh,' so it be said to the pro- 
 phets in England, Arise, and go into India, Turkey, or 
 Barbaiy, and there prophesy, and there eat your bread ; 
 I will then say that judgment hath both begun and 
 made an end with us, and that our ease is more des- 
 perate than if the gi-ound of this island had opened hev 
 jaws, and in one common gi-ave buried all her inhabi- 
 tants. If ever the like transgi-ession be found m this 
 city of yours (I will sooner wish it pools of water, and 
 all the stones of your building thrown down into empti- 
 ness), that as the brutish people of the Gadarenes 
 esteemed of their swine, so you of the pleasure of sin 
 for a season, more than Christ Jesus, and even hunt 
 him from your coasts, as they did ; and as it was said 
 unto a prophet in Israel, Arise, and go to Nineveh, so 
 to the prophets amongst you. Arise, and go the bor- 
 ders, where theft and revenge are hel<l for current law, 
 and all the streams of blood which Christ shod upon 
 the tree, cannot beg redemption for one injury done 
 unto them ; go, caiTy your tidings of peace to those 
 unpeaceable, uncivil, lawless, and graceless persons ; 
 then were your honom- gone. And though the gravel 
 of your river that bringeth in merchandise imto yon,* 
 were turned into pearls, and every shower of rain from 
 the clouds above were a shower of silver and gold into 
 your houses, yet then were you oast from the favour 
 of God, your sons and your daughters accursed, the 
 sin of their fathers not to be forgotten, nor the iniquity 
 of the mothers to be done away, whilst your name and 
 memory should continue. The prophets are yet in 
 Israel, long may they prophesy in Israel ; the pearl is 
 yet in our field, foreign merchants have not bought it 
 from us ; the gospel is yet amongst us, oh always may 
 it flourish, and spread like a palm-tree, amidst our 
 tabernacles ; the kingdom of God is now not far off, 
 neither in heaven above, that we need climb up, neither 
 in the earth beneath, that wo need dig low, neither 
 beyond the sea, that we need go over for it, neither in 
 those mists and obscurities, wherein fonuer ages had 
 involved it ; we have the sound thereof daily in onr 
 ears, the books in our houses and hands, the letter 
 walking through our lips, oh that wo wanted not' the 
 power of the gospel in our consciences, the life and 
 manifestation of it in o-nr lives. The Ijord make an 
 happy and an inseparable conjunction betweeni all 
 these, and grant that his law and our obedience may 
 alwavs meet together, his gospel and our fruits kiss 
 each other, his truth and our righteousness, his bless- 
 
 • This sentence is scarcely applicable to York, where the 
 Lectures were delivered, and may ha-pe been inserted on their 
 transcription, with a view to re-delivery in London'.— Ed; 
 
Ver. 2.] 
 
 LECTURE ir. 
 
 ings aucl oiu' tbankfiilness, never be found asunder ! 
 Let him say of England, even for ever and ever, as 
 sometimes he said of Zion, Ps. Ixviii., ' Here will I 
 dwell, I have chosen England for my habitation ;' let 
 him confirm that blessing of the psalm upon us, ' The 
 Lord gave the word, great was the company of the 
 preachers.' And let him make those preachers and 
 
 hearers, hearers and doers, doers and perseverers, good 
 teachers, good learners, good livers, everlasting com- 
 panions within our borders. So shall our land be 
 blessed with all both heavenly and earthly increase, 
 and God, even our own God, shall never repent that 
 he bestowed such blessing upon us. Amen. 
 
 LECTUEE II. 
 
 Arise, and ijo to Nineveh, that ijieat cilij, and cnj (iijainat it; for their iiiclvdness is come np before me. 
 
 JOXAH I. 2. 
 
 NOT to trouble you with longer repetition, we in- 
 quired in the former exercise of these three 
 points : 1, the place which Jonah was sent unto ; 2, his 
 business there ; 3, the cause. Touching the place, 
 we proposed fom- reasons why God sent him to 
 Nineveh : 1 , to keep his manner and use of for- 
 telling the plague before he inflicteth it ; 2, to set up 
 a standard of hope to the rest of the Gentiles, that 
 they also should partake the goodness of God ; 3, to 
 prevent his people ■with mercy, and to take up favour 
 in As.syria for them beforehand, against the time of 
 then- banishment; 4, to shame and confound the 
 house of Israel, with the singular repentance of a 
 strange people. 
 
 Nineveh is further beautified in my text by two 
 epithets or additions, the one describing the nature or 
 kind of the place, 'a city;' the other, the quantity 
 and ampleness thereof, ' a gi'eat city.' The inference 
 from both these must needs be this, that because it 
 was a city, and a gi-eat city, it was therefore stately 
 for wealthiness, glorious for buildings, well peopled, 
 tedious to be gone through, perilous to be threatened, 
 where the prophet was likely to find in all states 
 of men, princes, councillors, courtiers, merchants, 
 commoners, mighty contradiction. The gi'eatness of 
 Nineveh is more plentifully set do\\ii in the third of 
 this prophecy, where it is termed, ' a great and an 
 excellent citj', of three days' journey.' It had an 
 ancient testimony long before in the book of Genesis, 
 chap. X. 11 ; for thus Moses writeth, that ' Asshur 
 came from the land of Shinar, and built Nineveh and 
 Rehoboth, and Calah, and Resen betweenJNineveh and 
 Calah.' At length he singleth out Nineveh from the 
 rest, and setteth a special mark of pre-eminence upon 
 it, ' This is a great city ;' which honom-, by the judg- 
 ment of the most learned, though standing in the last 
 place, belongeth to the fij-st of the four cities, namely, 
 to Nineveh. Others* imagined, but their conjecture 
 is without ground, that the whole four cities were 
 closed up within the same walls, and made but one of 
 an unusual bigness. Somef ascribe the building of 
 Nineveh to Ninus, the son of Belus, of whom it took 
 its name, to be called either Ninus, as we read in 
 
 * Anius upon Berosns. t Eaph. Volater. 
 
 Pliny,* or, after the manner of the Hebrews, Nineveh. 
 They conceive it thus, that when Ximrod had built 
 Babylon, Ninus, disdaining his government, went into 
 the fields of Asshm-, and there erected a city after his 
 own name, between the rivers Lycus and Tybris.f 
 Others suppose that the atfinity betwixt these names, 
 deceived profane wTitcrs touching the author thereof, 
 and that it took the name Nineveh because it was 
 beautiful or pleasant. J Others hold opinion that 
 Asshur and Ninus are but one and the same person ; 
 and lastly, to conclude, the judgment of some leamed§ 
 is, that neither Asshur, nor Ninus, but Nimrod him- 
 self, was the founder of it. But by the confession of 
 all, both sacred and gentile histories, || the city was 
 very spacious, having four hundred and eighty fur- 
 longs in circuit, when Babylon had fewer almost by 
 an hundred, and as afterwards it grew in wealth and 
 magnificence, so they write, it was much enlarged. 
 Raphael Volateranus affirmeth that it was eight years 
 in building, and not by fewer at once than ten thou- 
 sand workmen. There was no city since, by the 
 estimation of Diodorus Siculus, that had like compass 
 of ground, or statehness of walls, the height whereof 
 was not less than an hundj-ed feet, the breadth suffi- 
 ciently capable to have received three carts on a row, 
 and they were fm'uished and adorned besides with one 
 thousand five hundred tm-rets. The Holy Ghost, no 
 doubt, had a double pui-pose in giving this glorious 
 title of distinction to Nineveh: the one in respect of 
 Jonah, the other of Nineveh itself. 
 
 1. In respect of Jonah, it was the meaning of 
 God to tiy and arm his prophet beforehand, with 
 commemoration of the greatest difficulties, that by 
 naming the worst at the first unto him, he might 
 prove his obedience, whether he felt himself disposed 
 to hold out, and so settle his thoughts in some sort in 
 declaring the costs of the building before he undertook 
 it, lest afterwards, when he came and found the danger 
 of the place beyond his expectation, he might complain 
 of God, as we read that Jeremiah did, chap, xx., 'I 
 am deceived, Lord, and thou hast deceived me.' 
 
 * Nafur. Hist. vi. 13. f Qu. ' Tigris' ?— Ed. 
 
 t Ar. Mont. | Jun. et Tren. 
 
 II Diodor. Sic. StraLo. Paulus de Palatio upon Jonah. 
 
16 
 
 KING ON JOXAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 Thus he dealt with Abraham his servant in the 22d of 
 Genesis, about the offering up of his son, whose faith 
 and obedience ho sounded before,* bj' aggravating in 
 his ears every circumstance of the action, that Abra- 
 ham might forecast ^\ith himseh" whether the iniii-mity 
 of his nature were able to brook it ; for it is written 
 there that ' God did prove Abraham.' The proof was 
 thus : Abraham, take (1) thy son ; (2) thine only son ; 
 (3) Isaac thy son ; (i) whom thou lovest ; take him 
 (5) thyself; take him (6) now presently ; (7) get thee 
 into tiie land of Moriah; (8) there otl'er him; offer 
 him (9) for a bumt-offering upon one of the moun- 
 tains which I shall show thee. The weight of every 
 word is enougli to bruise him in pieces, and make him 
 sink down under the burden of that charge. (1) Take 
 thy son, not thy bondman, nor beast, nor any common 
 thing, that bolongeth unto theo ; (2) thine only son, 
 the only begotten of the free woman; (3) not Ishmael, 
 but Isaac thy son, to whom thv' promises are estab- 
 lished ; (4) Isaac whom thou lovest, as tender and 
 dear unto thee as the bowels of thine o^^ti breast ; 
 (5) take him in thine own person, oven thou, the 
 father of the child, turn not over the execution to any 
 other man; (0) take him without delay, I give thee no 
 time to deliberate, nor day nor hour to confer with 
 thyself, and to comfort thy broken heart about the 
 loss of thy beloved ; (7) get thee into the land of 
 Moriah, which will ask the travel of three days, so 
 long will I hold and suspend thy soul in bitterness ; 
 (8) leave not thy son in Moriah as an orphan without 
 his father, to sojourn in a strange countiy ; offer him 
 in sacrifice, commit slaugliter upon his flesh ; (9) 
 lastly, when thou hast slain him, thou shalt bum him 
 in the fire, and consume him to ashes ; thou shalt not 
 spare thy son for my sake, neither quick nor dead. 
 
 So, likewise, when he sent Ezekiel to the rebels of 
 Israel, he gave him this provision, chap. ii. : ' Son of 
 man, I send thee to the childi'en of Israel.' \Miat 
 are they ? I will not dissemble with thee, they arc 
 ' a rebeUious nation, they and their fothers before them 
 unto this day, children hard of face and stiff-hearted : 
 Thou shalt say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God, 
 but surely they wiU not hear, neither will they cease, 
 for they are rebels, and thorns, and scorpions.' I 
 have now unfolded the conditions of thy charge ; if 
 thou fiiidest thy courage sufficient to endure the gain- 
 saying of rebels, the pricking and rending of thorns, 
 tearing the ears with contumely, and the name of thy 
 maker with blasphemous speech, the hissing and 
 stinging of pestilent scorpions, then go to the children 
 of Israel ; if not, thou art unmeet for this business. 
 As if a prophet of our days should be sent to Con- 
 stantinople, and have his instruction given him at his 
 setting forth, that it is a portly and insolent city, the 
 seat of the great Turk, the licart of the empire, a cage 
 of all uncleanuess, an enemy to the name of Christians, 
 
 * AfTectum iiiquirit, non factum exigit. — Ambros. <!e 
 P'lfnarch. 
 
 warring continually against the saints, a scorner of our 
 crucified Redeemer, a worshipper of the false prophet 
 Mahomet, with other such like cold encouragements, 
 feeling his pulses, as it were, and examining his spiiit, 
 whether it hath a power to fight with these dangers. 
 
 It was some comfort, no doubt, amongst the dis- 
 comforts to come, that our Saviom- lessoned his dis- 
 ciples before their going abroad: Mat. xii., ' Behold I 
 send you as lambs among wolves ; they will deliver 
 you up to the councils, and scourge you in their syna- 
 gogues: and you shall bo brought to the governors 
 and kings for my sake, in witness to them and to the 
 Gentiles.' In the IGth of John he plainly professeth 
 his meaning, in these kind of predictions, ' These 
 things have I said unto you that yo should not be 
 offended. They shall excommunicate you : yea, the 
 time shall come, that whosoever killcth j-ou shall think 
 that he doth God service. But these things have I 
 told you, that when the hour shall come you may re- 
 romember that I told j-ou of them.' The foreknow- 
 ledge of dangers ensumg gave invincible constancy 
 and resolution to Paul, as appeareth in his excellent 
 oration made at Miletum, Acts xx. 22, ' Behold I 
 go bound in the spu'it to Jerusalem, and know not 
 what things shall come unto me there : save that the 
 Holy Ghost witnesseth in every citj*, saying that bands 
 and afflictions stay for me.' Hereupon he composeth 
 his heart to patience, and calleth all his forces home 
 to himself to resist those afflictions : ' But I pass not. 
 at all, neither is my life dear unto me,' &c. And 
 when Agabus at Cesarea, chap, xxi., had taken the 
 girdle off Paul, and bound his o^vn hands and feet, 
 saying from the mouth of the Hoh' Ghost, ' So shall 
 the Jews at Jerusalem bind the man that o\^aieth this 
 girdle,' when his friends would have held him back 
 from going to Jerusalem, ho answered boldly, and said, 
 ' AVhat do ye, weeping and breaking mine heart ? for 
 I am ready not to be bound only, but also to die at 
 Jerusalem, for the name of the Lord Jesus.' Peter 
 persuadeth the dispersed saints, dwelling hero and 
 there, to patience in troubles, by an argument drawn 
 from the knowledge and experience thereof before had : 
 
 1 Pet. iv. 12, ' Dearly beloved,' saith ho, ' think it not 
 strange concerning the fiery ti-ial which is among j'ou 
 to prove you, as though some new thing was come unto 
 you ;' as if he had said. This fii'e is ancient and well 
 known ; you have long seen the smoke thereof, and 
 therefore the brealcing forth of the flames should not 
 so greatl}' astonish you. His own practice was not 
 inferior to his advice ; for upon that presage which 
 his master gave in the last of John, ' When thou art 
 old, thou shalt stretch forth thine hands, and another 
 shall gird thee,' &.C., he took his occasion to use more 
 diligence in his calling, knowing, as himself speaketli, 
 
 2 Pet. i., tliat ' the time was at hand, when he must 
 lay down his tabernacle, even as the Lord Jesus 
 Christ had shewed him.' 
 
 Thus much on the behalf of Jonah, that if the 
 
Vkr. 2.] 
 
 LECTURE II. 
 
 17 
 
 greatness of the city were any terror unto him, he 
 might not complain that he was taken at unawares, 
 suddenly called, and improvidently thrust forth, but 
 with alacrity of mind set his shoulder to the work, 
 and settle his confidence in the greatness of that God 
 from whom he was commanded. It is a direction to 
 us all, whatsoever our service be wherein God shall 
 employ us, whether in church or in commonwealth, 
 whether we sit upon the thrones of David for execution 
 of judgment, or in the chair of Moses for exposition 
 of the law, which are the cumbersomest charges upon 
 the earth, the vciy heat and burden of the day, if I 
 may so term them, not to remit our labours, and with 
 the sons of Ephraim, being armed and bearing bows, 
 to turn our backs in the day of battle. But though 
 we be crossed with a thousand afflictions, and have 
 just cause to cry out, as Moses in his government. 
 Num. xi. 2, ' Why hast thou vexed thy servant ? ' yet 
 persist and go forward in om- pains, addressing our 
 souls to contentment and quietness, This was I called 
 unto ; I cannot plead ignorance, neither had I reason 
 to expect less ; travail, vexation, anguish of spirit were 
 given me for my lot and my portion to drink, when I 
 first entered into these affairs. 
 
 2. Touching the place, when we hear it commended 
 for a great city, shall we infer hereupon, therefore privi- 
 leged to carelessness, haughtiness, oppression, wicked- 
 ness, which are the worms and moths, for the most 
 part, that breed of greatness ? therefore may Nineveh 
 sin with impunity, and say, I am the queen of the 
 earth, who shall control me ? therefore must sins set 
 up a monarchy also in Nineveh ? must prophets go to 
 Bethel, and prophesy in out corners, because Nineveh 
 is the king's court, and cannot bear the words of pro- 
 phets ? can the mightiness of her state, singularity of 
 her government, chming* of her walls, aspiring of her 
 towers, multitude of her people, make her secure 
 against the -m-ath of the Lord of hosts ? or can the 
 bars of her gates keep out his judgments ? Alas, what 
 is the greatness of Nineveh compared with the gi'eat- 
 ness of the Lord ? The lauds of Alcibiades, in the 
 map of the whole world, were less than a centre, and 
 small tittle, they could not be espied ; all the islands 
 of the sea are as a little dust, in the sight of the Al- 
 mighty, and the nations ' as the drop of a well-bucket,' 
 Isa. xl. What is the number and the height of thy 
 proud turrets ? Though they hold the earth in awe, 
 they cannot threaten heaven, and the closer they press 
 to the seat of God, the nearer they lie to his lightning. 
 The challenge of God to the selfsame city, is notably 
 set down in the prophecy of Nahum: chap. iii. 8, 'Art 
 thou better than No, which was full of people, that lay 
 in the rivers, and had the waters round about it, whose 
 ditch was the sea, and her wall was from the sea ? 
 Ethiopia and Eg3-pt were her strength, and there was 
 no end ; Put and Lubim were her helpers. Yet was 
 she caiTied away, and went into captivity : her young 
 * That is ' Lcifrht.'— Ed. 
 
 children were broken in pieces at the head of all the 
 streets : and they cast lots for her noble men, and all 
 her mighty men were bound in chains.' The reason 
 holdoth by equahty : the strength and puissance of 
 No was abased, and thy might shall be cast down. It 
 was afterward accomplished upon Nineveh, because 
 ' she was full of blood, full of lies and robbery, a mis- 
 tress of witchcrafts, her multitude was slain, and the 
 dead bodies were many, there was no end of her carcases, 
 and they even stumbled as they went upon her corpses.' 
 Mercurius Trismegistus sometimes spake to Asclepius 
 of Egypt* after this sort, Ai-t thou ignorant, Ascle- 
 pius, that Egypt is the image of heaven ? &c. — And 
 if we shall speak more truly, our land is the temple of 
 the whole world ; — and yet the time shall come when 
 Eg^'pt shall bo forsaken, and that land which was the 
 seat of the Godhead shall be deprived of religion, and 
 left destitute of the presence of the gods. 
 
 It is wi'itten of Tj'rus, in Isa. xxiii., that she was 
 ' rich with the seed of Nilus, that brought her abund- 
 ance ; the harvest of the river were her revenues, and 
 she was a mart of the nations,' &c. Yet the Lord 
 triumpheth and maketh disport at her overthrow : ' Is 
 this that glorious city of yours, whose antiquity is of 
 ancient days? &c., who hath decreed this against 
 Tyrus ? she that crowned men, whose merchants are 
 princes, and her chapmen the nobles of the world ? 
 The Lord of hosts hath decreed it, to stain the pride 
 of all glory, and to bring to contempt all the honour- 
 able in the earth.' ' It is fiillen, it is fallen ' (saith 
 the angel in the Kevelation, chap, xviii.), 'Babylon 
 the great city ' (having the same title of greatness that 
 Nineveh hath in this place), ' and is become the habi- 
 tation of devils, and the hole of all foul spirits, and a 
 cage of every unclean and hateful bird,' though she 
 had said in her heart, ' I sit as a queen, I am no widow, 
 and shall see no mourning.' That everlasting city of 
 Rome, urhs cterna, as Ammianus Marcellinus called 
 her, shall see the day when the eternity of her name, 
 and the immortality of her soul wherewith she is 
 quickened, I mean the supremacy of her prelates above 
 emperors and princes, shall be taken from her ; and 
 as Babylon before mentioned hath left her the inheri- 
 tance of her name, so it shall leave her the inheritance 
 of her destruction also, and she shall become as other 
 presumptuous cities, ' a dwelling for hedgehogs, an 
 habitation for owls and vultiu'es ; thorns shall grow in 
 her palaces, and nettles in her strongholds.' The 
 lamentations of Jeremiah touching the rum of Jerusa- 
 lem, sometimes ' the perfection of beauty, and the joy 
 of the whole earth,' Lam. ii., as near unto God as the 
 signet upon his right hand, yet afterwards destroyed 
 as a lodge in a garden, that is made but for one night, 
 if they can pass by the ears of any man and leave not 
 lamentation and passion behind them, I will say that 
 his heart is harder than the nether millstone. How 
 were her gates sunk to the ground, her bars broken, 
 * August, de Civi. Dei, viii. 23. 
 B 
 
18 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 the stones of her sanctuary scattered in the corners of 
 every street, her mountain of Sion so desolate, that 
 the vei"y foxes run upon it, whose strength was such 
 before, ' that the kinj^'s of the earth, and all the in- 
 habitants of the world, would never have believed that 
 the enemy should have entered into the gates of Jeru- 
 salem,' chap. iv. 
 
 I now conclude. Greatness of sins will shake the 
 foundations of the gi-eatest cities upon the earth ; if 
 theii' heads stood amongst the stars, iniquity would 
 bring them do\vu into dust and rubble. Multitude of 
 oflences will minish and consume multitudes of men, 
 that although the streets were sown with the seed of 
 man, yet they shall be so scarce that a child may tell 
 them : yea, the desolation shall be so groat, that none 
 shall remain to say to his friend, ' leave thy fatherless 
 children behind thee, and I will pi'eser\-e them alive, 
 and let thy widows trust in me,' Jer. xlix. 
 
 The days can speak, and the multitude of years can 
 teach wisdom ; ask j'oxir fathers, and they can report 
 unto _you, that grass hath grown in the streets of your 
 cities for want of passengers, and a man hath been as 
 precious as the gold of Ophir, as rare almost to be 
 foimd as if the ground of your city had been the moors 
 and wastes where no man dwelleth. One would have 
 wished a friend more than the treasures of the east, to 
 have kept him company, relieved his necessity, to have 
 taken some pains with his widow and orphans, to havo 
 closed his eyes at the time of his death, to have seen 
 him laid forth for burial, and his bones but brought 
 to the grave in peace. The arm of the Lord is not 
 shortened ; he that smote you once can smite j'ou the 
 second time ; he can visit the sons as well as the 
 fathers ; he is a God, both in the mountains and in 
 the valleys, in the former and later ages ; he is able 
 again to measure the gi'ound of your citj' with a line 
 of vanity, pull down j-our houses into the dust of the 
 earth, and turn the glory of _your dwellings into 
 ploughed fields ; only the fear of his name is your 
 safest refuge, righteousness shall be a stronger bulwark 
 unto j-ou, than if you were walled with brass ; mercy, 
 and judgment, and truth, and sobriety, and sancti- 
 mony of life shall stand with yoiu- enemies in the gate, 
 and repel the vengeance of God in the highest strength 
 thereof. 
 
 2. And so I come to the second general part, wherein 
 wc are to consider what Jonah was to do at Nineveh. 
 It is manifested in the words following, 'Cry against 
 it ;' lay not thine hand upon thy mouth, neither draw 
 in thy breath to thyself, when the cause of thy master 
 must be dealt in. Silence can never break the dead 
 sleep of Nineveh ; softness of voice cannot pierce her 
 heavy ears ; ordinary speaking hath no proportion with 
 extraordinary transgression ; speak, and speak to bo 
 heard, that when she hearcth of her fall, she may bo 
 wounded with it. It was not now convenient that Jonah 
 should go to Nineveh, as God came to Elias, 1 Kings 
 six., in a 'still and soft voice,' but rather as a 'mighty 
 
 strong wind, rending the mountains, and breaking the 
 rocks,' abasing the highest looks in Nineveh, and tear- 
 ing the hardest heart in pieces ; as an ' earthquake and 
 tire,' consuming all her dross, and making her quake 
 with the fear of the judgments of God, as the trees of 
 the forest. Jericho must be overthrown with trumpets 
 and a shout, and Nineveh will not yield but to a vehe- 
 ment outcry. A prophet must arm himself, I say not 
 with the spear, but with the zeal of Phinehas, when 
 sin is impudent and cannot blush : God cannot endure 
 dallying and trifling in weighty matters. The gentle 
 spirit of EU is not sufficient to amend children past 
 grace, and a prophet like Mitio doth but bolster a 
 sinner in his froward ways. 
 
 He chargeth his messenger otherwise in the prophecy 
 of Isaiah : chap. Iviii., ' Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy 
 voice like a trumpet, shew my people their trangi'es- 
 sions, and to the house of Jacob their sins.' Much 
 less can he abide flattery and guilefulness in his busi- 
 ness, for ' cursed be he that doth the work of the 
 Lord negligently,' Jer. xlviii., or rather, as the word 
 importeth, ' with deceit.' ' Woe unto them that sow 
 pillows under men's arm-holes,' E/,ek. xiii., when it is 
 more time to prick them up with goads, ' that sell the 
 cause of the Lord for haudfuls of barley, and pieces of 
 bread,' for favour, for fear, for lucre, or any the like 
 worldly respects ; and when the people committed un- 
 to them shall ' say unto their seers. See not, and to 
 their prophets. Prophesy not right things,' loqiiimini 
 p}aceiili(i, speak plcasings and leasings unto us, pro- 
 phesy errors,' Isa. xxx., are easilj- dra'SMa to betray the 
 will of theu' Lord, and to satisfy their humours. God 
 hath disclosed his mind in this treachery, ' Behold, 
 I will come against the prophets that steal my word 
 from their neighbours. Behold, I will come against 
 the prophets that have sweet tongues, that cause my 
 people to err by their lies and flatteries,' Jer. xxiii. 
 For then is the word of the Lord stolen and purloined 
 from our brethren, when we 'justify the wicked, and 
 give life to the souls that should not live ;' when wc 
 ' heal the hurts of Israel with sweet words,' when we 
 anoint the heads of sinners with precious balms, 
 whose heai'ts wc should rather break with sharp cor- 
 rosives ; when we put honey into the sacrifice instead 
 of salt ; when wc shoidd frame om' song of judgment, 
 and wc turn it into a song of mercy ; when we should 
 moui'u to make men lament, and wo jiipe to malie Ihem 
 dance, putting the evil day far Irom them, and hunt- 
 ing for their ])raise and acceptation of us with pleasing 
 discourses, afl'ected eloquence, histrionical jests, rather 
 than grave and divine sentences. Jerome gave another 
 exhortation to Nepotian, Laclmpiuc: aiuUtoruin, landes 
 tua sint, Let the tears of thy auditors bo thy praises. 
 And Augustine had a stranger opinion of these ap- 
 plauses and acclamations of men : These praises of 
 yonrs (saith he to his hearers) do rather ofl'end and 
 endanger me ; tolcraimis illas ct tiTmimu.i i)it<r illas ; 
 we suffer them, indeed, but we tremble when we hear 
 
Ver. 2. 
 
 LECTURE II. 
 
 19 
 
 thorn. We caunot promise 3'ou such deceitful baud- 
 liug and batteriug of the word of God, for whether _you 
 hear or hear not the prophecy that is brought unto 
 you, yet you shall know that there have been prophets 
 amongst you ; we will not sufl'er your sins to sleep 
 quietly in your bosoms, as Jonah slept in the sides of 
 the ship, but we will rouse them up ; if we see your 
 pride, your usury, your adulteries, j-our oppressions, 
 we will not only cry them, but cry against them, lest 
 they cry against us ; we will set up a banner in the 
 name of the Lord of hosts, and proclaim them in your 
 hearing ; and if our cry will not help, we will leave 
 you to that cry at midnight, when j-om' bodies that 
 sleep in the dust of the earth, and your sins that sleep 
 with your bodies, both shall be awaked, and receive 
 their meed at God's hands ; we will charm your deaf- 
 ness with the gi'eatest cunning we have. If our charm- 
 ing cannot move you, we will send you to the judg- 
 ment-seat of God with this writing upon your foreheads, 
 Noliierunt incantari, They would not be charmed. 
 
 3. The reason of his crying against Nineveh is this, 
 ' For their wickedness is come up before me.' 
 
 They that are skilful in the original, observe that the 
 name of irickediiess, here used, importeth the greatest 
 extremity that can be, and is not restrained to this or 
 that sin, one of a thousand, but is a most absolute 
 and all-sufficient term, for ' three transgressions, and 
 for four,' as it is in Amos, that is, for seven, that is, 
 for infinite corruption. Whatsoever exceedeth modesty, 
 and is most contrary to the will of God, beyond all 
 right or reason, settled into dregs, frozen like ice, 
 given over, sold to the will of Satan, is here meant ; 
 where every person in the commonwealth is degene- 
 rated : ' there is none good, no, not one,' Ps. xiv. ; and 
 eveiy part in the body and soul of man doth his part to 
 lift up the head of sin, ' the throat an open sepulchre, 
 the tongue used to deceit, the poison of asps under 
 the lips, the mouth full of cursing and bitterness, the 
 feet swift to shed blood, destruction and calamity in 
 all their ways, no knowledge of the way of peace, no 
 fear of God before theii- eyes.' And whether the word 
 hath that power, yea or no, it skilleth not much to 
 dispute ; for the words adjoined in the text make it 
 plain without further amplification. First, it is wicked- 
 ncs.i ; secondly, it asmidcth ; thirdly, into the jiresencc 
 of God himself. Whereby you may perceive, that the 
 wickedness of Nineveh was not base and shamefaced, 
 fearful to advance itself, but an high kind of wicked- 
 ness, swelling like Jordan above his banks. It lay 
 not close in the bottom of the sea, nor in the holes of 
 rocks, nor in the covert and secrecy of private cham- 
 bers ; it hath ' an whorish forehead, and could not be 
 ashamed ;' they ' declared their sins as Sodom, they 
 hid them not,' and as a fountain casteth out waters, 
 so they their malice. 
 
 (1.) The phrase here used noteth a gi-eat aggi-ava- 
 tion of the thing intended. So in the sixth of Genesis 
 it is said, that ' the earth was corrupt before the Lord;' 
 
 and in the tenth of that book, ' Nimrod was a mighty 
 hunter before the Lord ;' that is, the corruptions of the 
 world, and the violence of Nimrod, were so gross, that 
 the Lord could not choose but take knowledge of them. 
 So it is here said, ' Their wickedness is como up before 
 me.' It knoweth no end, it climbeth like the sun in 
 the morning, and passeth the bounds of all modera- 
 tion ; it is not enough that the bruit and fame thereof 
 is blown into the ears of men, but it hath filled the 
 earth, possesseth the air, lifteth itself above the stars 
 amongst the angels of God, ofl'ereth her filthiness and 
 impurity before the throne of his majesty, and if there 
 were farther to go, such is her boldness and shame- 
 lessness, she would forbear no place. 
 
 What ! are there seasons and times when the Lord 
 beholdeth sin and wickedness, and when he beholdeth 
 it not '? ' He that made the eye, doth ho not see '?' 
 doth he slumber or sleep that keepeth Israel ? or hath 
 he not torches and cresset light at all times to descry 
 the deeds of Babylon ? or is he subject to that scotf 
 which Elias gave Baal, 1 Kings xviii., ' It may be he 
 sleepeth, and must be awaked' '? or what else is the 
 meaning of that phrase, ' Their wickedness is come 
 up before me' ? As if there were some wickedness 
 which came not to his notice. Surely, besides the 
 increase and propagation of their wickedness (for there 
 is ditt'erence betwixt creeping and climbing), it noteth 
 some order in the actions of God. He saw their sins 
 in the book of eternity, before their hearts did ever 
 conceive them ; he saw them in thcii' breasts, before 
 their hands committed them ; he saw their infancy 
 and their full strength, their thirst and drunkenness, 
 their beginning and proceeding. But then he saw 
 them indeed and to pm'pose, when he saw them per- 
 fected and fulfilled ; and having winked as it were 
 before, and in patience forborne them, now beheld 
 them with fiery eyes, and his heart unremoveably bent 
 to take vengeance. ' The wild ass used to the wilder- 
 ness, snufl'eth up wind at her pleasure ; who can turn 
 her back ? they that seek after her, will not weary 
 themselves, but will find her in her month,' Jer. ii. 24. 
 God seeth and observeth at all times the untamed 
 madness of the wicked, woaiying themselves like the 
 wild ass, or the dromedary, in a race of abominations ; 
 but he will take them in their month, and turn them 
 back when their sins are ripe and his wrath thoroughly 
 incensed. 
 
 (2.) Their wickedness is come up before me. The 
 phrase doth minister a further instruction unto us. 
 Sin, in the eyes of some men, seemeth not sin. 
 Lactantius writeth of those who were not ashamed of 
 their faults, but rather sought out patronage and 
 defence for them, that at the least they might seem to 
 sin honestly, Ut hoiicstc pcccare videantur. Jeremiah 
 speaketh of the Jews in the same manner, chap. vi. : 
 ' Were they ashamed when they had committed 
 abominations ? nay, they were not ashamed, neither 
 could they have shame.' He smiteth them afterward 
 
KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap."_I. 
 
 in chap. xi. of his prophecy, with a sharper reproof, 
 that ' when they did evil, they rejoiced at it.' And it 
 is the fashion of us all, to bolster and bear out the 
 vices of our fi'ieuds, changing sour into sweet, and 
 evil into good, even for their fi-iendship's sake. Alccus 
 took a mole on the body for a gi-ace, yet was it a 
 blemish. One mule rubbeth another ; an hypocrite 
 liketh an hypocrite, because he is like unto him ; a 
 di-unkard, a drunkard ; an usurer, him that practiseth 
 the same trade ; he that transformed himself into an 
 angel of light, being a fiend of darkness, hath taught 
 an harlot to clothe herself like an honest matron, and 
 vices to disguise themselves under the habit of virtues. 
 But howsoever the eyes of men are blinded \\-ith par- 
 tiality, yet 'the eyelids of the Lord shall tiythe children 
 of men ;' his righteous and flaming countenance shall 
 soundly examine their actions, uncover the faces of 
 their iniquities, and call them rightly and truly by their 
 proper names. 
 
 (3.) But whatsoever we find else in the riches and 
 store of these words, this we may gather from the 
 nature of them, that there are some sins winged, of 
 an high elevation, ascending above the top of Carmel, 
 aspiring and pressing before the majesty of God's ovm 
 throne. The speech is but altered in other scriptures, 
 the substance and signification all one, where it is 
 said that some sins cry in the ears of God ; that which 
 is the wings or chariot unto them in this place, to 
 make them mount so high, is their cry in those others, 
 
 1 mean then- outrage and enormity. Cain's sin cried 
 itnto the Lord, Gen. iv. And in the ISth of Genesis, 
 ' Because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great,' 
 which is expounded in the next words, 'and because 
 their sin is exceeding grievous, I will now go down, 
 saith the Lord, and see whether they have done alto- 
 gether according to that cry which is come up unto 
 me.' ' Behold, the hire of the labourers which have 
 reaped the fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, 
 crieth : and the cries of them which have reaped are 
 entered into the ears of the Lord of hosts,' in the 
 epistle of James, chap. v. Answerable to that part 
 of Job his apology, which he presenteth unto his 
 judge, in the 81st of his book, ' If my land cry against 
 me, or if the furrows of my field complain, &e., let 
 thistles grow instead of wheat, and cockle instead of 
 barley.' Oppression is threatened by the like terms, 
 in the second of Ilabakkuk, 'The stone shall cry out 
 of the wall, and the beam out of the timber shall answer 
 it. Woe unto him that buildeth a town with blood, 
 and erecteth a city with iniquity !' All which sentences 
 of Scripture, expressing the loudness and vocality of 
 sin, are of the same force, as before I said, with those 
 that declare the sublimity anil reach of it. God 
 speakcth to Sennacherib in another manner of speech, 
 but the matter and purpose is not difi'erent from this, 
 
 2 Kings xix. 28, ' Because thou ragest against me, 
 and thy tumult is come np to mine ears, I will ]nit 
 my hook in thy nostrils,' &c. Lilicwise the projihet 
 
 telleth the children of Israel in the second of Chronicles, 
 chap, xxviii. 3, that because the Lord God was 
 WToth with Judah, he had delivered them into the 
 Israelites' hands, and they had slain them in a rage, 
 that reached up to heaven. By these and the like 
 conferences, a man may determine the nature, and set 
 down a catalogue in some sort of crying sins. Blood- 
 shed is a crying sin, I say not all kinds of bloodshed, for 
 the speech of God to Cain hath bloods, not blood, which 
 noteth an unsatiable appetite, wherewith he was so dry, 
 that if his brother had possessed a thousand times as 
 much blood, he would have spilt it all ; and though 
 he took away his life, yet he took not leave of his own 
 malicious thirst of blood. Blasphemy and rage against 
 God is a crying sin ; oppression, extortion, fraud 
 against poor labourers, against rightjo-miers, is a crying 
 sin ; and sin with outrageousness and impudency any 
 way, public, infamous, enormous sin, contemning the 
 judgment of God and censures of men, committed with 
 greediness, drawn with cart-ropes, gloried in, where 
 men even sell themselves to work wickedness, is a 
 crj-ing sin.* Which immoderate and proud humour 
 of viciousness is notably expressed in the sixth of 
 Genesis, where it is alleged, that ' v.hen the Lord saw 
 the wickedness of man was gi-eat upon the earth, and 
 all the imaginations of the thoughts of his heart were 
 only evil continually, then it repented the Lord that 
 he had made man, and he was sorry in his heart. 
 1, It was wickedness; 2, gi-eat ; 3, evident, for the 
 Lord saw it ; 4, their hearts were evil ; 5, every 
 thought of their heart ; G, every imagination of 
 thought ; 7, only evil ; 8, continually, or day by day, 
 there was no hope of amendment. Equal hereunto is 
 that general and imbridled corruption, which David 
 setteth dovm in the 14th Psalm, where they begin 
 with a most damnable principle of atheism, the gate 
 and highway into all iniquity, ' The fool saith in his 
 heart. There is no God ;' then is the sink or channel 
 opened to all dissolution of life, ' They are corrupted, 
 and do abominably, there is none that doth good. 
 The Lord looked down from heaven upon the children 
 of men, to see if there were anj' that would midcrstand, 
 and seek after God ; but they were all gone out of the 
 way,' &c. Wh(!n this canker of impiety hath so over- 
 spread and eaten into the manners of people, then is 
 fulfilled that which Isaiah putteth down for a sound 
 position, chap, xxvi., ' Let mercy be shewed to the 
 wicked, yet he will not learn righteousness ; in the 
 land of uprightness will he do wickedly, and will not 
 behold the majesty of the Lord.' If neither the 
 mercy nor the majesty of God, nor the company of 
 the riglitcous, can reform him, then is his bettering 
 despaired and past hope. I need no farther examine 
 this pai't. 
 
 The cause why Jonah cried against Ninevi-h, was the 
 cry of their sins. Their regions were white to harvest, 
 
 * Voluplatum monstra non species. — Q/pr, in proJor;. d 
 Cardin. ope. Christi. 
 
Veh. 3.] 
 
 LECTURE III. 
 
 21 
 
 tlieir iniquities ripe, and looked for a sicldc from heaven 
 to cut them down. The sufficiency of which cause to 
 derive the judgments of God upon us, Jeremiah 
 laj-eth down in his prophecy, chap. xxii. : ' Many 
 nations shall pass by the city (meaning of Jerusalem), 
 and shall say every man to his neighbour. Wherefore 
 hath the Lord done thus to this great city '? Then 
 shall they answer. Because they have forsaken the 
 covenant of the Lord their God,' &c. For the judg- 
 ment of the Lord, jironounccd by David, Ps. xxi., 
 shall stand longer than the stars in the firmament : 
 ' Him that loveth ini(iuity, doth his soul hate. Upon 
 the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, 
 and stormy tempests : this is the portion of their cup.' 
 And in the first Psalm, it is a singular opposition that 
 is made between the just and the wicked, Xoii sic impii, 
 noil sic, the wicked arc not so. That thou mayest 
 unmoveably believe how unmoveably God is bent to 
 deny the wicked his gi-ace, he strengtheneth the 
 negative by doubling it.* Therefore the wicked shall 
 not stand in judgment, for they are fallen before then- 
 judgment Cometh. "What ! shall they not rise again ? 
 Surely yes; but in judgment, saith Jerome, for they 
 are already judged. 
 
 The wickedness of our land, what it is, and in what 
 elevation of height, whether modest or impudent, 
 private or public, whether it spcaketh or crieth, 
 staudeth or goeth, lieth like an asp in her hole, or 
 flieth like a fierj- serpent into the presence of God, 
 yourselves be judges. Write my words in tables, that 
 they may be monuments for latter days ;'. for when 
 yom' childi-en's chikben shall hear them hereafter, 
 they will scarcely believe them. The months of the 
 year have not yet gone about, f wherein the Lord 
 hath bowed the heavens, and come down amongst us 
 ^^^th more tokens and earnests of his wrath intended, 
 than the agedest man of our land is able to recount of 
 so small a time. For say if ever the winds, since 
 they blew one against the other, have been more com- 
 mon, and more tempestuous, as if the four ends of 
 
 I Vt immobiliter crcdas, firmitatem negationis iteraudo 
 monstrat. — Cassiod. 
 
 t The year of the Lord 1503, and 1504. 
 
 heaven had conspired to turn the foundations of the 
 earth upside down ; thunders and lightnings, neither 
 seasonable for the time, and withal most terrible, with 
 such efl'ects brought forth, that the children unborn 
 shall speak of it. The anger of the clouds hath been 
 poured down upon our heads, both with abundance, 
 and (saving to those that felt it) with incredible 
 violence ; the air threatened our miseries with a 
 blazing star ; the pillars of the earth tottered in many 
 whole countries and tracts of our island ; the arrows of 
 a woeful pestilence have been cast abroad at large in 
 all the quarters of our realm, even to the emptying 
 and dispeopling of some parts thereof; treasons 
 against om- queen and countrj', we have known many 
 and mighty, monstrous to be imagined, from a number 
 of lions' whelps, lurking in then- dens, and watching 
 their hour to undo us ; our expectation and comfort 
 so failed us in France, as if our right arms had been 
 pulled from our shoulders. We have not altered the 
 coloiu' of the hair of our heads, nor added one inch to 
 our statui'e, since all these things have been accom- 
 plished amongst us. Consider then well, and think 
 it the highest time to forsake your highest wickedness ; 
 I call it highest wickedness, for if we laiew how to 
 add anything, in our several veins and dispositions, to 
 those idols of sin which we sei-ve, some to our covet- 
 ousness, some to our pride, some to om- unchasteuess ; 
 some to our malice, and such like, we would break 
 om- sleep, nay, we would compass sea and land to 
 increase it. Yet, howsoever it fareth with the multi- 
 tude, let there be a seed and remnant among us, left 
 to entreat for peace. Ten righteous persons would 
 have saved Sodom, and it may so stand with tho 
 goodness of God, that a few innocent fools shall pre- 
 serve the island, as Job spcaketh, chap. xxii. 30. Let 
 us thankfully embrace the long sufl'erancc of our God 
 forepast, leading us as by a hand of friendship to re- 
 pentance ; and let us redeem with newness of life our 
 days and j'ears formerly mis-spent, lest by impenitent 
 transgressions against the law of our Maker, we fall 
 upon his sentence of wi'ath, UTevocably passed and re- 
 solved by him, ' I have thought it, and will not repent, 
 neither will I turn back from it,' Jer. iv. 
 
 LECTURE III. 
 
 Lul Joiiiih arose up to jlcc unto 2'arsJtisJi fruin the presence of the Lord, and he went down to Joppa, dc.- 
 
 Jonah I. 3. 
 
 THE commission given to Jonah, we have already 
 weighed ; it followeth that we handle his recusancy 
 and disobedience therein committed. This verse now 
 in hand delivereth the whole body thereof, with every 
 member belonging unto it, 1, his preparation is set 
 down in that ' he arose ; ' 2, his speed, ' to fly ; ' 8, 
 the end and period of his journey, ' to Tarshish ; ' 4, 
 his end and purpose, why to Tarshish, ' to escape the 
 
 presence of the Lord ; ' 5, the opportunities, helps 
 and furtherances to his travel, are exactly put down. 
 (1,) ' He went down to Joppa,' an haven town ; (2,) ho 
 ' found a ship going to Tarshish ;' (3,) ' he paid the 
 fare thereof ; ' (4,) he ' went down into it ; ' (5,) lastly, 
 his reason of flying to Tarshish,* is again specified, 
 * oux e^yaf^o/iivci; aXXA -iri^ieoyaZ^o/jjivoi, 2 Tha3. iii. 11. 
 — No7i ayil sed satayit. 
 
22 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 with a regression in the end of the verse, ' that he 
 might go from the presence of the Lord.' A notable 
 pattern of man's disposition, 1, the Lord biddeth him 
 arise, and he ariseth, who, if he had sitten still, till 
 his flesh had cloven to the pavement, or if he had 
 stretched himself upon his bed and folded his arms 
 to sleep, he had done a ser^'ice more acceptable to 
 God ; 2, he is bidden to go, but not content with 
 going, he doth more than so, he fleeth, he hath the 
 feet of an hind, and the wings of a dove to do that 
 he should not, who had reaped more thanks if he 
 had crept but like a snail in his right course ; 3, he 
 is bidden to go to Nineveh, he goeth to Joppa and 
 Tarshish ; he is not idle, but he doth ill, he doth that 
 which he was not charged with, nnn nihil ar/it, scd 
 male, sed aliiul, and Mke one of those lords in Jere- 
 miah, chap, ii., who told God to his face, 'we are 
 lords, we will no more come at thee,' so doth he flatly 
 cross and overthwai-t that dii-ectiou which God had 
 set him ; 4, he heareth of a gi-eat city, of a wearisome 
 perambulation, asking the travel of three whole days, 
 but he saveth the labour of his feet, goeth into a little 
 vessel, and travelleth by sea, a far easier journey ; 
 5, he is bidden to cry, but he is so far from making 
 any noise, that all the clamour and noise of the 
 maiiners could not awake him and stir him up ; 6, 
 he heareth that the wickedness of Nineveh is come up 
 before the presence of the Lord ; notwithstanding he 
 feareth not to mock and abuse the presence of the 
 same Lord, neither despaireth he to avoid it. 
 
 There is nothing in all these but stubbornness and 
 rebellion, which is as kindly to man, as the flesh and 
 bones that he heareth about him. Amongst the other 
 plants in the garden of Eden, not far from the good- 
 liest trees of life and knowledge, gi-ew the bitter root 
 of disobedience, which our forefathers had no sooner 
 tasted, but it infected their blood, and the coiTupt 
 nutriment thereof converted itself into the w-hole body 
 of their succeeding hneage. The breasts of Eve gave 
 no other milk than perverseness to her children, and 
 Adam left it for a patrimony and inheritance unto all 
 his posterity. Though God had precisely said. Gen. 
 ii., ' Of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou 
 shalt not eat : for in the day that thou catest thereof 
 thou shalt die the death ; ' though there were no 
 comparison between their maker, and a murderer from 
 the beginning, the father of truth, and the father of 
 lies, a God and a devil, and the one had forbidden 
 but one tree, and fenced it as it were with a double 
 hedge, of a twofold death ; yet, when the serpent 
 came to the woman with a mere contradiction to the 
 voice of God, 'ye shall not die the death,' Gen. iii., 
 how credulous and forward was she to entertain his 
 suggestion 1 Moses proved to the children of Israel, 
 in the 9th of Deuteronomy, by a perfect induction, 
 that there was nothing but rebellion in them ; ' Re- 
 memljer, and forget not,' saith he, ' how thou pro- 
 vokedst the Lord thv God to anger in the wilderness : 
 
 also in Horeb, afterwards in Taberah, and in Massah, 
 and at the graves of lust; Ukewise when the Lord 
 sent you from Kadesh-barnea,' &c. At length he 
 concludeth, ' ye have been rebellious unto the Lord 
 since the day that I knew you.' And God pro- 
 nounceth of tlie same people in the fourth of Numbers, 
 that though ' they had seen his gloiT, and the miracles 
 which he did in Egypt, and in the wilderness, yet 
 they had tempted him ten times, and had not obeyed 
 his voice.' In the 17th of the same book, the Lord 
 gave commandment unto Moses, that Aaron's rod, 
 which budded for the house of Levi, when the other 
 rods budded not, should be kept in the ark for a 
 monument of their mm-murings and rebeUions fore- 
 passed. To forbear infinite other testimonies, the 
 whole world may be the ai'k to keep the monument of 
 their and our disobedience ; it is so common to us 
 both, when we arc willed to 'ask for the old way, 
 which is the good way,' to answer, 'we" will not walk 
 therein ; ' when the watchmen cr\- unto us, ' take heed 
 to the sound of the trumpet,' to answer, ' we will not 
 take heed,' Jer. vi. ; when ' wisdom crieth abroad, and 
 uttereth her voice in the streets : ye foohsh, how 
 long will ye learn foolishness, &c., to despise her 
 counsel, and to make a scorn of her correction,' 
 Prov. i. What work of our hands betrayeth not this 
 malice ? what word of our mouths speaketh not per- 
 verse things ? almost, what thought of om* hearts 
 kicketh not against the pricks of God's sacred com- 
 mandments, and desperately adventureth herself upon 
 the point of his sharp curse ? ' that our ways 
 were made so dii-ect, that we might keep his statutes ; 
 then should we never be confounded, whilst we had 
 respect imto all his commaudments.' 
 
 It is a question made by some (though I make no 
 question of it), whether this detraction and refusal of 
 Jonah were a fault, yea or no ? Dionysius Carthusianus 
 upon this place, doth partly excu.se it ; I think it far 
 from excuse, for doubtless the voice of God is the iu-st 
 rule and rudiments of all Christian instruction, the first 
 stone to be laid in the whole building, that cloud by 
 day, that pillar of fire by night, whereby all our 
 actions are to be guided. Paul, in his marvellous 
 conversion, desu-ed no other light, and lode-star to bo 
 governed by, but the will and word of his Saviour, 
 ' Lord what wilt thou have me do ? ' Acts ix. The 
 very prophet of Moub would not depart from his 
 standard ; for when Balak by his messengers sent him 
 word that he would promote him, and God did but 
 keep him back from honour; ho made this answer 
 unto him. Num. xxiv. 13, 'If Balak would give mo 
 his house full of silver and gold, I cannot pass the 
 connnandment of the Lord, to do either good or bad 
 of mine own mind ; what the Lord shall command, 
 that same will I speak.' He had said before to the 
 king in person, ' Lo, I nm come unto thee, and can I 
 now say anything at all ? the word that God puttoth 
 in my mouth, that shall I speak,' ch.ap. xxii. 38. 
 
Ver. 3.] 
 
 LECTURE III. 
 
 Tlio words of Samuel to Saul determine the doubt, 
 and make it as plain as the light at noonday, that the 
 fact of Jonah here committed, was an uuexcusable 
 ofl'ence ; ' Behold, saith he, ' to obey is better than 
 sacrifice, and to hearken is better than the ftit of rams, 
 for rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and trans- 
 gression is wickedness and idolatry,' it followeth in 
 the next words, ' because thou hast cast away the 
 word of the Lord, therefore he bath cast away thee 
 from being king," 1 Sam. sv. You hear the nature 
 of these two contraries, obedience and disobedience, 
 kindly deciphered, the one to be better than sacrifice ; 
 for he that oflereth a sacrifice, oflereth the flesh of a 
 beast, but be that obeyeth, oflereth his own will as a 
 quick and a reasonable sacrifice (which is all in all), 
 the other to be as witchcraft and idolatry ; for what 
 is disobedience, but when the Lord hath imposed some 
 duty upon us, we confer with our own hearts, as Saul 
 consulted with the woman of En-dor, 1 Sam. xxviii., 
 or Ahaziah, king of Samaria, with the god of Ekron, 
 Beelzebub, whether the word of the Lord shall be 
 hearkened to, yea or no ? Thus we set uj) an idol 
 within our own breasts, against the God of heaven, 
 and forsaking his testimonies, we follow the voice and 
 persuasion of om" own devices. Bernard, alluding to 
 this place before recited, writeth thus : The childi'en 
 of disobedience make their will their idol.* He addeth 
 for further explication, that it is one thing not to obey, 
 another thing to purpose and prepense disobedience ; 
 neither is it the simple transgression of God's com- 
 mandment, but the proud wilful contempt of his will, 
 which is reputed the sin of idolatry ; and surely I see 
 no reason they have to conceal the infirmity of Jonah 
 herein, when Jonah himself (if I mistake not the 
 meaning of the whole sentence) doth amply disclose it. 
 
 Ih(t Jonah. Jonah was the author and writer of this 
 history, yet Jonah reporteth the fault in himself, as if 
 some stranger and person without his skin had com- 
 mitted it. He forgetteth, as it were, his own people 
 and his father's house, and setting affection aside to 
 his own credit, maketh a simple and plain declaration, 
 namely and singularh-, of the transgression of Jonah. 
 A wise man, by the rule of Solomon, in the beginning 
 of his speech will accuse himself (Prov. xviii. in the 
 vulgar), so doth Jonah, not shrouding his head, nor 
 running into a bush, as Adam did, but writing his 
 fault in his brow, and pointing with his finger at the 
 very transgi'essor ; under his proper and individual 
 name, he bringeth the accusation, ' Then Jonah arose,'' 
 the party not long since mentioned, even the son 
 of Amittai, he that immediately before received the 
 word of the Lord to go to Nineveh, let his name 
 be registered, and his fault be pubhshed to the whole 
 world. Jonah arose. 
 
 Arose. WOl you now see his readiness in an evil 
 cause ? no sooner called but be arose forthwith. He 
 
 * Filiis inobedientise sua voluptas idolum est, &c. — Trad, 
 de prcEcept. et dispens. 
 
 might have excused himself, as Moses did in the 3d 
 and 4th chapters of Exodus, when he was called to his 
 burthensome office, ' "Who am I that I should go to 
 Pharaoh, and bring the children of Israel out of 
 Egypt ? ' again, ' Lord, send by the hand of him 
 whom thou shouldest send.' It hath been the use of 
 God's servants, when they have found their ability 
 unmeet to undergo the duties of their provinces 
 allotted them, in modesty and humility to withdraw 
 themselves. So did Gideon in the 6th of Judges ; for 
 when the Lord had encouraged liim, ' Go in thy 
 might ; thou shalt save Israel out of the hands of 
 the Midianites,' he answered again, ' Ah, my Lord, 
 whereby shall I save Israel ? Behold my father is 
 poor in Manasseh, and I the least in mj' father's 
 house.' Likewise, when Samuel asked Saul, 1 Sam. 
 ix., 'On whom is all the desire of Israel set ; is it not 
 upon thee and thy father's house ? ' he returned this 
 answer unto him, ' Am not I the son of Benjamm, 
 of the smallest tribe of Israel, &c., wherefore, then, 
 speakest thou so to me ? ' But Jonah hath no such 
 excuse, nor that he is the son of Amittai, nor of the 
 least tribe, nor of the poorest family, nor himself the 
 unfittest of all the rest to be sent to Nineveh, but at 
 the first call and summons of the Lord he ariseth up. 
 
 To fire. When he is up, he fleeth ; his driving is as 
 the driving of Jehu, the son of Nimshi (saith the watch- 
 man in the second Book of the lungs and the ninth 
 chapter), for he driveth as if he were mad. So cbiveth 
 Jonah, as if he had received that posting commission 
 which the apostles received, ' Salute no man by the 
 way,' or rather as if he had vowed a fast with himself 
 neither to eat nor drink till he had frustrated God's 
 commandment. Cyprian* wTote to Cornelius of five 
 schismatics that had taken shipping and sailed to 
 Rome with their mart of lies, as if the Lord of heaven 
 who rideth upon the cherubim could not overtake 
 them. Quasi Veritas post eos navii/are non posset. 
 
 To Tarshish. If he had fled to the right jilace, the 
 haste he made had added much to the commendation 
 of his painfulness. God loveth cheerfulness and 
 alacrity in his work ; excuses dislike him much. The 
 delay that Elisha made, ' Let me go kiss my father,' 
 and those shifts in the gospel, ' Let me go bury my 
 father,' or ' take my leave of my friends,' are not to 
 be admitted into his business. Paul witnesseth of 
 himself in the fii'st of the Galatians, that when he was 
 called by the grace of God to preach his Son amongst 
 the Gentiles, ' immediately he communed not with 
 flesh and blood, neither came he again to Jerusalem, 
 but went into Arabia,' and so forward, for the execu- 
 tion of that message. That which he did, he did 
 presently, ei;''jw;, and his baste is praise-worthy, be- 
 cause he followed the will of the Lord, rather than the 
 motions of flesh and blood. In this sense it is true 
 that ' the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and 
 the violent catch it away.' A man can never run too 
 * Li. i. epist. 3. 
 
2t 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Uhap. I. 
 
 fast that nmnetb in tlicse ways. ' I will run the ways 
 of thy commandments,' saitli David, Ps. cxix., 'when 
 thou hast set my heart at liberty.' Otherwise to run 
 the way of om' own devices is cnrsus celerriiiiiis pneter 
 viam* a swift race, besides the way. ' So run,' saith 
 the apostle, 1 Cor. ix., ' that ye may obtain ;' run 
 wiselj', run aright, run by the level and rule of God's 
 statutes. Philosophers hold, that if the inferior 
 spheres were not governed and stayed bj' the highest, 
 the swiftness of their motion would quickly fire the 
 world. And if the affections of men were not mode- 
 rated by the guidance of God's Holy Spirit, it could 
 not be chosen, but this little image of the world would 
 soon be overthrown. Haste in Jonah was not amiss ; 
 but there was more haste than good speed in his travel, 
 because he went to the wrong place. This is to go, I 
 grant, but not with the right foot, oohToosTv, as the apostle 
 speaketh in the second to the Galatians. The wicked 
 have then- ways, but they are crooked and circular end- 
 less ways, as it is noted of them in the 12th Psalm, 
 Impii ill circuitu amhiilaiii, they walk by compass, they 
 walk not ' towards the mark, the prize that is set bo- 
 fore them,' and therefore lose both their pains and 
 their recompense ; they follow their father the devil 
 in these walks, who testifieth of himself in the first of 
 Job, that he had ' compassed the whole earth.' These 
 crooked ways are ever applied, by the judgment of 
 Cassiodore, to evil manners, Tortuosa- vicr malis semper 
 moiihiis ajiplicantiir. They shall never come to the rest 
 of the eighth day-j that thus go wheeling about to no 
 pm-pose, like the turning of Samson's mill, which, 
 when it hath labom'ed the whole day long, is found at 
 night in the self-same place, where it first began. 
 Thus the wicked have their compassing ways, 'ze^ddou;, 
 and the devil hath his outways and byways, fnhda'ai ; 
 but happy is that man that ordcreth his feet in the 
 jiaths of God's commandments. 
 
 Now, whether the place here mentioned signify 
 the sea, as the Chaldaic paraplirast, and Jerome, and 
 others, according to the Hebrew name so importing, 
 expound it ; (whose reason is not much amiss, that 
 being amazed, and at his wit's end, more confused in 
 his mind than the winds and waves that drave him, 
 he eared not whither he went, so he walked not with 
 God, as Enoch did ; taking his mark at large, and 
 putting himself unto the sea to fall by adventure upon 
 any country) ; or whether Tarshish were that famous 
 haven-town of Africa, of which we read, Ezek. xxvii., 
 ' They of Tarshish were thy merchants, for the multi- 
 tude of all riches, for silver, iron, tin, and lead, which 
 they brought to thy fairs,' the riches whereof may be 
 esteemed by that report which is made in the second 
 of the Clu-onicles, chap. 9, that ' silver was nothing 
 accounted of in the days of Solomon ; for the king's 
 ships went to Tarshisli, with the servants of Hiram ; 
 every three years once came the ships of Tarshish, and 
 brought gold and silver, ivoiT, apes, and peacocks,' or 
 
 * Augustine. f Qu- 'rigl't way '? — Ed. 
 
 whether it signify Carthage, which Dido sometime 
 built, and is now called Tunis, which is the opinion of 
 Theodoret, and others ; or whether Tartessus, a town 
 in Spain ; or whether that city in Cihcia, nearer to 
 Syria, whence Paul reporteth himself to have been, in 
 the 21st of the Acts, ' I am a citizen in TarshLsh, a 
 femous city in Cilicia;' or whether the whole country of 
 Cilicia, because in ancient times, if Josephus deceive us 
 not, all Cilicia was called Tarshish, by the name of the 
 chief city ; or whether it name unto us any other place 
 not j'et agreed upon, pai'tly by curious, pai'tlj' bj* in- 
 dustrious authors, it skilleth not gi'eatly to discourse ; 
 I leave you, for your satisfaction therein, to more ample 
 commentaries. But certain I am, whether his mind 
 bear him to land or to sea, to Asia or Africa, country 
 or city, nearer or farther off, at Nineveh he cometli 
 not, which was the place of God's appointment. 
 
 Many dispute many things, why Jonah forsook 
 Nineveh and fled to Tarshish. (1.) The infirmity of 
 the flesh, some say, was the cause; pusillanimiiy of 
 mind, want of courage, being terrified with the great- 
 ness of the city. (2.) Or there was no hope, saj' 
 others," of the dry, when the green was so barren. 
 The children of Israel had so hardened his heart with 
 the hardness of theirs, that he could not imagine the 
 children of Asshm- would ever have fallen to repent- 
 ance. (8.) Or the strangeness of the charge dismayed 
 him ; for when all other prophets were sent to Israel, 
 he reasoneth \^^th himself, why should I be sent to 
 Nineveh? It was as uncouth unto him as when Peter 
 was willed to 'arise, kiU, and eat unclean beasts,' 
 Acts X., and he answered in plain terms, ' Not so. 
 Lord.' (4) Or it might be zeal to his country, be- 
 cause the conversion of the Gentiles, he saw, would be 
 the eversion of the Jews. And surely this is a great 
 tentation to the mind of man, the disadvantage and 
 hinderance of brethren. For this cause Moses inter- 
 posed himself in the quarrel between the Hebrew and 
 the Egyptian, and slew the Egyptian, Exod. ii. ; and 
 in the behalf of all Israel he afterwards prayed unto 
 the Lord against his own soul, Exod. xxxii., ' If Ihou 
 wilt pardon their sin,' thy mercy shall appear; 'but if 
 thou wilt not, I pray thee raze me out of the book of 
 life which thou hast written.' (5.) Or it might be he 
 was afraid of being accounted a false prophet, if the 
 sequel of his prophecy fell not out, ^^hich reason is 
 afterward expressed by him in the fourth chapter, ' I 
 praj- thee, Lord, was not this my saying when I was 
 in mine own country ? ' &e. As I said of the place 
 before, so of the reasons that moved him (for this pre- 
 sent, till fitter occasions be offered), whatsoever it were 
 that drew him awav', whether weakness of spirit, or 
 despair of success, or insolcucy* of charge, or jealousy 
 over the Israelites, or fear of discredit, sure I am that 
 he Cometh not to Nineveh, but rcsolveth in his heart 
 to reject a manifest commandment. 
 
 I make no question but in e\ery cii-cumstauce fore- 
 * That is, ' uuusualuess.' — Ed. 
 
Ver. 3.] 
 
 LECTURE III. 
 
 handled he uncovereth his own nakedness, and layeth 
 himself open to the censure and crimiuation of all 
 men. As who would sa}-, will you know the person 
 without dissembling his name ? it was Jonah. His 
 readiness without deliberation ? he ariseth. His haste 
 without intermission ? he fleeth. The place far dis- 
 tant fi-om the which God had appointed ? Tarshish. 
 And if all these will not serve to prove the disobe- 
 dience of Jonah a fault by his own confession, then 
 hearken unto the next word ; if others were but 
 candles to discover it, this is a blazing lamp to lay it 
 forth to all men's sight. 
 
 From the presence of the Lord. He fleeth into Tar- 
 shish from the presence of the Lord. How can that 
 be, if it be true which David wisheth in the 27th 
 Psalm, ' Blessed be his glorious name for ever, and 
 let all the earth be tilled with his glory' ? But in 
 the hundred and thirty-ninth Psalm, wonderful are the 
 testimonies that the prophet there bringeth to amplify 
 God's illimited presence, ' Lord, thou hast tried me, 
 and known me. Thou knowest my sitting and my 
 rising: thou understandest my thoughts afar ofl',' &c. 
 For not to stay your ears with commemoration of all 
 those arguments, this I gather m sum, that there is 
 neither heaven nor hell, nor the uttermost part of the 
 sea, neither day nor night, light nor darkness, that 
 can hide us from his face. Our sitting, rising, lying 
 down, the thoughts of omr hearts, words of our 
 tongues, ways of our feet, nay, our reins, om- bones, 
 our mother's wombs, wherein we lay in our first in- 
 formity and imperfection, are so well known unto him. 
 If this wore his purpose, to think that the presence of 
 God might be avoided, • who sitteth upon the circle of 
 heaven, and beholdeth the inhabitants of the earth as 
 grasshoppers, whose throne is the heaven of heavens, 
 and the earth his footstool, and his ways are in the 
 great deep,' I must then needs say with Jeremiah, 
 chap. X., ' doubtless every man is a beast by his own 
 knowledge,' prophet or no prophet. If the Spirit of 
 God instruct him not, he is a beast ; worse than 
 MeUtides, that natm-al fool of whom histories speak, 
 that he could not define whether his father or his 
 mother brought him forth. But I cannot suppose 
 such palpable and gross ignorance in a prophet, who, 
 knowing that ' God was well known in Jewry, and his 
 name great in Israel,' could not be ignorant that God 
 was the same God, and the presence of his Godhead 
 no less in Tarshish and all other countries. What, 
 then, is the meaning of this phrase, ' He fled from the 
 presence of the Lord' '? (1.) Some expound it thus : 
 He left the whole border and ground of Israel, where 
 the presence of the Lord, though it were not more 
 than in other places, yet it was more evident, by the 
 manifestations of his favours and graces towards them. 
 There was the ark of the covenant, and the sanctuary, 
 and the Lord gave them answer by dreams and oracles, 
 and other more special arguments of his abode there. 
 Moses spake truth in the fourth of Deuteronomy of this 
 
 privilege of Israel, ' What nation is so great, unto whom 
 their gods come so near unto them as the Lord is near 
 unto us in all that we call upon him for?' David's 
 acclamation. Psalm cxlvii., goeth hand in hand with 
 it, ' He hath not dealt so with other nations : neither 
 have the heathen knowledge of his judgments.' 
 
 (2.) But I rather conceive it thus, which_ maketli 
 much for the confutation of my matter now in hand. 
 He fled from the presence of the Lord, when he 
 turned his back upon him, shook off his yoke, and 
 wilfully renounced his commandment. It is a sign 
 of obedience that servants bear unto then- lords and 
 masters, when they stand before their face, attending 
 their pleasure, and ready to receive and execute their im- 
 posed bests. You have the phrase in the first of Job '. 
 ' On a day, when the children of God came and stood 
 before the Lord, Satan came also and stood amongst 
 them.' And Ps. cxxiii., ' Behold, as the eyes of 
 servants look unto the hands of their masters,^ and as 
 the eyes of a maiden unto the hands of her mistress ; 
 so our eyes wait upon the Lord our God, until he 
 have mercy upon us.' In the 18th of Matthew, our 
 Saviour adviseth his disciples not to despise one of 
 those little ones : the reason is this, ' For I say unto 
 you, that in heaven their angels always behold the 
 face of mv father which is in heaven.' The like 
 manner of speech did Elisha use to Naamanthe Syrian, 
 when he ofl'ered him a reward, 2 Ivings v., 'As the 
 Lord hveth before whom I stand,' a witness to my 
 actions, the searcher of my heart, whose honour and 
 service I tender more than my gain, I will not receive 
 it. By these may we see what the phrase intendeth, 
 of fleeing from the presence of the Lord. It lettoth 
 us understand that Jonah, as a fugitive and refi-actoiy 
 servant, ran from the Lord, as Onesimus from his 
 master Philemon, breaking his bond of duty, and 
 making no conscience or care to do service unto him. 
 
 Some have presumed by conjecture upon his going 
 to Tarshish, and fleeing from the face of the Lord, 
 that not only he reneged his obedience in this parti- 
 cular action,' but changed the whole trade of his life, 
 and leaving the oflice of a prophet, became a merchant 
 adventurer. A worldly dangerous profession, not only 
 for the hazard of hfe, and for wreck of goods, but for 
 wTeck of conscience also, which is the worst shipwreck ; 
 which wi-ecks notwithstanding are taken not only in 
 your ships abroad, but in your shops and warehouses 
 at home, when you fall either upon the syrtes and 
 quicksands of lying, which is a present and quick kind 
 of sin, always at the tongue's end, or upon the rocks 
 of perjury, "which is a more obstinate and indurate 
 transgression. I will not be so strict in this point as 
 Chrysostom was, who counselled Christians to avoid 
 marketing, that neither they sufl'ered nor oflered guile- 
 ful dealing : Tu qui Christianus es,fuf;eforHm, ut ne- 
 que patiaris, neque facias fraudem. I know they 
 are lawful and profitable callings in commonwealth, if 
 lawfully handled. The state of the world cannot 
 
26 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 stand without buying, selling, traffic, transportation. 
 Noil owiiis fen omnia tell us : no country yieldeth all 
 kind of commodity. There must be a path from 
 Egypt to Assur, and from Assm' to Egj^jt again, to 
 make a mutual supply of their several wants. Mesech 
 the king of Moab was a lord of sheep, Hiram had 
 store of timber and workmen, Ophir was famous for 
 gold, Chittim for ivoiy, Bashan for oaks, Lebanon for 
 cedars, Saba for frankincence, &c. But this I must 
 tell you that live upon buying and selling, you walk 
 upon coals and carry fii-e in j-our bosoms ; gain is a 
 busy temptation, and there is neither stone or ephah, 
 measm-e nor balance, you use, but Satan is at hand 
 to do some office. ' It is naught, it is naught, saith 
 the buyer,' in the twentieth of the Proverbs, ' and 
 when ho is gone apart he boasteth.' Now, on the 
 other side, It rs good and very good, saith that seller, 
 and when he hath sold his wares, he boasteth indeed, 
 because he hath given dross for silver, and water for 
 wine, Isa. i. I say no more ; but take heed ' that 
 the treasures of wickedness be not found in your 
 houses, neither a scant measure, which is an abomi- 
 nation unto the Lord.' ' Shall I justify,' saith God, 
 Micah vi. 11, ' the wicked balances, and the bag of 
 deceitful weights ?' His meaning is, that they shall 
 never be justified ; much less a wicked and deceitful 
 conscience. I will not enforce this collection upon 
 you, because it is not plainly expressed in the text, 
 and without such foreign and unnecessary helps, if I 
 may so term them, the bare letter of the words doth 
 notoriously evict the disobedience of Jonah, wherein 
 he was so fixed and confii-med, that neither respite of 
 time, neither danger of voyage, nor expense of money 
 could change his pm-pose. Examine the particulars. 
 
 (1.) He goeth down to Japho, or Joppa (Jafl'a, at 
 this day), a city of Palestine, an haven town and road 
 for shipping ; it spent some travel and time, no doubt, 
 before he came to Joppa. 
 
 (2.) He findeth a ship going to Tarshish. I am 
 sm-e he was not presently acquainted with the quay, 
 neither did he find that ship without some inquiry. 
 
 (8.) He payeth the fare. What ! incontinently '? It 
 is not uuhkely but they stayed one tide at least. 
 
 (4.) i\jad it standeth with the order of the text, that 
 he paid the faro aforehand, and in haste, before ho 
 needed. 
 
 (5.) Some of the Rabbins add, that he paid the 
 fare of the whole ship, for the rest of the passengers 
 that were bound for Tarshish. 
 
 (G.) Lastly, when he had paid, he goeth down into 
 the ship, not remembering the danger he entered into, 
 to put his life within four inches of death ;* and what 
 safety it is, in comparison, to see the raging of the 
 waters from the sea banks. It was one of the three 
 things that Cato repented ; travel by sea, when by 
 land he might have gone ; and a chai-ge that Antigonus 
 gave his sons, when they were tossed with a tempest : 
 * Quanta sijissitudo iiavium ? qiiatuor digitorum. — Anach. 
 
 remember, my sous, and warn your posterity of it, 
 that they never hazard themselves upon such adven- 
 tures. What needed the recital of these particular, 
 and, one would think, trifling cii'cumstances, as that he 
 went to the haven, found a ship, paid the fare, descended 
 into it, which might have been spoken at once, 
 He went to Tarshish ; but to express thus muchj 
 that though there were many occurrences that met 
 him in the way of disobedience, as the angel met 
 Balaam ; many messengers, as it were, sent from God 
 to call him back again ; many spaces of ground, many 
 interruptions of time, manj- occasions of better advice 
 and consultation ; yet, as Agrippa came into the world 
 with his heels forward, so Jonah holdoth on his un- 
 toward com'se, whither his feet would boar him, 
 having little reason, and less grace, to direct him ? 
 
 The sum of all that hath been spoken hitherto, for 
 I will leave a remnant behind at the least to make a 
 connection between this and the next sentence, is, 
 strong and incredible disobedience. I say not con- 
 ceived alone, but brought forth, perfected, persisted 
 in, w-ithout remorse ; not against father, mother, 
 magistrate, any superior, but against God himself; 
 not in the tail of the people, to use the words of a 
 prophet, but in the chiefest and honom-ablest part. 
 The complaint of God, Isa. xlii. 19, is now revived 
 again, ' who so blind as my servant ? or so deaf as he 
 whom I have sent ?' Jonah, a seiwant in the highest 
 room, a vessel of the greatest honour in the great 
 house, a prophet, one of a principal spirit, and, as 
 thefr usual name was for unusual gifts, a man of God, 
 having received a mandate from his Lord, is bUnd, 
 deaf, senseless to perform it ; or rather he goeth, 
 hasteneth, flieth, saileth with the wings of the wind 
 from the execution thereof. Paul upbraideth the Jew, 
 Rom. ii., on this wise : ' Thou art called a Jew, and 
 restest in the law, and gloriest in God, and knowest 
 his will, and allowest the tilings that are excellent, in 
 that thou art instructed in the law ; and persuadcst 
 thyself that thou art a guide to the blind, a light to 
 them which are in darkness, an instructor of them 
 which lack discretion, &c. Thou therefore which 
 teachest another, teachest thou not thyself ? thou that 
 preachcst a man should not steal, dost thon steal ? 
 thou that sayest, a man should not commit adultery, 
 dost thou commit adultciy ? thou that abhoiTcst idols, 
 committest thou sacrilege ? thou that gloriest in the 
 law, tlu'ough breaking the law dishonourest thou God?' 
 The coals of this scripture may be heaped upon Jonah 
 his head. Thou art a prophet, a familiar friend with 
 God, thou hast seen visions and dreamed dreams, and 
 always standest in the presence of the Lord to know 
 his counsels ; thou art a seer to the blind, a teacher 
 of the ignorant, a watchman over those that arc asleep ; 
 thou therefore that teachest Israel, teachest thou not 
 thyself? thou that preachest obedience to Jeroboam, 
 art thou disobedient ? thou that beginnest thy mes- 
 sage, ' Hear the word of the Lord,' dost thou reject 
 
Ver. 4. J 
 
 LECTURE IV. 
 
 27 
 
 it ? AVhat shall we say then, but that which Daniel 
 yieldeth unto in the Oth of his prophecy ? ' Lord, 
 righteousness belongeth unto thee, but unto us apper- 
 taineth open shame, to our kings, to our princes, to our 
 fathers ;' we may further say, to oiu' prophets, to om- 
 priests, because we have aU sinned against thee. ' There 
 is no difference,' saith the apostle, Eom. iii., he mcaneth 
 neither of Jew nor Gentile, ' for all have sinned, and 
 are deprived of the glory of God, and are justified freely 
 by his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ 
 Jesus.' And, Gal. iii., ' the Scripture hath concluded 
 all under sin, that the promise by faith in Christ Jesus 
 should be given to those that believe.' Gal. v. : I 
 shew you your sin and the propitiation, your sickness 
 and the remedy to cure it ; think not of the other 
 remedies. If you deem that either Tarshish, or any 
 other region beyond seas ; that a cabin in a ship, or 
 a couch in a chamber ; that the clouds of the day, or 
 the darkness of the night ; the top of the mountains, 
 or the bottom of the sea ; a secret fi-icnd, or more 
 secret conscience ; heaven or hell, or any the like 
 evasion, can hide it from the eyes of God, you are 
 deceived. His seven eyes go through the whole world, 
 Zech. iv. You may interpret them seven thousand 
 thousand of eyes, for he is totus octdus* altogether 
 ■eye. Therefore let us not flatter om-selves, with those 
 that pluck out the eyes of knowledge itself, in the 
 * Auirustine. 
 
 tenth Psalm, ' Tush, who secth us ? God hath for- 
 gotten, he hideth away his face and will never see ;' 
 but rather let us acknowledge with Jacob, Gen. xsviii., 
 all places to be filled with the majesty of God, ' The 
 Lord was in this place, and I was not aware of it ; 
 how fearful is this place ! this is the house of God, 
 and the gate of heaven ;' this, and that, and the other 
 \\ithin the compass of the round world, all are alike. 
 Let us reclaim ourselves in time from sinning, which 
 Jonah could not do, and in a serious cogitation, before 
 we go too far, ask one the other, What have we done ? 
 If we forget it in Israel, let us remember it in Joppa. 
 Let either house or field, land or sea, youth or full 
 strength, put us in mind of our duty neglected. Let 
 us not follow om' sensuality too far, nor buy voluptu- 
 ousness with a price, but rather say with the Athenian 
 orator, when we hear how chargeable pleasure is, 
 Non cmam taiiti jicenitere, I will not buy my repent- 
 ance at so high a rate. Or if we have paid the fare 
 of pleasure, let us withth-aw our feet, before we descend 
 into the bottom and sink of it ; let not the sides and 
 entrails of the ship bmy us, nor a careless profound 
 sleep bereave us of all sense ; let not the waters go 
 over our heads, nor a flood of iniquity overwhelm us, 
 lest that (which is the wages of sin, and presently 
 overtook Jonah in his transgression), we endanger both 
 body and soul to the justice of God. 
 
 LECTUEE IV. 
 
 lUit the LonI sent out a r/reat wiittl into the sen, tt-c.- — JoxAll I. 4. 
 
 THE recusancy of Jonah was the abridgment of the 
 whole thii'd verse ; whereof, 1 , he accuseth him- 
 self by name ; 2, he noteth his readiness in arising ; 
 
 3, his speed in fljing ; 4, his pcrverseness, because 
 to Tarshish ; 5, open rebellion in going from the face 
 of the Lord to renounce his service ; G, his confirma- 
 tion therein, that having such stops and remembrances 
 laid in his way, as, namely, 1, to roach the haven not 
 near at hand ; 2, to find a ship not without inquiiw, 
 and to stay the leisure thereof; 8, to be at charge ; 
 
 4, therein to be more liberal or more hasty than cause 
 was ; 5, to commit himself to so manifest a danger as 
 the travel by the sea bringeth with it ; yet he swalloweth 
 and digestoth all these hooks, and is not revoked by 
 any means to perform his obedience. For all this he 
 did : to what end ? ' That he might go to Tarshish 
 from the presence of the Lord.' Once again he 
 repeateth the cause, and by a retire to his former 
 speech, maketh the pubhcation of his crime both 
 Alpha and Omega, the iii-st and the last of the sentence : 
 thus he beginneth, and thus he endeth, ' That he might 
 flee,' &c. 
 
 With them. To this you may add, as the conclu- 
 sion of all the rest, the company he made choice of. 
 
 ' that he might go with them.' Who were they ? By 
 accord of all opinions, men of sundry nations, lan- 
 guages, conditions, and, as is evident in the fifth verse, 
 idolaters. Thus he mingled himself, in the ecstaey 
 of his wilfulness, as fire and water, hysena with dogs, 
 an Israelite with gentiles, the circumcised with the 
 uncircumcised, a prophet with profaners of sound 
 religion, and one that feareth the God of the Hebrews 
 with those that worship strange gods. The parable 
 in Matthew, chap, ssi., maketh mention of a man 
 that had two sons ; the one he biddeth go to his vine- 
 yard, and he answered, I will not ; yet afterwards 
 repented himself, and went ; the other said, I will go, 
 yet went not. The one is the image of the penitent, 
 the other of the hypocrite ; the one a deed without 
 show, the other a show without deed. Jonah may 
 stand in a third branch, who neither saith that ho will 
 not and doth, nor that he will and doth not ; neither 
 in truth nor in colour obedient, but having cleared 
 and dissolved all objections of travel, charge, peril, 
 company, is shipped, as you see, and under sail to go 
 to Tarshish. 
 
 ' But the Lord sent out a j/ieeit uiiid,' &c. Behold 
 a pursuivant dispatched from heaven to attach him, 
 
28 
 
 KINO ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 vengeance is shipped in a wbii'lwind, and sailetli aloft 
 in the air, to overtake him.* There is no counsel (as 
 Jerome here noteth), against the Lord. In a calm 
 Cometh a tempest ; the ship is endangered which 
 harboureth a daugerful passenger, Periclitalur navis 
 qute pcricUtaiitem e.vceperat, there is nothing peaceable 
 where the Lord is an enemy. Whom the voice of the 
 Lord could not move, a storm followeth him (as when 
 Absolom could not draw Joab unto him by entreaty 
 and fair means, he fireth his barley fields to make him 
 come, 2 Sam. xiv.) ; and whom a still spirit could not 
 chai-m, the turbulent spirit of a raging wind, Scverior 
 magister, a rougher instructor to deal withal, enforceth 
 to hearken. There be spirits (saith the sou of Sirachf), 
 that are created for vengeance, which in their rigour 
 lay on sure strokes. In the time of destruction they 
 shew forth their power, and accomplish the wrath of 
 him that made them. Fire, and hail, and famine, 
 and death, aU these are created for vengeance ; the 
 teeth of wild beasts, and the scorpions, and the ser- 
 pents, and the sword execute judgment for the de- 
 struction of the wicked. Nay, the principal things 
 for the whole use of man's life, as water, fire, and ii'on, 
 and salt, and meal, wheat and honey, and milk, and 
 the blood of the grape, and oil, and clothing, all these 
 things are for good to the godly, but to the sinners 
 they are turned to evil. To these you may add the 
 wind, which being a meteor whereb}' we live in some 
 sort, for our life is a breath {aniiiia, av£,ao;), a fan in 
 the hands of God to purge the air that it be not cor- 
 rupted, as the lungs lie by the heart to do it good, is 
 hero converted to bo a plague unto them ; that as 
 David was afflicted by the son of his o\\ti bowels, who 
 should have been the staff' of his age ; Samson by the 
 wife of his bosom who should have been his helper ; 
 the children of Israel by manna stinking and full of 
 worms, and by quails coming out of their nostrils ; 
 and the children of the prophets by a bitter herb in 
 the pottage, which were appointed for their sustenance 
 and food ; so these mariners for the sin of Jonah, are 
 scourged with a wind, a principal furtherance and 
 benefit at other times required to sailing. 
 
 Obedience hath her praise both with God and men ; 
 the oft'spring of the righteous is obedience and love. 
 The Ilechabites shall never want a testimony of their 
 obedience, unless the book of Jeremiah the prophet 
 be again cut with a penknife, and burnt upon an 
 hearth, as in the days of Zodckiah. ' Jonadab their 
 father commanded them to drink no wine, and they 
 would not drink it for that commandment' sake, they, 
 nor their wives, their sons, nor their daughters.' 
 Chi-ist prophesieth of himself, Isa. 1., ' The Lord hath 
 opened mine car, and it was not rebellious ; neither 
 turned I back.' It was written of him in the book, 
 that he should do the will of his father, he was ready 
 to do it. The law was in the midst of his bowels, 
 
 * Fugicbat tcrrani, et Dei iram non fiigiebat. — Chrysosl. 
 homil. 5. ad ]jop. t Kcclus. xxxix. 
 
 Ps. si., and without protracting the time, he oficrcd 
 himself, ' Lo, I come.' He was ' obedient unto death, 
 even the death of the cross,' Philip, ii. And ' though 
 he were the Son, yet learned he obedience by the 
 things he sufiered,' Heb. \.,qni ne pcrdcrct obcdieiitiam, 
 pcrdidit ritam ;" though he slept a woeful and heavy 
 sleep to flesh and blood, yet he slept in peace. 
 
 Disobedience, on the other side, hath never escaped 
 the hands of almighty God. It cast Jonah out- 
 of the ship ; and the angels, before Jonah, out of 
 heaven ; Adam and Eve. out of paradise ; Lot's wife 
 out other life and nature too ; Saul out of his kingdom ; 
 the childi-en of Israel out of their native soil, and fur- 
 ther, their natural root that bear them. For no other 
 reason is given but this, Jer. xssv., ' I spake, and 
 they would not hear ; I cried, and they would not 
 answer.' To leave foreign examples, the justice of 
 God now presently manifesting itself against disobe- 
 dience Cometh in a storm, the vehemency and fuiy 
 whereof appeareth, 
 
 1. By the author, 'God sent it.' Who alihough 
 he be the author of all winds and weathers, and bring- 
 eth them out of his treasm-es, yet when it is singulai'ly 
 noted of God that he was the cause, it cameth a like- 
 lihood not of his general providence alone, but of some 
 special and extraordinary purpose. 
 
 2. By the instrument, which is ' a wind,' and 
 neither thunder nor rains to help it. 
 
 3. By the epithet and apposition of the insti-ument, 
 ' a gi-eat wind.' 
 
 4. By the nature of the word here used, it was 
 ' sent ;' nay, rather thrown and sent headlong, as the 
 lightning is shot from heaven. It was cast fi'om God, 
 as the mariners cast their ladings into the sea, for 
 the same word is originally used in both places. A 
 wind so sudden and furious, that they could guess at 
 other tempests before they fell, they had no signs 
 whereby to prognosticate this. 
 
 5. By the place that recciveth it, ' the sea ;' a 
 champain and plain channel, an open floor, where there 
 was neither hill, nor forest, nor any other impediment 
 to break the force of it. 
 
 C. By the explication added, there was ' a tempest' 
 upon it, even a ' mighty tempest.' 
 
 7. By the eflects that ensued, in -Ith and 5th verses, 
 marvellously described. 
 
 (1.) The" breaking of the ship, a strong and an ablo 
 ship by conjecture, because so lately sot forth to sja_; 
 and the danger is the more to be considered, that it 
 fell not upon rocks or shelves, but by the power of Iho 
 only wind w^as almost sphtted ; the Hebrew phrase is 
 very significant, the ship ' thought to bo broken/ as 
 if it had soul and sense to feel the hazard it was in. 
 
 (2.) The fear that followed upon the whole company 
 of the passengers. 
 
 (8.) The i'ear of the mariners, men accustomed 
 and inured to the Uke adventures, of whom it is truly 
 * Bernard. 
 
Ver. i.] 
 
 LECTURE IV. 
 
 29 
 
 spoken, ' illis robur et res triples,'* &c., tlieir hearts 
 are of brass and oak to encounter dangers. 
 
 (4.) Their prayers, nay, their vociferalions and out- 
 cries upon their gods, as the priests of Baal cried upon 
 their idol. 
 
 (5.) The casting out of their ladings, the necessary 
 instrnments and utensils for their intended voyage. 
 
 All which, and whatsoever besides is set down to 
 the end of the 5th verso, may be reduced to three 
 persons, with their actions and administrations be- 
 longing unto them ; the first is, tlie Lord ; the second, 
 the mariners ; the third, Jonah. 
 
 Of the first, it is said, that he ' sent out a great 
 wind.' 
 
 It was the error of the Paynims to divide the world 
 amongst sundi-y gods, with every several region, city, 
 family, and almost chamber, and chimney therein, 
 with heaven and hell, land and sea, woods and rivers, 
 wine and corn, fruits of the ground, all things what- 
 soever. Amongst the rest, the winds in the air they 
 ascribed to ^Eolus, whom they imagined to have them 
 closelj' mewed up and housed in a lodge, and to ha-\-o 
 sent them abroad either for calms or tempests at his 
 discretion. Horace commended Virgil his friend 
 going toward Athens, to the mighty goddess of Cyprus, 
 and the two brethren of Helen, and the father of the 
 winds, that is, to Venus, and the two twins, Castor 
 and Pollux, and ^Eolus, wishing, for his better speed, 
 that all the winds might be bound up, besides lapyx, 
 a quiet western wind, Ohslriclis aliis pnrter lajiiji/n, 
 with many the like fables, not unknown to grammar 
 schools. The blowing of the winds more or less we 
 impute not to /Eolus, nor any the like devised gods 
 of the Gentiles ; we honour the Lord of Hosts alone 
 in the power of this creature, who sitteth upon the 
 circle of heaven, and causeth both the sun to shine, 
 and the rains to fall, and the winds to blow in their 
 seasons, and at this time appointed this wind to a 
 singular service. It is he that ' flicth upon the wings 
 of the wind,' Ps. xviii. 'The channels of the waters 
 have been seen, and the foundations of the earth dis- 
 covered at his rebuking, and at the blasting of the 
 breath of his nostrils.' You see it is called the breath 
 of the Lord, as also in the book of .Job, chap, xxxvii., 
 not that substantial breath of his whereof we read in 
 the fu-st of Genesis, ' The Spirit of God moved upon 
 the waters,' but a created breath, extracted, and en- 
 gendered out of other creatures. The wind that came 
 from the wilderness and overthrow the corners of the 
 house wherein the children of Job were feasting, that 
 saint aeknowledgeth to have come from heavenly dis- 
 position, ' The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh 
 away,' Job i. Wind, and fire, and bands of robbers, 
 he assigneth not to any idol of the heathen, nor to the 
 malice of men, nor to the hazard of fortune, which 
 others made a goddess, but to the almightiness and 
 sovereignty of him who ruleth all things. And as 
 * Ilorat. 
 
 his dominion is undoubted in the air, so doth the sea 
 submit itself likewise to his governance, who ' sitteth 
 upon the water-clouds, and is a king for evermore,' as 
 the Psalmist speaketh. For who but he ' hath shut 
 up the sea with doors, when it issued and came forth 
 as out of the womb ? Who established his command- 
 ments upon it, when he set bars and gates, and said, 
 hitherto shalt thou come, and no farther ; here will I 
 stay the proud waves ? ' Who else divided the Red 
 Sea into two parts, that the children of Israel passed 
 through on dry foot ? But as for Pharaoh and his 
 host, the horse and the rider, they were overthrown 
 therein. Who else turned the stream of Jordan the 
 coutraiy way, whereof the prophet demandeth with 
 admiration, ' What aileth thee, Jordan, that thou 
 wentest back ? ' Who else turned the waters into 
 blood, and drieth up the rivers, that the fishes rot for 
 want of moisture ? Tell me his name (to use the 
 words of Job) if thou knowest it, and what is his Son's 
 name. It is he and his Son, who in the gospel of 
 Mark, chap, iv., ' rebuked the winds, and said unto the 
 sea, Peace, and be still ; and the wind ceased, and there 
 was a great calm ;' and they could not be satisfied about 
 it, but asked ' Who it was, that both the winds and the 
 sea should thus obey him ?' All kinds of weather, 
 by land or sea, thunders and lightning, even the coals 
 of fire that were never blown, hailstones and stormy 
 tempests, they come by his assignment, who cleaveth 
 the rocks asunder with his voice, and shooteth forth 
 his thunderbolts as arrows at a mark ; who ' biddeth 
 his lightnings walk, and they say, Lo, here we are,' 
 Job xxxviii. ; and divideth the spouts in the air, to 
 yield their moisture to the ground, more or less, at the 
 will of their maker. And we utterly renounce herein 
 not only the palpable idolatry of the Gentiles, who 
 gave the glory of the Most High to their base and 
 inglorious abominations, but the foolish ignorance of 
 others nearer home, who in the working of these crea- 
 tures never look up to the seat of majesty, that ordereth 
 all things ; but whatsoever befalleth them by fiill of fire, 
 blast of wind, inundation of waters, or the like, they 
 term it chance. Alas, chance is nothing ; for nothing is 
 done in the whole world without an order from above ; 
 and it was wisely noted by a learned man,"'- puo/5 pus/ 
 ruy_^ri'j, nature bringeth forth that which we wrongfully 
 call chance, because it cometh unexpected. 
 
 I read of a certain people in Africa, who, being 
 troubled with the north wind driving heaps of sands 
 upon their fields and dn-elling places, thej' gathered an 
 army of men to fight against it ; but with so evil success, 
 tliat tliemselves were also buried under hills of sands. f 
 Xerxes, the Persian monarch, having received a loss 
 by the rage of Hellespontus, himself more mad than 
 the sea, caused fetters and manacles to be cast into 
 the waters thereof, as if he would make it his prisoner, 
 and bind it with links of iron at his pleasure. DariusJ 
 
 * Jul. Seal. Exerc. 18R. t Herodot. 
 
 i Some say Cyruis. 
 
30 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. L 
 
 did the like upou the river Gynde, who, because it bad 
 dro^\Tied bim a white horse, threatened the river to 
 divide it into so many streams, and so to weaken the 
 strength of it, that a woman gi'eat with child should 
 go over it dry shod. It is not unlike the madness of 
 our days, who must not be crossed either with wet or 
 di-y, wind or rains, fail' or foul, but we fall to repining, 
 murmuring, banning, blaspheming, and all kind of 
 cursed speaking, or wishing at least. But as God 
 asketh Sennacherib, 2 Kings xix., ' Whom hast thou 
 railed upon, or whom hast thou blasphemed?' so I 
 ask these men. Whom are you angry with ; who bath 
 displeased you ? Are you angry mth the saw or with 
 bim that lifteth it ? do the winds and the seas move 
 your impatience ? Tbey are but servants unto that 
 Lord who saith unto them, smite, and they do it ; 
 favour, and they are obedient. Kabsbakeh speaketh 
 to the nobles of Jerusalem, Isa. xxxvi., 'Am I come 
 hither without the Lord ? The Lord said unto me. Go 
 up against this land to destroy it.' So it is in the force 
 of these creatures, when either they drown, or blast, or 
 parch too much, it is not done without the Lord ; the 
 Lord saith unto them, do thus or otherwise. 
 
 Besides the impieties above named, it is an error 
 of our times, heathenish enough, to give the honour 
 of God in these and the like accidents, to witches and 
 conjurors. For if ever tempest arise, more than com- 
 mon experience hath inm-od us unto, especially with 
 the havoc and loss either of life or limb in ourselves, 
 or of om- cattle, or houshigs, forthwith the judgment 
 is given, as if the God of heaven and earth were fallen 
 asleep, and minded nothing. There is some conjm-ing. 
 Be it so. What is conjuring '?* a pestilent commis- 
 sion, convention, stipulation, betwixt men and devils. 
 Men and devils ! what are they ? Look upon the 
 sorcerers of Egypt for the one ; Mnt/orum potestas, 
 saith Augustine, t de/ccit in muxcis, they cried in the 
 smallest plague that was sent, and past their cunning 
 to remove, ' this is the finger of the Lord,' Exod. viii. ; 
 their power is limited thert'fore. Look upon the martyr- 
 ings of Job for the other ; for though the circuit of Satan 
 be very large, even to the compassing of the whole 
 earth to and fro. Job i., yet ho hath his days assigned 
 him to stand before the presence of the Lord for the 
 renewing of his commission ; and besides, Oviciilarn 
 vnam auforre non poliiit, i(x., he could not take one 
 poor sheep from Job till the Lord had given him leave, 
 ' put forth thine hand ;' nor enter into the herd of 
 swine. Mat. viii., without Christ's permission. And 
 so, to conclude, whether men or devils be ministerial 
 workers in these actions, all eometh from him, as from 
 the higher supreme cause, whose judgments executed 
 thereby, no man can either fully comprehend, or 
 reprehend justly. God professeth no less of himself, 
 Isa. xlv., ' I form the light, and create darkness ; I 
 make peace, and create evil ; I the Lord do all these 
 things.' And in the 54th of the same prophecy, 
 
 * Aucust. do doct. Christi. lib. ii. t De Trin. iii. 7. 
 
 ' Behold I have created the smith that bloweth the 
 coals in the tire, and him that bringeth forth an instru- 
 ment for his work, and I have created the destroj-er 
 to destroy ;' destruction eometh fi'om the instrument, 
 the instrument fi'om the smith, and the smith and all 
 from God. In the 10th of the same book, Asshur is 
 called ' the rod of his wrath, and the staff iu his hands 
 was the Lord's indignation.' And the prophet prayeth 
 in the 17th Psalm, to the same etiect, ' Up, Lord, 
 disappoint him, cast him down, deliver my soul from 
 the wicked, which is a sword of thine.' We need 
 not farther instructions in this point, but whatsoever 
 it is that outwardly troubleth us, let us learn to feiu' 
 bim therein, from whose secret disposition it pro- 
 ceedeth ; who hath a voice to allay the winds and the 
 seas ; a finger to confound sorcerers and conjiu-ors ; 
 an hook for the nostrils of Sennacherib ; and a chain 
 for the devil himself, the prince of darkness. 
 
 In the second person, which were the mariners, wc 
 are directed by the hand of the Scripture, to consider 
 three effects, which the horror of the tempest wrought 
 upon them. For, (1), they were afraid ; (2), they 
 cried upon their gods ; (3), they cast out their wares : 
 the first, an affection of nature ; the second, an action 
 of religion ; the thhd, a work of necessity. Some of 
 the Kabbins held, that the mai'iuers in this ship had 
 more cause to bo astonished and perplexed than all 
 that travelled in these seas besides ; for when other 
 ships were safe and had a prosperous voyage, theirs 
 only, as the mark whereat the vengeance of God aimed, 
 was endangered. But because it appcareth not in the 
 book, I let this pass, with many other imwritten col- 
 lections ; as namely, that they were near the shore, 
 and laboured with all their force to tow then* ship to 
 land, but could not do it ; which haply may be true, 
 and as likely otherwise, and therefore I leave it indif- 
 ferent, and am content to see no more than the eye 
 of my text hath descried for me. But this I am sure 
 of: affliction hcgiuneth to school them, and drive 
 them to a bettor haven than they erst found. It ever 
 worketh good for the most part ;* and although the 
 better sort of men are corrected by love, yet the 
 greater are directed by fear. As the wind the seas, 
 so the fear of the wrath of God, in this imminent 
 danger of shipwreck appearing, shaketh and porturbeth 
 their hearts, though they bad hardened them by use 
 against all casualties by sea, like the hardest adamants. 
 All the works of the Lord, to a considerate mind, arc 
 ver\' wonderful ; his mercy reacheth to the heavens, 
 and his ffxithfulncss is above the clouds ; his wisdom 
 goeth from end to end ; his righteousness is as the 
 highest mountains, and bis judgments like agreat deep, 
 and whatsoever procecdeth from him, because that 
 artificer excclleth, must needs be excellent.f liut 
 it is as true a position : persererantia cniisiit'ludinis 
 amhit adminitionan,* the assiduity and continuance of 
 
 * August, de correctiono Donatis. 
 
 t Uubct justara vcuerationem quicquid excellit.— T";///. 
 
Ver. -i.] 
 
 LECTURE IV. 
 
 31 
 
 things bringeth them into contempt. Qiiam niulta 
 usitata calcantui; qua considcrata stupentur '.\ howmany 
 things doth custom make vile which consideration 
 would make admirable ! because the natm-e of man 
 is such, to be carried away rather with new than with 
 gi-eat things. The creation of man, who maketh 
 account of, because it is common ? But would we 
 ponder in our hearts, as David did, Ps. cxxxix., that 
 we are ' wonderfully and fearfully made, and that our 
 bones were not hid from the Lord, though they were 
 shaped in a secret place, and fashioned beneath in the 
 earth ; that he possessed our reins in our generation, 
 and covered us in our mothers' wombs ; that his eyes 
 did see us when we were yet unperfect, and all things 
 were written in his book, when before they were not ;' 
 it would enforce us to give acclamation to the work- 
 manship of our maker, as the sweet singer of Israel 
 there did, ' JlarvoUous are thy works, Lord, and 
 that my soul knoweth right well.' A tempest to 
 mariners is nothing, because they have seen, and felt, 
 and overliveti so many tempests. As David, because 
 he had killed a lion and a bear at his fold, persuaded 
 himself that he could also kill Goliath, so these, having 
 passed already so many di-eadful occurrents, begin to 
 entertaiu a credulous persuasion of security, ' No evil 
 shall approach us.' They make their hearts as fat as 
 brawn, to withstand mishaps. It fareth with them 
 as> with soldiers beaten to the field ; they have seen 
 hundi'eds fall at their right hand, and thousands at 
 theii- left, and therefore are not moved ; and though 
 they bear their Uves in their hands, they fear not 
 death ; whereupon gi'ew that judgment of the world 
 upon them, Armatis, diritm iiiiUus pudoi-,\ soldiers, 
 the greater part, fear not God himself. 
 
 Undoubtedly our seamen drink down and digest 
 their dangers with as much facility and felicity too, 
 as some their wine in bowls ; yet notwithstanding, the 
 mariners here spoken of, even the master of the ship, 
 with the vulgar sort, having such iron sinews in their 
 breasts, giants by sea, and, if I may term them so, 
 '^ioij.aypi, men that fight with God, being in their 
 proper element, the region and ground where their art 
 lieth, having fought with the waves and winds a thou- 
 sand times before, they are all stricken with fear, and 
 their hearts fall asunder within them like drops of 
 water. David, Ps. cvii., setteth down four kinds of 
 men which are most indebted to God for deliverance 
 from perils. The first, of those that have escaped a 
 dearth ; the second, prisoners enlarged ; the third, 
 such as are freed from a mortal sickness ; the last, 
 sea-faring men, of whom bo writeth thus : ' They that 
 go down into the sea in ships, and occupy then- mer- 
 chandise by great waters ; they see the work of the 
 Lord, and his wonders in the deep. For he com- 
 mandeth and raiseth up the stormy winds, and it 
 lifteth up the waves thereof; they mount up to heaven, 
 
 * August, de Trin. lib. iii. chap 2, epist. ad Volua. 
 t Tull. % Pit. Italic. 
 
 and descend again to the deep, so that their soul 
 melteth for trouble. They are tossed to and fro, and 
 stagger hke a drunken man, and all their cunning is 
 gone.' A lively image of then- uncertain and variable 
 lives ; and, if you hearken to the comparison, it is 
 next to famine, imprisonment, a deadly disease, to 
 be a seaman. Sailors and adventurers are neither 
 amongst the living, nor amongst the dead.* They 
 hang between both, ready to ofl'er up their souls to 
 every flaw of wind, and billow of water wherewith they 
 are assaulted. Yet these are the men, and such the 
 instruments and means, whereby your wealth cometh 
 in, that hve by merchandise ; you eat, and drink, and 
 weai- upon your backs, you traffic and spend the blood 
 of your sons and servants. So David called the water 
 of the well of Bethlehem, blood, 1 Chron. xi. 13, 
 because it was brought through the army of the 
 PhiUstines with the hazard of men's Uves. You owe 
 much unto God for the preservation of their lives, 
 your ships, and commodities, and are bound to re- 
 hearse unto your souls day and night that verse of 
 thanksgiving which David repeateth in the psalm be- 
 fore named, as the burden and amwhaum. to those 
 songs of deliverance : ' Let us therefore confess be- 
 fore the Lord his loving kindness, and his wonderful 
 works before the sons of men : let us exalt him in the 
 congi-egation of the people, and praise him in the 
 assembly of the elders.' And as you fear his majesty 
 yom-selves, ' who turneth the floods into a wilderness, 
 and a wilderness into springs of water,' who ' breaketh 
 the ships of the sea with an east wind,' Ps. xlviii., so 
 see that your factors beyond the seas, with all the 
 officers and ministers belonging to j-our company, be 
 men of the like afl'ection. It is not the tallness of 
 your ships, nor their swiftness, manning, and mimi- 
 tion, that can protect them against God's vengeance. 
 You call them lions, leopards, bears, and scorning the 
 names of beasts, you term them angels, archangels ; 
 but remember that when all is done, that as The- 
 mistocles called the navy of Athens wooden walls, so 
 yours are but wooden beasts, and wooden angels. 
 And ' woe be to him that saith to a stone. Thou art 
 my father ; and to a piece of wood, Thou art my 
 helper.' They have good fortune written upon their 
 beaks, saith Plutarch, but many misfortunes in the 
 success of then- labom's. Horace spake to as proud 
 a ship, it should seem, as any those times knew ; f 
 
 Though Pontus pines thy frame, 
 
 A forest fair thy dame, 
 
 Proud be thy stock, 
 
 And worthless name : 
 
 The winds will mock, 
 
 To see thy shame. 
 
 Take heed. 
 
 * Navigantes neque inter vivos, ncque inter mortuog. 
 —Pittac. 
 
 t 1 Car. od. 14,— 
 
 Quamvia Pontija piniis, 
 Svlva; filia nobilis, &c. 
 
32 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 Tlie navy of Tyrus, if the prophet describe it aright, 
 Ezek. sxvii., was the noblest navy that over the seas 
 v.'ere furrowed with ; ' the builders thereof made it of 
 perfect beauty. The boards of the fir-trees of Senir ; 
 the masts of the cedars of Lebanon ; the oars of the 
 oaks of Bashan ; the banks of the ivory of Chittim ; 
 the sails of the fine embroidered linen of Egypt ; the 
 coverings blue silk and purple, of the isles of Elishah. 
 They of Zidon and Arvad were her. mariners ; the 
 wisest in Tyre her pilots ; the ancients of Gebal her 
 caulkers ; they of Persia, and Lud, and Phut, her sol- 
 diers ; the Gammadims were in her towers, and hung 
 their shields upon the walls round about ; and the 
 king of Tyi'e said in the haughtiness of his heart : 
 I am a god ; I sit in the seat of God, in the midst of 
 the sea ; ' yet see the end in the same place ; ' her 
 rowers brought her into great waters, and the east 
 wind brake her in the midst of the sea ; ' her riches, 
 together with mariners, pilots, and caulkers, merchants, 
 and men of war, all were overthrown, and came to a 
 fearful ruin. The fear of the Lord will be instead of 
 all these provisions ; fear him, and both floods and 
 rocks shall fear you, and all winds shall blow you 
 happiness, and shipwrecks shall avoid the place where 
 your foot troadeth ; and as the apples of God's own 
 eyes, so shall they reverence you, and not dare to 
 approach the channel where your way lieth ; hills shall 
 fidl down, and mountains shall be cast into the sea; 
 but those that fear the Lord shall never miscarry ; the 
 fear of the Lord shall both land your ships in an happy 
 haven, and after your travels upon the earth, harbour 
 your souls in his everlasting kingdom. 
 
 Theij were afraid. I will not examine what kind of 
 fear it was which sini^rised these mariners. There is 
 a fear that accompnnieth the nature of man, and the 
 Son of God himself was not free from it : Mark xiv., 
 It is written of him that he ' began to be afraid ;' 
 which fear of his, and other the like unpleasant affec- 
 tions, ho took upon him (our divines say), as ho took 
 our flesh, and undertook death rather in pity, than of 
 necessity.* And Jerome upon the place of the evan- 
 gelist before cited, noteth, that the fear of our blessed 
 Saviour was not a passion which overbare his mind, 
 but a pro-passion, TfocaSs/a, which he seemeth to col- 
 lect from the word itself ; he began, ii'f^aro, to bo 
 afraid. 
 
 There is, besides, a fond and superstitious fear, 
 when men are afraid of their shadows, as Pisander was 
 afraid of meeting liis own soul ; and Autenor would 
 would never go forth of the doors, but either in a coach 
 closed upon all sides, or with a target boi'ne over his 
 head, fearing, I guess, lest the sky should fall down 
 ii])on it, according to that in the psalm, they fear where 
 no fear is, Ps. xiii. I'i//'/. The disciples were abashed 
 at the sight of their master after his resun-ection, su))- 
 posing they had seen a spirit, when neither had they 
 
 * Non humanffi conditionis necessitate, seJ miserationis 
 vohuittite. — Senten. iii. (list. 15. 
 
 seen a spirit at any time to move that conceit, neither 
 is it possible that a spiritual substance can sensibly bo 
 perceived. We may easily acquit this company from 
 such foolish fear, it hath so apparent a reason to be 
 grounded upon. 
 
 There is another fear, the object whereof is only 
 God ; which, by the prayer and cry that followeth in 
 the next words, seemeth to be the fear meant (though 
 ignorantly misplaced), and this in some is a servile 
 fear, full of hatred, mahce, contumely, reproach, if they 
 dm'st be^Tay it, tristis, ini/tilis, cnidelis, qniejuia veniani 
 non quirrit, non conscfjuitiir, saith Bernard,* it fleeth 
 and abhorreth the Lord, because he is Veus percuticnx, 
 a God of vengeance ; in other it is filial, such as the 
 child hououreth his father \rith, perfectly good, wherein 
 there is nothing but love, reverence, purity, ingenuity, 
 born of ' a free spirit ;' Ps. li., the spirit of bondage and 
 slavei-y wholly abandoned, so near in affinity to love, 
 that you can hardly discern them. Peiie Ilia est, et 
 penc non est ; it is almost love, and almost not love,f 
 so little difference is ; it never beholdeth God, but in 
 the gracious light of his countenance ; ' There is mercy 
 with thee, Lord, therefore shalt thou be feared,' 
 howsoever the clouds of displeasure seem sometimes 
 to hide that gi-ace away. The fear of these men I 
 cannot decide, whether it were mixed with hope, or 
 altogether desperate, and it skilleth not greatly to 
 inquire, because they apply it not to the true and living 
 God. But let this be observed as a matter (saith the 
 psalm), of deep understanding, and one of the secrets 
 within the sanctuary of the Lord, that sea-beaten 
 mariners, barbarians by country, and men as barbarous 
 for the most part for their conditions, fearing neither 
 God n,or man, of sundry nations some, and most of 
 sundry religions, it may be epicures, but, as my text 
 bewrayeth them, idolaters, they all know that there is 
 a God, whom they know not ; they fear a supreme 
 majesty, which they cannot co7nprehend ; the}' rever- 
 ence, invocate, and cry upon a nature above the nature 
 of man and all inferior things ; potent, benevolent, 
 apt to help, whereof they never attained unto any 
 special revelation. This man adoreth the god of his 
 country, that man some other god, and Jonah is 
 raised up to call upon his God ; but all have some 
 one god or other, to whom they make supplication, and 
 bemoan then- danger. 
 
 If Jonah had preached the living and immortal God 
 unto them, the God of the Hebrews, the God of Abra- 
 ham, Isaac, and Jacob, the Holy One of Israel, I 
 W(udd have imputed their devotion to the preaching 
 of Jonah. Or had there been any other soul in the 
 ship, belonging to the covenant, and ' born within the 
 house' (as the proiihet speaketh), that might have 
 informed them in this behalf. There was not one. 
 Who then instructeth them ? Nature. Ntiiitir intel- 
 le-rernnt (lUqnid esse veneramhim sub errore reU(jionis;l 
 
 * Epist. Ixxxvii., ad Oger. 
 
 t Gillibcrt. in Cant. iii. ser. xi.x. % Hicron. 
 
-i] 
 
 LECTURE IV. 
 
 33 
 
 the mariners nnderstood even in the falsehood of that 
 rehgion which they held, that something was to be 
 worshipped. 
 
 It is not denied by any sort of divines, ancient or 
 recent, but that by nature itself, a man may conceive 
 there is a God. There is no nation so wild and bar- 
 barous which is not seasoned with some opinion touch- 
 ing God.* The Athenians set up an altar Ljnoto Deo, 
 ' to an unknown God,' Acts xvii. ' The Gentiles not 
 having the law, do by nature the things contained in 
 the law, and are a law unto themselves, and show the 
 effect of the law written in their hearts, their con- 
 science bearing witness, and their thoughts accusing 
 one another or excusing.' Rom. ii., ' For the invisible 
 things of him, that is, his eternal power and Godhead, 
 are seen by the creation of the world, being considered 
 in his works, to the intent that they should be without 
 excuse,' Rom. i. These are common impressions and 
 notions (Kio;a; bo'^ai, Koivai hmiai) sealed up in the 
 mind of every man, a remnant of integi'ity after the 
 fall of Adam, a substance or blessing in the dead elm, 
 sparkles of fire raked up under the ashes, which can- 
 not die whilst the soul livoth. Nature within man, 
 and nature without man, which Jerome calleth Xotii- 
 ram et fncturain, nature and the creatui'e ; our invisible 
 consents, and God's visible works ; an inward motion 
 in the one, and an outward motion of the other ; if 
 there were no further helps, shew that there is a God, 
 and leave us without excuse. f Protagoras Abderites, 
 because he began his book with doubt, De diU, neqne 
 Ht sint, iieqiie ut noil sint, haheo dicere, I have nothing 
 to say of the gods, either that they be, or that they 
 be not, by the commandment of the Athenians was 
 banished then" city and country, and his books pub- 
 licly and solemnly burned to ashes. I may call it a 
 light that shineth in darkness (though the purity and 
 beams thereof be mightily defaced), which some cor- 
 rupt and abuse, and so become superstitious and vanish 
 away in then- vain cogitations ; and others extinguish, 
 and so become mere atheists. For so it is, as if we 
 took the lights in the house and put them out, to have 
 the more hberty in the works of darkness. Thus do 
 the atheists of our time ; the light of the Scripture 
 principally, and the light of the creatm-e, and the light 
 of nature they extinguish within the chambers of then' 
 hearts, and with resolute, dissolute persuasions, 
 threep % upon their souls against reason and conscience 
 that there is no God, lest, by the sight of his justice, 
 their race of impiety should be stopped. I trust I 
 may safely speak it, there are no atheists amongst 
 
 * Nulla est gens tam fera, &e. — Tul. 
 t Tul. Acadcm. qucBSt. 
 
 X A word still retained in the Scottish dialect, signifying 
 to argue. — Ed. 
 
 you, though many haply such as Agrippa was. Acts 
 xxvi., but ' almost Christians ;' I ' would to God j-ou 
 were not only almost, but altogether such' as you 
 seem to profess. But there are in our land that 
 trouble us, with virulent, pestilent, miscreant posi- 
 tions ; I would they were cut ofl', the children of hell, 
 by as proper right as the devil himself, the savour of 
 whose madness stinketh, from the centre of the earth 
 to the highest heavens. Let them be confuted ■nith 
 arguments drawn from out the scabbards of magis- 
 trates, ai'guments without reply, that may both stop 
 the mouth and choke the breath of this execrable 
 impiety ; and, as the angel cursed Meroz, Judg. v., 
 so cursed be the man (and let the curse cleave to his 
 childi-en) ' that cometh not forth to help the Lord in 
 this cause.' Is it fit to dispute by reason, whether 
 there be a God or no ? which heaven, earth, angels, 
 men, and devils, all ages of the world, all languages ; 
 and in the atheist himseU' (who bindeth a napkin to 
 the eyes of his knowledge), shame, fear, and a thou- 
 sand witnesses like gnawing worms within his breast, 
 did ever heretofore, and to the end of the world shall 
 acknowledge? Let us leave such questions, 'ramSo^ou;, 
 docj^ouc, I'ToSigsi;,* incredible, inglorious, infamous 
 questions, to the tribunal and trial of the highest judge, 
 if there be no throne upon the earth that will deter- 
 mine them ; and for our own safety, and the freeing 
 of our souls, let us hate the very air that the atheist 
 di-aweth, as John eschewed the bath wherein Cerin- 
 thus was ; and let their damned spirits ' having 
 received damnation in themselves,' auroxardxpiroi. 
 Tit. iii. 11, ripen and be rotten to perdition ; let them 
 sleep their everlasting sleep in filthiness not to be 
 revoked, and when death hath gnawn upon them like 
 sheep for a taste beforehand, let them rise again from 
 the sides of the pit, maugre their stout gainsaying, at 
 the judgment of the gi'eat day, to receive a deeper 
 portion. 
 
 As for ourselves, my brethren, which know and 
 profess that one and only God for ever to be blessed, 
 let us be zealous of good works, according to the 
 measure of oiu' knowledge which we have received. 
 Let us fear him (without fear) as his adopted sons, 
 and serve him without the spirit of bondage, in right- 
 eousness, all the days of our lives, that at the coming 
 of the Son of God to judge the ends of the earth, we 
 may be found faithful servants ; and as we have dealt 
 truly in a little, we may be made rulers over much, 
 through the riches of his grace, who hath freely and 
 formerly beloved us, not for our own sakes, but be- 
 cause himself is love,f and taketh dehght in his own 
 goodness, t 
 
 * Aid. Gel. t Amat (jnia amat. — Bern. 
 
 c 
 
34, 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 i 
 
 LECTUEE V. 
 
 And cried evenj man upon his yod, and cast the naves in the ship into the sea to lighten it of them. — 
 
 JON.\H I. 5. 
 
 I SHEWED before, that by the instinct of natm-e 
 itself, the mariners might conceive there was a 
 God. Here it appeareth by the multitude they wor- 
 ship, ' every man his god,' that nature alone sufficeth 
 not without further revelation. Nature may teach 
 that there is a God ; but what in substance and pro- 
 priety, and how to bo worshipped, must elsewhere be 
 learned. Nature without grace is as Samson without 
 his guide. Judges xvi., when his eyes were out, with- 
 out whose direction he could not find the pillars of 
 the house ; nor the natural man any pillar or principle 
 of faith mthout the Spirit of God guiding his steps 
 unto it ; or as Barak without Deborah, Judges iv., who 
 would not go against Sisera, unless the prophetess 
 went with him. Such is the faintness of nature, 
 except it be strengthened with a better aid. Vw soli : 
 if nature be single, woe to it, she falleth down, and 
 there is not another to help her up. Therefore our 
 Saviour maketh a plain distinction betwixt these two, 
 Mat. xvi. : ' Blessed art thou Simon the son of Jonas, 
 for flesh and blood hath not revealed this unto thee ;' 
 the aflirmative part followeth, ' but my Father which 
 is Ln heaven ;' when he made that notable and funda- 
 mental confession. Afterwards, when he had dehorted 
 his master, with carnal persuasions, ' Sir, pity theyself,' 
 he biddeth him avaunt, not by the name of Peter, nor 
 the son of Jonas, nor Cephas, but of Satan himself. 
 Nature was then alone, and the heavenly light had 
 withdrawn her influence from him. No man living 
 had ever gi-eater endowments, and blessings of nature, 
 than the apostle Saint Paul. First he was ' a man 
 that was a Jew,' Acts xxii., as gi'cat a comfort unto 
 him, no doubt, as it was to Plato to be born at Athens, 
 rather than in Barbary ; and although ' born at Tarsus 
 in Cilicia, yet brought up in the city of Jerusalem, at 
 the feet of Gamaliel, and instructed according to the 
 perfect manner of the law of the fathers, and zealous 
 towards God.' You have his birth, education, master, 
 learning, and devotion already set down ; we may add 
 his sect and profession, out of the same history, chap, 
 xxvi., for, 'after the strictest sect of the Jewish 
 religion, he hved a phiu'isee.' In his epistle to the 
 Philippians, chap, iii., he concludeth from the whole 
 heap of his prerogatives, ' K any other man thinketh 
 that he hath whereof to trust in the flesh, much more 
 I : cii-cumcised the eighth da}', of the kindred of 
 Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the 
 Hebrews, by profession a pharisee ; concerning zeal, 
 I persecuted the church ; touching righteousness in the 
 law, I was unrebukeable ;' so ho persecuted the church, 
 you see out of that place ; and ho ' verily thought in 
 liimself that he ought to do many things contrary to 
 
 the name of Jesus of Nazareth, which thing he also 
 did in Jerusalem,' Acts xxvi. Thus, notwithstanding, 
 he had, (1) received the sign of the covenant, circum- 
 cision, not as the manner of proselj'tes was at the 
 time of their conversion, sometimes old, sometimes 
 young, but, (2) according to the law, the eighth day ; 
 and, (3) his kindred and descent were fi'om Israel, 
 not from Esau, which lost the inheritance ; (4) his 
 tribe such as never fell to idolatry, but continued in 
 the service of God ; and, (5) his antiquity in that line 
 not inferior to the ancientest, being as able to shew 
 his great, and great-grandfathers, from the fu'st root 
 of the Hebrews, as any man ; besides those personal 
 advantages of profession, emulation, conversation, 
 yet till there shined a clearer light from heaven, not 
 only upon his face, but upon his heart, and he was 
 thi'own to the gi'ound. Acts is., both from his horse 
 and from his confidence in the flesh, and heard a voice 
 speaking unto him, ' Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou 
 me ?' and was instructed who it was that spake unto 
 him, ' I am Jesus of Nazareth,' &c., and received 
 direction for his life to come, ' Aiise and go to Da- 
 mascus,' all the knowledge he had before was but 
 dung, and loss, and not worth the reckoning. 
 Socrates was a man excellent for human wisdom, the 
 hke to whom could not be found among manj- thou- 
 sands of men ; qualem non rcpperis uniim ; of whom, 
 notwithstanding, Lactantius* writeth thus : ut cater- 
 arum aryueret inscitiam, qui se aliquid tenere arbitra- 
 abantur, ait se nihil scire, iiisi uuiim quod nihil sdret : 
 to convince the ignorance of others, who thought they 
 knew something, he professed to know nothing but 
 this one, that he knew nothing. He further testified 
 openly, and in a place of judgment, that there was no 
 wisdom of man ; and the learning, whereof the philo- 
 sophers then gloried, he so contemned, scorned, 
 renounced, f that he professed it his greatest learning 
 to have learned nothing. It is not unknown what 
 Cicero said : Utinain tain facile vera invenire possein, 
 quam falsa convinctre : I would I were as able to find 
 out truth, as to refute falsehood ; the most renowned 
 orator that ever Kome, or the earth bare. Daniel, 
 chap, ii., saw more m the secrets and counsels of God 
 than all the wizards of Babylon besides. The en- 
 chanters and the astrologians, and the sorcerers and 
 Chaldeans, as they are numbered in the second of 
 Daniel, they confess plainly before the king, concora- 
 ing his dream, ' there is none other that can declare 
 it before the king, except God, whose dwelling is not 
 with flesh ;' yet they arc called in the same prophecy, 
 
 * De ira Dei. 
 
 t Coutcmpsit, dcrisit, abjrcit. — Lact. deoriyine crroris. 
 
,Ver. O.J 
 
 LECTURE V. 
 
 35 
 
 the 'king's wise men.' But by the judgment of the 
 queen, wife of Belshazzar, Daniel esceedeth them all 
 in wisdom, chap. v. : ' There is a man in the kingdom,' 
 saith she, ' in whom is the spirit of the^holj- gods, and 
 in the days of thy father, hght and understanding, 
 and wisdom, like the wisdom of the gods, was found 
 in him.' Pharaoh made no less report of Joseph in 
 the ears of all his servants. Genesis xli. : ' Can we 
 find such a man as this, in whom is the Spu'it of God ?' 
 It was wisdom m them, that they were able in some 
 sort to discern such spirits, and to give them their 
 projier names, though secretly condemning themselves 
 thereby, to have but the spirits of men or beasts, 
 when Daniel and Joseph were inspired far otherwise. 
 The little flock of Christ exempted onlj', to whom ' it 
 is given to know mysteries,' we may seek the whole 
 world besides with cresset light, and inquu'e as the 
 apostle did, 1 Cor. i., ' A\Tiere is the wise ? where is 
 the scribe '? where is the disputer of this world ? hath 
 not God made the wisdom of this world foolishness ?' 
 To what other end is that confession or thanksgiving 
 of om' Saviour in the eleventh of Matthew ? ' I give 
 thee thanks, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, 
 because thou hast hid these things from the wise, and 
 men of understanding, and hast ojjened them unto babes; ' 
 wise, and yet fools, men of understanding, j'et they 
 understand nothing. How are wisdom and folly 
 bound up together in one heart ? or what agreement 
 between light and darkness in one eye ? No marvel 
 if we ask of it, for the Lord himself calleth it a 
 marvellous work, Isa. xxix. 14, 'Even a marvellous 
 work, and a wonder : for the wisdom of the wise men 
 shall perish, and the understanding of the prudent 
 men shall be hid.' Before, he bade them ' stay them- 
 selves, and wonder, that men should be drunken, but 
 not with wine ; and stagger, but not with strong 
 drink.' The cause followeth, ' the Lord hath covered 
 them with a spirit of slumber, and shut their ej'es.' 
 
 There are many and mighty nations at this day ; 
 their soil most happy, their air sweetly disposed ; 
 people, for flesh and blood, as towardly as the gi-ound 
 carrieth, most provident to forecast, most ingenious 
 to invent, most able and active to perfoi"m, of whom 
 you would say, if you tried them, ' Surely this is a 
 wise people, and of gi-eat understanding ;' to whom, 
 notwithstanding, if Christ should speak in person, as 
 he spake to Saul before his illumination, ' why jjerse- 
 cutest thou me ?' why do you stumble at my gospel, 
 and are ofl'ended at my name, and account the preach- 
 ing of my cross foolishness '? they would ask, as he 
 did, ' Who art thou ?' or what is thy gospel, name, 
 and cross, that thou tellest us of ? So bhnd they arc 
 to behold our day-spring, so ignorant and untaught 
 touching Jesus of Nazareth. Or if we should ask 
 them of the Holy Ghost, ' Have you received the 
 Holy Ghost since you behoved ?' Acts xix. 2, nay, do 
 you beheve that there is an Holy Ghost ? they would 
 answer as the Ephesians did to Paul, ' We have not 
 
 so much as heard whether there be an Holy Ghost,' 
 ' What new doctrine is this ?' they seem to be ' setters 
 forth of new gods,' and though they aclmowledge some 
 God, which nature itself obtrudeth unto their thoughts, 
 yet they know not ' the God of Shadrach, Meshach, 
 and Abednego,' Dan. iii., whom Nebuchadnezzar with 
 that dill'erence confessed, after his understanding was 
 restored unto him ; nor the God of Daniel, whom 
 Darius by that name magnified, Dan. vi., after he saw 
 the deliverance of his prophet from the lion's den ; 
 nor the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to whom 
 the promises were made ; nor ' the Lord God of 
 heaven, which hath made the sea and the dry land,' 
 here specified. 
 
 Is it not a wonder, think you, that the people of 
 the Turks, the hammer of the world, as sometimes 
 Babylon, the rod of Christendom, able to say, as the 
 Psalm spake of Gilead and Manasses, &c., Asia is 
 mine, Africa is mine, over Em-ope have I cast my 
 shoe, a warlike, politic, statelj', magnificent nation, 
 should more be carried away by the enchantments of 
 their lewd prophet Mahomet, than by the celestial 
 doctrine of the everlasting Son of God, who shed bis 
 blood, and gave his soul a ransom for the sin of man- 
 kind ? Wiat is the reason hereof ? want they natm-e ? 
 or an arm of flesh ? are they not cut fi'om the same 
 rock '? are they not tempered of the same mould ? are 
 not their heads upward toward heaven, as the heads 
 of other men ? have they not reasonable souls, capable 
 and judicious ? What want they, then ? It is leclus 
 spiritus, a ' right spirit,' Ps. li., whereof they are 
 destitute ; thej' have a spirit, I gi'ant, to eulivo their 
 bodies, but not rectified, sanctified, regenerated, 
 renewed, to quicken their souls. They have a heart 
 to conceive, but it is a froward heart, a slow heart, a 
 stony heart, a vain and foolish heart, a scornful, con- 
 temptuous, insolent, incredulous heart, against him 
 that framed it. Now if Egypt be so dark that the 
 darkness thereof may be felt, and it is a wonder in 
 om' eyes to see such mists in other places ; yet let 
 Goshen rejoice that it staudeth enlightened still. And 
 those that have seen an happy stfir in the east to lead 
 them to Christ, which Herod and his princes, the 
 Turk and his pachas never saw, let them come and 
 worship, and bring presents unto the King of glory ; not 
 of gold, myrrh, and frankincense, but of the finest 
 metal, purest odours, frankest ofl'ering of thankful 
 hearts. And let them not think, but where more is 
 received, more will be required ; and that they must 
 answer to the Lord for these talents, not only for 
 nature, but for a special inspiration besides, wherewith 
 they are endued. And so to end this point ; blessed 
 are yom* eyes, for they see, and your eai's, for they 
 hear ; I will not say, that which many prophets and 
 righteous men have desired, but to change the speech 
 a httle, that which many mighty empires and large 
 continents, and not small cantons or corners, but 
 whole quarters of the world, never attained unto, and 
 
S6 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 will bitterly rue the time, and wisli to redeem with 
 the loss of both their eyes, that they have not heard 
 and seen as much "as you have done. 
 
 Thcij cried cvertj man upon God. To come now to 
 my pm-pose : these mariners fear, but where no fear 
 is'; they fear nothing, because they fear but idols and 
 fancies," the suppositious of their own brains. And as 
 they fear, so they pray, which was the second action ; 
 and (theur eiTor therein being pardoned) a natiu-al, 
 necessary service belonging to every mortal man ; and 
 theu- prayer is consequent to their fear. For upon 
 the reverence they carried towards their imaginary 
 gods, they betook themselves to this submissive and 
 suppUaut service. 
 
 Primus in orbs Deos fecit timor.* 
 
 Unless we feared, we could not think that there 
 were a God. But this action of theirs hath something 
 good in it, something to be reproved. 
 
 1. In that they praij, it shcweth the debility and 
 wealmess of the nature of man, if it be not holpen, and 
 commendeth the necessity and use of prayer in all sorts 
 of men. 
 
 2. In that they pray with crying and vehemency, it 
 noteth that their hearts were fixed, and earnestly longed 
 for that which their lips craved. 
 
 3. In that they cry to their f/ods, it proveth it a 
 tribute due unto God alone, by the practice of heathen 
 men. 
 
 4. In that they pray every man, as if in a common 
 cause, though they had not a common religion, yet 
 they had one soul, heart, and tongue common to them 
 all,' it noteth the communion and fellowship of man- 
 kind. Thus far the observations hold good. Their 
 praying sheweth the misery of mortal men ; crying in 
 prayer, their eaniest desire to obtain ; praying to gods, 
 themajesty of the immortal power ; praying together, 
 that bond of humanity and brotherhood wherewith we 
 are coupled. 
 
 5. Their error is a part of their object, in the num- 
 ber of the gods which they invocate, that every person 
 in the ship hath a proper and peculiar god whom he 
 calleth upon. 
 
 The gods of the nations have been mnltiplied as the 
 sands of the sea ; what have they not deified ? It 
 cost but a little frankincense, E.riyua thuris impensa, 
 to give the godhead where it pleased them. They 
 have 'turned the glory of the immortal God into the 
 similitude of the image ot corruptible man, and of 
 birds, and four-footed beasts, and of creeping things,' 
 Rom. i. Besides the sun and moon, and the whole 
 host of heaven, they have consecrated for gods the 
 sons of men, wliosc breath is a vapour in their nostrils, 
 who shall be consumed before the unprofitable moths ; 
 of which foolish idolatiy one of their own sophists f 
 sometime spake in derision. Bono estole animo, quando 
 diimoriuntur ante homines, Bo of good courage, since 
 gods die before men. And not only men have they 
 
 * Statius. t Theocritus in Clo. Alex, protrcp. 
 
 thus hallowed, but their qualities and virtues, justice, 
 prudence, and the like ; j'ca, their aflections and per- 
 turbations, fear, hope, love, with the rest, whereof 
 Lactantius* writeth, Audax consilium Gracia quod 
 cupidiuem et amorem consecrant, Greece was very bold 
 in making love a god. Shall I add, moreover, the 
 defects and infirmities of men ? they had their dumb 
 goddess, Tka Muta, by Lactantius a thing most ridi- 
 culously taxed in them : Qui<l pnrMarc colcnti potest, 
 quie loqui non potest ? What good can she do to her 
 suitors, that cannot speak ? They are not yet filthy 
 enough, unless they erect altars and shrines to these 
 vices, to impudence and contumely, as Epimenidcs did 
 at Athens, t and- to those plagues which their sins 
 deserved, as to furies, unA fiends, revenye, and the like 
 mischiefs. TuUus Hostilius put fear and paleness, 
 pavorem palloremqiie, in the number of his gods. It 
 is pity, saith Lactantius, that ever his gods should go 
 fi'om him ; and the people of Rome held rust, and the 
 ayiu>, in no less account. The fruits of the ground, 
 as corn and vine, the ver^' land marlcs in the field, 
 terminus, rude and imshapen stones, were not debarred 
 of this honour. They had their god for dunyiny their 
 land, Slercutius, and (the basest thing that could be 
 imagined) a goddess for their drattylit -houses, ( 'haciua ; 
 and not to disquiet any longer Christian cars with their 
 heathenish absm-dities, drunkards f Bacchus), harlots 
 ( Venus), and thieves ( Laverna j, were not left without 
 their patrons. A poet of their own I inveighed against 
 their multitude of gods in a satire long since : 
 
 Nee turba deorura 
 Talia ut est hodie, contentaque svdcra paucis 
 Numinibus, miserum urgebant Atlanta minora 
 Pondere. 
 
 There were not wont to be so many gods as ncw- 
 a-days ; the heavens were content with a smaller num- 
 ber of them, and laid less burden upon th(> shoulders 
 of poor Atlas. We read in the history of the sacred 
 book that Astarolh was the idol of Zidon, Melchom of 
 Ammon, Chemosh of Moab, Beelzebub of Ekron; and 
 for every nation that came out of Asshur to inhabit 
 Samaria, who were therefore destroyed by lions, 
 ' because they knew not that manner of worship which 
 the God of the country required,' 2 Iviugs xvii.,'a 
 several god was found out : for the men of Babel, 
 Succoth-Benoth ; for the men of Cuth, Nergal ; for 
 Hamath, Ashima ; Nibhaz and Tirtak for tlie Avims ; 
 for Shcpharvaim, Adramclech and Auammelech, to 
 which they burned their children in the fire. 
 
 Tanfnm rrligio pnluit suadcro malonim : 
 so much mischief could their veiT religion persuade 
 unto them. Lactantius § setteth down the cause of 
 this vainness in the thoughts and darkness in the 
 liearts of men, that ' wherein they profess themselves 
 to be most wise, therein they become most fools.' 
 
 * Do fals. rclig., lib i. cap. 10. 
 t Clem. AIpx. in protropt. 
 5 Institut. lib. iii. cap. 10. 
 
 \ Juvenal. 
 
Ver. 5.] 
 
 LECTUEE V. 
 
 37 
 
 Men are therefore deceived, because cither thej- take 
 upon them reUgion without wisdom, or study wisdom 
 without religion ; so they fall to many religions, but 
 therefore false, because they have forsaken wisdom, 
 which could teach them that there cannot be many 
 gods ; or they bestow their pains in wisdom, but there- 
 fore false, because they have let slip the rehgion of the 
 highest God, which might instruct them in the know- 
 ledge of truth. To shew the absurthties wherewith 
 this opinion tloweth of devising many gods, Cyprian* 
 proveth that the majesty and sublimity of the Godhead 
 cannot admit an equal. Let us borrow an example 
 from the earth, saith he : when did you ever know 
 society and communion in ^ kingdom either begin 
 with fidelity, or end without bloodshed ? f Thus 
 was germanity and brotherhood bi-oken betwixt the 
 Thebans (Eteocles and Polynices). One kingdom 
 could not hold those brethren of Rome (Romulus and 
 Remus), though the harbom' of one womb contained 
 them. Pompey and Cresar, though so nearly allied, 
 yet they could not endure, 
 
 Cnjsarve priorem, 
 Pompeiusve p.irem. . . . 
 
 either Cresar his better, or Pompey his peer. Neither 
 marvel, saith he, to see it thus in man, when all nature 
 doth consent therein. The bees have but one king, Ec.v 
 wiuti est (ipibus, &c. ; flocks and herds but one leader, 
 much more hath the world but one governor. That 
 which was spoken to this effect in general, Ouk ayaMi 
 TToXuMisaviri, that the kingdom of many governors is not 
 good, Cicsar applied to his own name, oux ayaAm 
 'iroy.xjy.a.iaas'r/), in exception to the multitudes of Cffisars 
 or emperors. The College of bishops in Rome 
 answered Marcellus, when he would have built but 
 one temple both to honour and virtue. One chapel or 
 chancel cannot well be dedicated to two gods.* I 
 often allege Lactantius in these matters, a man that 
 hath notably deserved of the gospel of Christ against 
 the vanities of Gentility, who being, as it were, a 
 stream issuing from the eloquence of Tully, Quasi 
 quidaiii Jliiviiis eloquentke Tullkmu:, as Jerome com- 
 mended him, converted all the force of his eloquence 
 to assault, beat down, vanquish, triumph over the 
 enemies of true religion. Thomas Beacon, a country- 
 man of ours, in an epistle to D. No well (cherubim to 
 cherubim), givoth him this commendation to close up 
 bis appetite amongst many others before uttered. I 
 cannot but cry out, Cdius, a man truly celestial and 
 divine ; Lactantius, an author sweeter than any milk 
 and honey; Firmiaiuis, a champion in defending 
 Christian verity, most firm, faithful, and constant. 
 Behold the man, &c., alluding to his happy names, 
 which he rightly fitted by answerable good conditions. 
 This Lactantius presseth his arguments nearer to the 
 
 * De vanitate idolorum, tract. 4. 
 
 t Quando unqiuim aut cum fide caepit, aut sine cruoro 
 desiit? Sic Tliebanorum germanitas rupta. 
 
 X Una cella duobus diis non rectO dicanda Val. Max. 
 
 mark : If there be more Gods than one, then singly 
 and apart they must needs have less strength,* for so 
 much shall be wanting to every one as the rest have 
 gleaned from him ; and the nature of goodness cannot 
 be perfect and absolute, but where the whole, not 
 whore a little portion of the whole is. If they shall 
 say, that as there are sundry offices to be looked unto, 
 so they are divided amongst many officers, all comcth to 
 the same end.f For their several jurisdictions cannot 
 exceed their bounds, because they are crossed and 
 kept in bj' others, as two contrary winds cannot blow 
 together in one place; for if they have equal force, one 
 hindereth the other ; if unequal, the weaker of the 
 two must perforce yield. Again, if offices be shared 
 amongst them, besides that the care of every god will 
 go no farther than his own charge and province, thej' 
 must of necessity often fall out, as they did in Homer, 
 where the court is divided into two factions, some 
 alleging for Troy, that it should be defended, others 
 against it, that it should be sacked. If in an army of 
 men there should bo as many generals as there are 
 regiments, bands, and companies, neither could they 
 well aiTay, nor easily govern and hold in their soldiers. 
 And to say that the world is ruled by the disposition 
 of many gods, is such a kind of speech as if a man 
 should affirm there were many minds in one body, 
 because the members thereof have diverse ministries, 
 every sense to have a peculiar mind set over it; which 
 whoso saith, Ke ipsam quidcm quw una est habere 
 videatur, proveth himself destitute of that which is 
 but one in every man. But amongst the rest, there 
 is some one principal supereminent, as Antisthenes 
 sometimes said that there were many popular gods, 
 having tuition of the divers nations and people of the 
 world (perhaps he meant vulgar and tri\-ial gods), and 
 but one natm-al, MuUi dii popalarcs, unus uaturalis, by 
 whom the whole crcatm'e was formed ; then are the 
 rest not gods (Lactantius inferreth), but servants and 
 attendants. He addoth to his former confutations the 
 testimony of the Sybils, that there is but one only 
 God, ih /j,6\iog 'ieri Ssoj ; and the reason which Mcr- 
 curius Trismegistus bringeth why God is without 
 name, is, because he is but one, and one hath no 
 need of any name, o iic, oK)/Aaro$ oO Tsosdhrai, for 
 there is no use of a proper name for distinction from 
 the rest, but where there are more of the same kind 
 to enforce it. Clemens Alexandrinus framoth the like 
 discourse : that which is one is not subject to division ;J 
 wherefore it is infinite, and wantcth both difl'erence and 
 name. For though we call him unproperly sometimes, 
 either one, or i/ood, or tliat that is, or Father, or God, 
 or maker, or Lord, we do not this to declare his name, 
 but to shew the ampleness of au unexplicable sub- 
 
 * Do fals. relig , lib. i. cap. 3. Minus habebunt singuli 
 
 nervorum. . 
 
 t Virtutis perfecta natura, &c. At ofhcia multi partiti sunt._ 
 X Nee opus est proprio vocabulo, nisi cum nomen exigi 
 
 multitudo.— Strom. 5. 
 
38 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 stance.* To conclude, God teiineth himself I am, 
 Exod. iii., opposing his being and existence to things 
 that ai-e not, as Justin MartjT collecteth in his ora- 
 tion to the Greeks, Eijo sum eu-islens, se ipsiim iioii 
 existentihus opponeiis; and as it appeareth bj'the same 
 father, there was no difference in describing the nature 
 of the Godhead betwixt Moses, if I may so speak, 
 a Plato amongst the Hebrews, and Plato a Moses 
 amongst the Athenians, but a httle varying the article; 
 for where the one writeth, He that is, o iliv, the other 
 writeth, That that is, to ov, both tending to the same 
 scope, that the everlasting being of one only God 
 might be averred. He furthermore witnesseth, that 
 Plato took delight, and spent much contemplation in 
 the brevity of that speech, consisting but of one parti- 
 ciple (we may say particle), as one perceiving therein, 
 that, when God had a purpose to reveal his eternity 
 to Moses, he chose to do it by a word ; which, being 
 but one syllable 'amongst the Greeks, doth, notwith- 
 standing, signify and contain three times, that which 
 is past, that which is present, and that which is to 
 come ; all which are indistinct in God, because he is 
 not changed, ' but is yesterday, to-day, and the same 
 for evermore.' I have shewed you the error of the 
 Gentiles, together with the unprobability and absur- 
 dity thereof, in forging to themselves, and conse- 
 quently fearing, adoring, honouring many gods. In 
 regard of ourselves, I grant, an impertinent speech ; 
 ' for though there be that are called gods, whether in 
 heaven or in earth, as. there be gods many and lords 
 many, yet to us there is but one God ; ' and ' we know 
 that an idol is nothing in the world ; ' but because 
 ' every man hath not knowledge,' as the apostle con- 
 tinueth his speech, and some men have not conscience : 
 the infidel, through ignorance, on the one side, mis- 
 taking; and the athiest, through maliciousness, on 
 the other side denying and defying ; and the papist in 
 a third crew, tlu-ough heresy, in manner dividing that 
 one only God, by giving his glory as great as himself 
 to angels and saints, the works of his fingers, it is not 
 amiss to be stored with all kinds of proofs on this 
 behalf, that some may be instructed, others convmced, 
 silenced, utterly confounded. 
 
 The third action specified in these mariners, is the 
 casting forth of their wares to lighten their ship, which 
 some ascribe in part to religion, as if then- intent were 
 to make some satisfaction, and to pacify their gods, 
 if by piracy or other unlawful means they had taken 
 aught before. Others impute it to necessity alone, 
 and, methinketh, the text speaketh for them, ' To 
 lighten it.' For it is no unusual practice, in peril of 
 shipwreck, to disburden the ship. So did Paul and 
 his company in the 27th of the Acts, by reason of 
 that jeopardy wherein they stood : one day they cast 
 out wares, the next day, with their ov>ii hands, they 
 cast away their tacklings ; for in such extremities they 
 
 * Non ut iKimen ejus proferentes dicimus, scd propter rei 
 ineffabilis am]ilitu(liin-n. 
 
 must conclude, as the philosopher once did, Vcricram 
 nisi periissem, I had perished if I had not perished, we 
 lose om- Uves, unless we lose our goods. 
 
 The order and proceeding they hold is very good, 
 and which the chikh'en of the light need not scorn to 
 imitate. First they try their gods by supplication ; 
 then they consult of their means and hkelihoods for 
 the preservation of themselves. 'Which order others 
 pervert, using God but for a shift, and at second hand, 
 if haply by other device we are not able to withstand 
 a mischief. Nee Dens oratur, nisi clignus vindice tiodiis 
 Incident ; we never use the aid of God but when the 
 Itnot is so hard that ourselves cannot undo it. We 
 are all reasonable creatures, and God will use us for 
 the most part in matters appertaining to our good, as 
 lining and reasonable instruments. What else was the 
 reason that Naaman, the Syrian lord, was will^^d to go 
 and wash himself seven times in Jordan, 2 Kings v., 
 when there was a God in Israel that could have re- 
 stored his flesh, as he fii-st formed it, ■with a word of 
 his mouth, as the centm-iou spake in the Gospel, ' Say 
 but the word. Lord ?' and that they were bidden to 
 take a lump of drj- figs and lay upon the boil of Eze- 
 kias, Isa. xxxviii., and he should recover his siclcness, 
 when the Lord had befoio told him, ' I have heard thy 
 prayer, and seen thy teai's : behold, I will add unto 
 thy days fifteen years' ? and that the blind man in the 
 Gospel, John ix., was sent to wash his oj'es in Siloam, 
 and he went, and retm'ued seeing, when our Saviour 
 had made a plaster of spittle and claj", and applied to 
 the part afi'ected ? What else is the meaning hereof, 
 but that we must not eschew such ordinary and honest 
 helps as God hath designed '? ' The sluggard lusteth,' 
 as it is in the Proverbs, chap, xiii., ' but his soul hath 
 nothing ;' doubtless, because he doth but lust and will 
 not follow it ; ' For he hideth his hand in his bosom, 
 and it grieveth him to put it to his mouth,' chap. xix. 
 Ho that will feed such slow bellies, and slack hands, 
 deserveth to want himself. ' The desu'cs of the slothful 
 slay him, for his hands refuse to work,' chap. xxi. ; 
 you hear the right properties of a sluggard, he is 
 wholly made of desires, lusts, appetites, wishings, 
 longings, but it is death unto him to thrust forth a 
 finger for the achievement of anything. The}- had an 
 evasion to the like effect, to colour their idleness withal, 
 in ancient times, which the philosophers called the 
 idle reason, a^yo; Aoyo;. I(/n(n<i ratio. For thus they 
 disputed. If it be thy destiny to recover of such a 
 sickness, whether thou shalt use a physician or not 
 use him, thou shalt recover, &c. I would have such 
 patrons of idleness used, as Zeuo used his servant, who 
 being taken with theft, and aUcging for himself that it 
 was his destiny to steal, his master answered. And thy 
 destinj- to be beaten ; and accordingl}- rewarded him. 
 If these mai'iuers liad so disputed, or sitten upon the 
 hatches of their ship, their arms folden together, and 
 their hearts onlj' desiring to escape, their sorrows had 
 there presently been ended ; but neither their hearts 
 
Ver. 5.] 
 
 LECTURE V. 
 
 39 
 
 nor hands were unoccupied. And, therefore, as in the 
 cui-ing of bodily diseases, though of the Most High 
 Cometh healing, yet the physician must be honoured 
 with that honour that bclongeth unto him, and the 
 apothecary [who]maketh the confection ; as in the wars 
 of Israel against Madia, the sword of the Lord and of 
 Gideon went together, Judges vii., and the cry of the 
 people was not left out ; and, as in preventing this 
 shipwreck, spirits and bodies, prayer and labour, 
 heaven and earth (if I may so say), were conjoined ; 
 so in all the aflairs and appiu-tenances of our lives, we 
 must beware of tempting God. We must not lie in a 
 ditch sullen, and negligent of ourselves, and look to 
 be di-awn out by others ; nor think to be fed as the 
 young ravens, without sowing ; neither to be clothed 
 as lilies of the field, without spinning and labouring ; 
 health cometh not from the clouds without seeking, nor 
 wealth fi'om the clods without digging. We must cast 
 our care upon God, that yet we be not careless and 
 dissolute in om' own salvation : Odi homines ii/iiavd 
 opera, pliUosophd seiitentid:* I hate men that haply 
 have good and provident thoughts, but they will take 
 no pains. That which Metellus sometime spake by 
 number, I hold a truth iji him that is without number, 
 Oui' one and onemost God ; \ iisdem <leos propitios ease 
 aquum est, qui sihi adirrsarii non sunt : It is meet that 
 God favour them, who are not enemies and hiudevers 
 to themselves. 
 
 But to leave this point, there is a time, I perceive, 
 when the riches of this world are not worth the keep- 
 ing, especially compared with the life of man. Their 
 wares, adventures, and commodities, and not only the 
 ballast of the ship, but the necessary implements, 
 furnitm-e (for the original word, though signifying a 
 vessel in particular, is a general name for all such 
 requisite provision), their victual, munitions, and what- 
 soever was of burden besides, are they conveyed and 
 landed by boat, or any way thought upon to be saved ? 
 Nay, they are thrown into the sea, to lighten their 
 sliip, without ever hope of recovery. It is a proverb 
 justified^by truth, though the father of lies spake it. 
 Job ii., ' Skin for skin, and all that a man hath, will 
 he give for his life.' And it is a rule in nature aUowed, 
 ' No man ever hated his own flesh, nay, rather he will 
 nourish and cherish his life, as the Lord his church,' 
 Eph. V. ' Is not the life more worth than meat, and 
 thy body than raiment ? will not a man givejiis riches 
 for the ransom of his life ?' Mat. vi. The poorest 
 worm in the earth, which hath a life (saith Austin), 
 as well as the angel iu heaven, Tuni vild vivit quum 
 iiur/elus, will not forego that life without resisting, 
 Prov. svi. If either horns or hoofs, or tusks, or talons, 
 or beaks, or stings of beasts, birds, flies, unreasonable 
 creatures may withstand, they will not spare to use 
 their armour and weapons of nature to defend them- 
 selves withal. 
 
 * PacuviuB. 
 
 t Unu3 et (si dioi debet) uui3simu3. — Ber. ad Eiiyen. 
 
 Is the life of the body, my beloved brethren, so dear, 
 and is not the life of the soul more precious ? is the 
 life present so tender, and the hfe to come so much 
 inferior '? will you unload a ship to save it ? will you 
 burthen and surcharge a soul to destroy it ? shall the 
 necessary instruments of the one be throwni out, and 
 shall not the accessary ornaments, superfluous, sump- 
 tuous, riotous delights of the other be departed with ? 
 or, are not souls bettor than bodies ? and incoiTuptible 
 lives hereafter, better than these present, subject to 
 corruption ? or, are not riches a burthen to your 
 souls ? ' Ho, he that increaseth that which is not his 
 own, and he that ladeth himself with thick clay ! how 
 long '?' Hab. ii. 6. Ai'o not riches a load ? or what 
 doubt you of? I know yom- answer, we increase but 
 our own. Yoiu' own ? Who entitled you thereto ? 
 Is not the earth the Lord's, and the fulness thereof! 
 are you coloni or domini ,••''- lords of the earth, or tillers, 
 manurers, dressers, dispensers ? Jerome writeth of 
 Abraham, and other rich patriarchs of former age, 
 that they were rather to be termed the bailifts of the 
 Lord, than rich men ; dispcnsalores mayis Dei quam 
 divites appellandi. But were it your own ; hath the 
 sea bars or doors to keep it in, and is your appetite 
 without all moderation ? How long ? is there no end 
 of increasing ? The widow in 2 Kings, that had her 
 liberty given to boiTow as many vessels for oil to pay 
 her debts, as her neighbours could spare her, had as 
 large a scope, I am sure, and mth bettor authority 
 than ever was proposed to you ; yet there was a time 
 when she said to her son, ' Give me j'et a vessel, and 
 he answered, there are no more vessels,' and the oil 
 ceased, and I doubt not, but with the oil, her desire 
 ceased too. It may be you have filled your vessels 
 vrith oil, your own and your neighbom-s', your gamers, 
 your coffers, your bags, yom- warehouses, your fields, 
 j'our fai'ms, j^our children, are full. I ask again with 
 the prophet. How long ? do you ever think to fill your 
 hearts ? The barren womb, unmerciful grave, unsati- 
 able death will sooner be satisfied. It is a bottomless 
 purse ; the more it hath, the more it coveteth. See 
 an image hereof. Alcmoson being willed by Croesus 
 to go into his treasure-house and take as much gold 
 as he could carry away with him, provideil for that 
 business a long hanging garment down to bis ankles, 
 and great boots, and fiUed them both ; nay, he stutt'eil 
 his mouth, and tied wedges of gold to the locks of 
 his head ; I think, but for hurting his brain, he would 
 have ferstf the skull of his head, and the bowels 
 within his breast, if he could have spared them. Here 
 is an heart set upon riches, and riches set upon an 
 heart ; heaps of wealth like the hills that wantsj cast 
 up ; cumuli, tumuli, every hill is a grave, every heap 
 a tomb to bury himself in. Is this to dispense ? Is 
 this to exercise bailiwicks ? Is this to shew fidelity in 
 your master's house ? In few words I exhort you, if 
 
 * Senec. t That is, ' stuffed,'— Ed. 
 
 t Qii. ' ants ?'— Ed. 
 
40 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 the ship be too full, unlade it ; cast j'our goods into 
 the sea, lest they cast yourselves ; cast your bread 
 upon the waters, distribute your mercies to the needy, 
 •where you look for no recompense. It is not certain, 
 it is not likely, and so it may fall out, that it is not 
 possible ' for those that are rich to enter into the 
 kingdom of heaven.' You can dissolve that riddle, I 
 know ; our Saviour, j'ou say, meant of such as trust 
 in riches ; and do not you trust in them '? Do you 
 not say to the wedge of gold, in the applause that 
 yourselves give to it, ' Thou art my coufidence' ? Do 
 you not plant, build, purchase, add house to house, 
 join field to field, put to use, grind, eat, tear, rack, 
 extort to the uttermost ? What meaueth such cost- 
 liness in your houses, delicacy at your tables, stately 
 habiliments upon youi" wives and daughters, insolent 
 neighbourhood against your bretlu-en, like the mahg- 
 nant aspect of unluckj' planets upon them, discoun- 
 tenancings, disturbings, dispossessings of them, but 
 that you trust in riches ? Where is yom- trust in the 
 living God,' meantime, ' riches in good works, readi- 
 ness to distribute and communicate,' which the aj)ostlc 
 preached to Timothy, 1 Tim. vi. 17, 18, and willed 
 him to give in charge (because such hard doctrine 
 must be driven in with hard hammers), to ' those that 
 are rich in this present world,' lest they be deprived 
 
 of those incon-uptible riches which God bath stored 
 up ? Where are yom- morsels of bread to feed the 
 hungiy, j'our fleeces of wool to warm the loins of the 
 naked, hospitality in your halls, bounty at your gates, 
 liberality in your hands ? I think, you keep the rule 
 of the gospel, that the right hand knoweth not what 
 the left doth, because neither right nor left doth any- 
 thing. I like the advice of an heathen well : use thy 
 wealth as thou wouldst use thy coat ; let it be rather 
 fit than too long, L'oncinnam, magis pioho qnam hnujam. 
 A little may be a burthen, but in too much there is 
 no question. In the land of Havilah there is good 
 gold ; in the land of the hving, in the land of promise, 
 in the land of heavenly Jerusalem, there is good gold 
 indeed, gold tried in the fii-e (in the third of the 
 Revelation), where neither moth nor rest can corrupt, 
 nor thief purloin it ; gold of more worth than all the 
 mines of the earth can send up. Oh, thii'st after this 
 gold, if you must needs thu-st ; be covetous after 
 dm-ablo riches ; lay up treasm'es for yourselves in 
 heaven, and of yom- unrighteous mammon (neither 
 well gained perhaps, and ill kept, and worse laid out), 
 make friends in time, that they may receive you into 
 the heavenly tabernacles ; save youi' ships, if it maj" 
 be, and save your lives ; but save your souls, though 
 you lose your wares, your ships, and your lives too. 
 
 LECTUKE VI. 
 But Jonah was (/one down into the sides of the sJtip ; and he lay down, and was/ast asleep. — Jonah I. 5. 
 
 THE mariners had thrown out their wares, but the 
 greatest burden was behind, the sin of Jonah ; 
 for wickedness is as ' a talent of lead,' Zech. v. 7, the 
 weight whereof cannot be expressed. Salt, and sand, 
 and a lump of iron is easier to bear * than an unwise, 
 foolish, and ungodly man. We see by the proof of 
 this example that the sin of one private person is 
 likely to sink a ship in the midst of the sea ; and 
 Peter thought it of force to overturn more than one, 
 Luke V. For when the two ships were so fraught 
 with fish, that they were ready to sink, he fell down 
 at the knees of Jesus, and said, ' Go from me. Lord, 
 for I am a sinful man ;' thinking that his sin had so 
 endangered them. They say, no element is ponder- 
 ous in the proper place of the element, elementum in 
 loco suo non ponderal ; wo feel not the weight of the air, 
 though we live in the circle of it ; the water of the sea, 
 as much as the whole channel holdeth, if we lay in the 
 nethermost bottom thereof, would not ofl'end us with 
 burden, though annoy us otherwise ; so is it in the 
 estimate of sin, it seemeth not a burden in the will of 
 man, wherein the rtigion and clement of sin is, because 
 of that lust and appetite the will hath to commit sin ; 
 but bring it from the house and home where it dwelleth, 
 convent it before reason, examine it with judgment and 
 • Ecclus. xxii. 
 
 understanding, consider what an infinite majesty it 
 ofi'endeth, and what infinite plagues it briugeth forth, 
 then shall we know the weight of sin. No sooner had 
 Jonah entered the ship, but the sea, which was at rest 
 before, feeling a burden more than common, camo forth 
 like a bridegroom out of his chamber and channel, to 
 ease itself, and to shako his bones with an ague that 
 troubled the quiet thereof; that we may learn (saith 
 Chrysostom*), xihi jieceatuin, ihi procella, where sin is, 
 there will also be a storm ; and if we will save our- 
 selves, we must drown sin as they drowned Jonah. 
 
 The sleep of Jonah is as strange, prodigious, and 
 brutish kind of sleep as ever I heard of. The winds 
 rage, the sea roareth, the ship tottereth and groaneth, 
 the mariners fear, and pray, and cry, every soul in the 
 ship, so many persons upon so many gods (it was as 
 the howling of Baal's priests, or as the yelling of 
 wolves), they run to and fro, they ransack all the 
 corners of the ship, unbowel her inmost cells, throw 
 out commodities, rend and rape down tackles, sails, 
 all implements ; Jonah in the mean time, as a man 
 possessed with the deaf devil, Mark vii., or as one 
 that had lost his soul, as they write of Hermotimus, 
 that his soul would depart fi'om the body at times and 
 come home again, sleepeth. ' If a thief should come 
 * llomil. V. ad pop. 
 
Yer. 5.] 
 
 LECTURE VI. 
 
 41 
 
 to rob, would" he not steal till bo bad enough ? if 
 grape-gatherers should come to a vine, would they not 
 leave some grapes '? ' Obadiah 5. Behold, the custo- 
 mer of the life of man, who taxeth half our daj-s to his 
 own use, atioci^siiiius rilcc Iiimunne ]nibliciinus,s(iiiinus, 
 Cometh upon Jonah, and is not content with ordinarj', 
 moderate fees, but boreaveth him of all sense. And 
 no orator in the world could better have described 
 this drowsiness, to the disgrace of Jonah, than Jonah 
 himself. 
 
 lie descemJcil. He staid not upon the hatches, to 
 visit the light of heaven, to behold the waves of the 
 sea, his persecutors, but removed as far from God and 
 his anger as his heart could devise, shewing that his 
 works were evil, because he buried himself iu dark- 
 ness. A sinner ever deseendeth till he cometh to the 
 lowest that may be ; his afl'ections are downwards, 
 and, I am sure, his inheritance and hope is not above; 
 but as we bury dead Hesh under the ground, so it is 
 not uuhkely of dead souls ; and as the heaviest bodies 
 draw to the centre of the earth, so the saddest and 
 heaviest spirits, which the mercy of God hath forsaken. 
 
 He descended not into the bosom and thoroughfare 
 of the ship, where the passage of the mariners up and 
 down might have disturbed him, but into the sides or 
 thighs of it. 
 
 He descended into the sides of the keel, the veriest 
 bottom that the vessel had. I think if there had been 
 a vault in the ship as deep as hell and destruction 
 itself, he would have entered thereinto. 
 
 He descended into the ship, not to bestow time in 
 any serviceable employment for the furtherance of the 
 voyage, but to lie down. 
 
 Not for the ease of his body alone, to give it some 
 short repose, but to sleep. 
 
 • Nay, he slept and slept, Endymion's sleep ; somno 
 sopitus e.-it, it was an heavy, stupid, deadly sleep. 
 
 The best inducement to sleep, you know, where the 
 body is aptly framed unto it, is stillness and quietness ; 
 and therefore the poet * describeth the place of sleep to 
 be in a vault of the earth, where the light of the sun 
 never cometh ; a long gallery or porch leading unto it 
 remove it from the assembly of people ; no door to the 
 house, lest the turning of the hinges should disquiet 
 his ease ; and neither dog, nor cock, nor goose, nor 
 any wakeful creature to break silence, nor tree to make 
 a noise : thus is he lodged upon a bed of down, in a 
 bedstead of ebony, free from the annoyance of any- 
 thing. 
 
 This was the reason that the Sibarites, a sleepy, 
 lascivious, riotous nation of men, who would lodge 
 themselves for pleasure in beds of violets, the better 
 to take their ease, banish cocks from their cities, and 
 all kinds of trades wherein hammerings or noise might 
 be used. Jonah hath nothing iu the world, neither 
 without nor within, to invite sleep ; clamours, and 
 commotions, and cursitations one way ; vexation and 
 * Ovid. xi. Metamor. 
 
 trouble of heart another way ; these were his helps. 
 Admit ho were weary with travel fi'om the city to the 
 haven, as Jacob was weary when he went to Aram, 
 and lay down by the way, and slept upon a pillow of 
 stone ; what '? so weary that neither the voice of men, 
 nor God, nor conscience, nor the voice of the ship, 
 which, as before I noted, yearned in her inward spirit, 
 and thought to be rent, could awake him ? The 
 sleep of Adam was an heavy sleep, so the text termeth 
 it. Gen. ii., when God took a rib from his side, and 
 closed up the flesh again, and he felt it not ; but the 
 reason is there given, God cast him into it ; it was a 
 matter devised and composed beforehand. The sleep 
 of Sisera, Judges iv.,^was an heavy sleep, when a nail 
 was driven into the temples of his head ; but he had 
 run on foot from the battle, and was wearied with hot 
 pursuit. The sleep of Ish-bosheth, 2 Sam. iv., an 
 heavy sleep, when his two captains slew him at noon, 
 upon his bed ; but the heat of the day procured that 
 sleep. The sleep of Samson, Judges svi., an heavy 
 sleep, when the seven locks of his head were shaven 
 off ; but the charms and enticements of Delilah caused 
 him to sleep upon her knees. The sleep of Eutyohus, 
 Acts xs., an heavy sleep, when he fell from the third 
 loft, and was taken up dead ; but the night, which was 
 the time of rest, was far spent ; that reason Scipio 
 giveth, and it holdeth in nature, quia ad muliain 
 noch'tii r(V/(7((ss(';H, atxtior me somnus complexus est : 
 because I had watched long till a great part of the 
 night was spent, I fell into a deeper sleep. It was a 
 marvellous sleep which Lot was siu'prised with, when 
 his two daughters abused themselves with him, and 
 he neither perceived when they lay down, nor when 
 they rose up ; but the text noteth their shameless 
 policy, they gave him wine to make him sleep. The 
 seven sleepers, in the time of Decius the emperor (if 
 the history deceive us not), slept in an hill, by a 
 miracle ; Epimenides, the Cretian, slept fourscore 
 years in a cave (they that say fewer say enough), 
 beyond a miracle, and I nothing doubt but beyond the 
 truth. Surely the sleep of Jonah, though neither so 
 fabulous as some, nor so miraculous as others, and 
 more unprobable than the most, is, for the time, not 
 inferior to any before mentioned, and no right cause 
 can be rendered of it. 
 
 For what can we say ? Was it because ho was 
 vexed, and troubled in his spirit, as the disciples of 
 Christ ; Mat. xxvi., and in the number of the dis- 
 ciples, the choice, Peter, John, and James, to whom 
 our Saviour came and said, ' Could ye not watch with 
 me one hour ? ' and a second time in the same manner. 
 But they are there excused iu part by the weakness of 
 nature, 'for their eyes were heavy,' and surely the 
 heaviness of then- eyes came from the heaviness of 
 their spirits. 
 
 Or was it not rather the hardness and resolution of 
 his heart, the dregs of sin frozen and congealed within 
 him, sin beyond measure sinful, and beyond measure 
 
42 
 
 KlXCi 0\ JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 dull, that so oppressed bim? Undoubtedly tbere is a 
 time aud state iu sLu (let it be heard attentively, that 
 the enchantments thereof get not too deep a posses- 
 sion), there is a time and state in sin when the heart 
 is as i'at as grease, the conscience seared as with hot 
 irons ; aud, as they write of Dionysius Heracleote, 
 though they thrust needles into bis belly to let out 
 bis fat, by reason of his grossness he felt them not ; 
 so wound, and extimulate, and grieve this bead-strong 
 iniquity never so much, it careth not, stoutly bearing 
 itself against God and man, and as it hath no hope, 
 so having in a manner no desperation. Such was the 
 case of Catiline, when ho bad fired the cit3'[of Rome 
 with bis conspiracies, he had no belter comfort than 
 this, incemUum meuin niina c.viiiii/iimn.* I will 
 quench the fire I have kindled with a final ruin ; I 
 will add worse to evil, thirst to drunkenness, and leave 
 the success of my mischievous and ungracious actions 
 to the estremest adventures. Cyprian writeth of 
 himself,t who had sometime been a great persecutor, 
 and afterwards proved a glorious martyr, Miya; xai 
 diuiy.Trig xa; ffr£^a»£r?);,J that being entangled in the 
 errors of his former life, past hope of getting out, he 
 even gave over himself to his adherent vices, and 
 favoured his sins as now become proper unto him, 
 born as it were in his o'wn home, and incorporate 
 into his flesh and bones by long acquaintance. ' Et 
 mails meis ivluti jam propriis et venuicnUs adfare- 
 ham.' And Bernard in bis books of consideration to 
 Eugenius,§ doth notably describe an hard heart. 
 What it is, saith he ? It is that which is not cut 
 with compunction (a razor will sooner cut a whetstone), 
 not softened with love, not moved with entreaty, 
 yieldcth not to threatenings, with scourges is har- 
 dened, unthankful for benefits, unfaithful in counsels. 
 Unmerciful in judgments, shameful in dishonesty, 
 reckless in dangers, in things appertaining to men, 
 void of humanity ; in matters concerning God, full of 
 temerity ; unmindful of what is past, negligent of 
 what is present, improvident of what to come. This 
 might be the cogitation of Jonah. I have run too far 
 in rebellion to return, I know the worst that can befall 
 me ; but be it as it may, from henceforth sleep my 
 soul, and take thy ease, bury thyself in security, and 
 digest thy sorrow with carelessness. 
 
 Or was it a spirit of slumber sent from God ? Was 
 he brought into this drowsiness for some end unknown 
 unto him ? Were bis eyes held of purpose (as the 
 eyes of the two disciples that went to Emmaus), his 
 senses bound up that some e.-ctraordinary work of God 
 might afterwards bo manifested '? There is a conflict 
 .and reiHignancy herein, whichi know not how to recon- 
 cile, a man so troubled iu conscience, that be dcsccndcth 
 into the sides of the ship. Hying the face of God, the 
 face of men, the face of his own person, the face of 
 the light of heaven, not able to endure the face of the 
 winds and seas, that were up in arms against bim, 
 
 • Sallust. t Lib. cp. 22. J Nazian. § Lib. i. 
 
 yet sleepetb. It is against all reason. For sleep 
 departetb from the eyes of fearful men : ' If they lay them 
 down, they say, When shall I rise ? They measure 
 the hours of tlie night, they are full of tossing to and 
 fro, until the dawning of the day. When they say, 
 My couch shall relieve me, and my bed shall bring 
 comfort in my naeditation ; then are they feared with 
 dreams, aud astonished with visions,' Job. vii. There- 
 fore the poet* called one of the sous of sleep, Phobe- 
 tor, a terrifier of men, presenting himself unto their 
 phantasy in the likeness of beasts, of bu-ds, of ser- 
 pents, of anything that may aflright the wicked. 
 
 Fit fera, fit volucris, fit toto corporc serpens. 
 
 I never would have thought that conscience could 
 have slept till this time ; she is so marked and 
 observed by her own eye, though no other cj'e per- 
 ceive her ; so followed and chased by her own foot, 
 though nothing else in heaven or earth pursue her. 
 She tleoth when no man followeth, and bath a thou- 
 sand wituesses within her own breast when she is free 
 from the whole world besides. The worm that ever 
 gnaweth, the fire that ever burneth, is the remem- 
 brance of her forepast iniquities. And though we 
 escape the hands of the living God, we shall find it 
 fearful enough to fall into the hands of a living and 
 yet dying conscience. But nothing iu the world, I think, 
 save either a dulness of sin incredible, and the next 
 degree to a reprobate sense, or else a purpose of God, to 
 shew the perfection of his powerin the imperfection and 
 weakness of his prophet, could have wrought this etfect. 
 The end of all is this. He neither slumbereth nor 
 sleepetb that keepeth Israel, he walketh in beayeu that 
 hath an eye and care of Jonah in his profound sleep- 
 ing. Though smitten into the place of dragons, or 
 whales, and covered with the shadow of death, he 
 Cometh to light again ; ' though be lieth amongst the 
 pots,' as another psalm speaketh,Ps. Isviii., iu a filthy, 
 fuliginous corner, as one forgotten, forsaken, forlorn ; 
 he becometh as ' a dove, whose wings are of silver, 
 and her feathers of yellow gold,' purified as it were by 
 the finer of bis soul, and restored to that beauty and 
 perfection wherewith before he shone. Though he 
 dwelleth in the ' land of forgetfulness, and is laid in 
 the lowest pit, &c., iu the deep of displeasure, as a 
 man without strength, free among the dead, and exiled 
 from the living, and as the slain in the grave, ,whom 
 God remembereth no more,' Ps. Ixxxviii. (for such was 
 the cabin of security which Jonah was entered mto), 
 yet ho is quickened with life, and brought up to 
 heaven to bo an example of mercy to those that were 
 then unborn. Of judgment and morcy may be our song; 
 judgment in the revenge, mercy in the deliverance of 
 Jonah; judgment in bis flight and running from God, 
 mercy in bis I'etreat; judgment iu bis sleeping, morcy 
 in his rising up. If God had not watched to preserve 
 Jonah (as when we all sleep, he waketh for us all. 
 • Ovid. 
 
 I 
 
Vek. 5.] 
 
 LECTURE VI. 
 
 43 
 
 ' Omnium somitoi illiii.s viijilaiilia dcfciidil),' Jonah 
 might have slept his sleep (to use the phrase of the 
 psalm, Pfj. Isxvi.), aud (as Jeremiah expoundeth it) 
 his everlasting sleep, Jer. li. ; not that sweet sleep of the 
 body, wherewith nature is refreshed, but of the soul 
 in sin, and of the body and soul in immortal perdi- 
 tion. If God should have said unto him, touching the 
 spirit of slumber now fallen upon the spirit of Jonah, 
 as our Saviour said to his disciples, touching the sleep 
 of their bodies, ' from henceforth sleep and take thy 
 rest,' till thy eyes sink into the holes of thy head, I 
 will neither come nor send to call thee up again ; the 
 night had compassed him in with darkness, and the pit 
 had shut her mouth upon him for ever. 
 
 Look not, my brethren, for favour at the hands of 
 God so singular as Jonah found ; make not the watch- 
 fulness of God an occasion to your sluggishness ; 
 neither sleep you in sin because he sleepeth not in 
 his providence and protection. Look not that the 
 sun shall stand still any more, as it did to Joshua, 
 or go back again, as to Hezekiah ; or that Jordan 
 shall flee from his place, the sea divide itself, aud 
 stand up like walls, as to the childi-en of Israel ; nor 
 that a voice shall be heard from heaven, or a light 
 seen besides the ordinary light of the firmament, as 
 when Paul was converted. Do ye complain that the 
 firm of the Lord is shortened in your days, because 
 ye see not the like signs '? or will ye not be saved 
 without miracles ? are your eyes evil because God 
 hath a larger hand towards other men ? or is not his 
 hand full enough towards us if we knew our happi- 
 ness ? Unless the course of the world be altered for 
 our sakes, the pillars of the earth moved, the channels 
 of the waters discovered ; unless we see tokens in the 
 sun and the moon, and one rise from the dead to give 
 us warning, will we not be warned ? ' The Jews re- 
 quire a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom : we 
 preach Christ crucified,' 1 Cor. i. And woe to the 
 world if the open face of the gospel cannot move us 
 without a sign, nor the simplicity of Christ Jesus per- 
 suade us without other wisdom. Jonah was sufl'ered 
 to run his race of disobedience, and when he had 
 wearied and spent himself in perverse ways, mightily 
 brought back. Thou sayest. Why not I ? I dispute 
 not. God will measure his graces]'at his pleasure; 
 and though they run over to some, they are plentiful 
 enough to us all. As it is in the tenth to the Romans, 
 ' He that is Lord over all, is rich unto all that call 
 unto him.' That answer which he gave to Paul in 
 another case, Snificit lihi fjratia mea, 2 Cor. sii., 'My 
 grace sufficoth thee,' may suflioe all suitors. But if 
 they will not return to God till they have tempted his 
 justice as far as Jonah did ; and be cast into a bed of 
 sin, as Jezebel into a bed of fornication ; and rocked 
 asleep in the deepest security that can be imagined ; 
 till they have lain hke ' brands in the tire,' wasted to 
 the stump, Zach. iii. ; or as a sheep in the mouth of 
 the lion, consumed to an ear or a leg, Amos iii. 12, 
 
 as the prophets spake ; in this case, if God give them 
 over also, and leave them to perish in the fire and in 
 the lion's mouth, and in that bed of rest which their 
 hearts have coveted, their destruction is of themselves, 
 for putting back that accepted time, were it more or 
 less, which God had ofl'ered them. But Jonah fiudeth 
 more favour with God, as appeareth by a message 
 sent unto him. 
 
 So the shijDiiastcr came uiilo him, and said unto him, 
 What ineaiu'st thou, O sleeper.^ &c., ver. G. 
 
 The shipmaster, or the master of the cable, the 
 cordage, and tackle, cometh unto Jonah, and biddeth 
 him arise. I will not say what a shame it is to 
 Jonah, that he which was appointed a watchman unto 
 others should himself be awaked ; nor how much the 
 greater reproach to be condemned by a heathen, 
 who himself was coudemned by the sentence of the 
 Hebrews* for an uncircumcised, common, and un- 
 clean person. But methinketh I see an image iu 
 the shipmaster of a good governor, who is not content 
 alone himself to take pains (which was the complaint 
 of Nehemiah, chap, iii., that the great men of the 
 Tekoites put not their neck to the work), but so 
 ordereth the rest of his company, as the head and 
 heart, copartners in the kingdom, or one the king, the 
 other the viceroy, [order] the members of the body, 
 that there is not a man amongst them sufiered to sit 
 at rest and do nothing. 
 
 The care of a governor over his charge is no way 
 better expressed than by the phrases which the Scrip- 
 ture hath used. For therefore is he said to ' go in 
 and out before the people,' to note not only the 
 priority of his place, but the prudency of virtue 
 every way, and to 'lead them, as a shepherd his sheep,' 
 on whom their dependence standeth, both for the safe- 
 guard of their lives and estate, and their provision 
 otherwise. To forbear other proofs herein, Moses 
 nameth both at once in that serious request of his, 
 w^hich, after the knowledge of his death given, Num. 
 xxvii., he made to the Lord for substitution of some 
 other in his room, ' Let the Lord God of the spirits 
 of all flesh appoint a man over the congregation, who 
 may go iu and out before them ; and both lead them 
 forth and bring them home again, and that the congrega- 
 tion of the Lord be not as sheep without a shepherd.' 
 It appeareth by a former speech by him uttered, that 
 he was not only charged with them as a leader with 
 his followers, or a shepherd with his sheep, but as a 
 father, mother, or nurse with his children and suck- 
 ing babes. Else why did he ask his Maker in terms 
 of most natural reference. Num. xi. ' Have I con- 
 ceived all this people ? or have I begotten them, that 
 thou shouldst say unto me. Carry them in thy bosom, 
 as a nurse beareth her sucking child ? ' Let masters 
 and magistrates learn by this speech, that when they 
 are put in authority, they receive, as it were, a roll 
 from the Lord, like the roll of Ezekiel, wherein their 
 
 * Major est pcena a damnato damnari. — Ci/j>r. desing. ckr. 
 
44. 
 
 KING OX JONAH. 
 
 [CUAP. I 
 
 duties are abridged and summed up in this short sen- 
 tence, ' carry them in thy bosom.' For as a writing 
 received immediately from the mouth of God, so doth 
 Moses set it down, or as if thei'e had passed some 
 interlocution betwixt God and him ; as much as to 
 say, let them be tender and dear unto thine atiection, 
 let them be under thine eye, and near thine heart, 
 that they perish not ; pity their miseries, redress their 
 ■wrongs, reheve their wants, reform their errors, pre- 
 vent their mishaps, procure their welfare and peace 
 by all good means. It is an art of arts, and science 
 of sciences to rule man ;* and they are magistrates 
 indeed which have the knowledge and skill that be- 
 longeth to magistrates;! which have oculum cum 
 sceptro, by which emblem the Egyptians figured their 
 governments, a sceptre for jurisdiction and power, au 
 eye for watchfulness and discretion. For if they 
 interpret their calUugs aright, they have not the bond- 
 age and service of the people so much as the tutelage 
 of them ; \ neither is the commonwealth theirs to use 
 as they list, but they the commonwealth's. § What 
 meant Clem. Alexandrinus in his fiction|| that he 
 citeth out of Plato, that the former of all things hath 
 mingled gold with the complexion and temperature of 
 princes, of their subordinate helpers and assessors 
 silver, but in the constitutions of husbandmen and 
 artificers brass and iron ; but that the excellentest 
 rooms should be furnished with the excellentest gifts, 
 and as for meaner callings, they were sufficiently sped 
 if they had common and ordinary qualities ? Sedes 
 2Jrima et vita ima, saith Bernard :'i the highest place 
 and basest life agree not ; and the ancient proverb 
 agreeth hereunto : Rex fatitiis in solio, simia in lecto, 
 a foolish king in a throne is an ape upon the house- 
 top, highly perched, but absurdly conditioned. The 
 example of good governors (we know) is of great force 
 to draw the hearts of the people after them ; their 
 proclamations and edicts are not so available to per- 
 suade, AVc sic injicck're scnuus &c., as their manners. 
 Confessor papa, confessor populus, saith Cyprian to 
 Cornelius, bishop of Eome : where the prelate or pas- 
 tor is confessor of the name of Christ, his people will 
 confess it also. When Shemaiah counselled Nehemiah 
 to fly into the temple and shut the doors, because 
 his enemies would that night come to slay him, he 
 drew an argument of courage and magnanimity from 
 the pre-eminence of his oflice, and withstood his per- 
 suasion : Nch. vi., ' Should such a man as I flee ? 
 who is ho, that, being as I am, would go into the 
 temple to live '? I will not go in.' Where an hart 
 leadeth the army, though it consist wholly of lions, 
 be makcth them all harts, but where a lion is captain 
 
 * Ars artiiunjdisciiilina disciiiliiiannn regere homiiicm. — 
 Jfa:ianz. 
 
 t Sui)eriorc'3 suut, qui superiores esse sciimt. — Ber. sor. 
 xxiii. in cant. 
 
 t Civium non scrvitus tradita, ."ied (utela. 
 
 2 Ncc respublica tua scd tu reijjublica;. — Senec de cle. 
 
 II Strom. 0. ^ 2 de cousid. ad Eugon. 
 
 over harts, he turneth them all into lions. The fear 
 of Nehemiah, being their prince and commander, had 
 been enough to have weakened the hands and hearts 
 of all his flock ; for thus they would have reasoned 
 against themselves, our leader is discomforted, under 
 whose shadow we said, we shall be safe. Lam. iv. 20. 
 What a mischief it is to a commonwealth to be en- 
 cumbered with a foolish, intemperate ruler, the wisest 
 preacher of the earth next the Son of God hath 
 soundly defined in these words, Eecles. x. IG, ' Woe 
 to thee, land, where thy king is a child, and thy 
 princes eat in the morning ! ' When they have not 
 wisdom to govern, and rather follow those pleasures 
 which accompany the honour and royalty of princes, 
 than the pains which their magistracy requireth. 
 Whereas on the other side, the government of an 
 honourable and temperate magistrate bringeth singu- 
 lar blessings with it: ver. 17, ' lilessed art thou, O 
 land, when thy king is the son of nobles, and thy 
 princes eat in time, for strength, and not for drunken- 
 ness.' What are the stays and strengths of Jeru- 
 salem and Judah, cities and nations, all public and 
 politic bodies ? Isa. iii. 1, 2, Are not 'the strongman, 
 and the man of war, the judge, and the prophet, tho 
 prudent, and the aged, the captain over lifty, tho 
 honourable and the counsellor,' and so forth ? And 
 are not their joints loosed, and their sinews taken 
 away, when that judgment of God is fulfilled upon 
 them, ver. 4, ' I will appoint children to be their 
 princes, and babes shall rule over them.' Amongst 
 those dreadful curses which the prophet calleth from 
 heaven against his malicious, unthankful adversaries, 
 leaving no part unexamined, but running like oil into 
 every joint and bone of them, smiting themselves, 
 wives, children, posterity, goods, good names and 
 memories that they leave behind them, the first that 
 leadeth them all the race, as Judas led that cursed 
 band of soldiers, is this, ' Set thou the wicked man to 
 be ruler over them,' Ps. cix. 
 
 I have hitherto commended the porson~of the ship- 
 master, and, under this pattern or sampler, shewed 
 the duty of all magistrates, who in the proportion and 
 extent of their government, be it more or less, must 
 care for the whole body of their subjects, and shew a 
 part of their diligence herein, that none of their com- 
 pany neglect the duties which to them appertain. 
 
 Now for the nature and use of government, both 
 by land and sea, in houses and cities, in regions, in 
 ail mankind, whole nature, and the universal world 
 (as the orator* writeth), how necessary and requisite 
 it is, I also observe in this, that tho master of the 
 ship, having authority in his hands, rather than any 
 of the inferiors, cometh unto him to raise him up, 
 ' What meanest thou, sleeper '? ' Others might have 
 asked him, Quid tibi est ' what meanest thou ? and 
 he have made answer again, Quid robis est ' what 
 mean you to trouble me ? , As they asked Moses, 
 * Cic. de Icgib. 3. 
 
Ver. 5. 1 
 
 LECTURE VI. 
 
 4o 
 
 ExoJ. ii., ' Who mfide thee a man of aathority and a 
 judge over us ?' There must be a mastery and domi- 
 nion in every order of men, specially designed, besides 
 private persuasion or reproof, to say unto sleepers. 
 Why sleepest thou ? and to other offensive and dis- 
 ordered persons, either in church or in commouwealth, 
 Why do ye thus '? 
 
 Hoc puto non justum est, illud male, rectius istuil.* 
 This is not right, that is evil, and the other is 
 better. This is the band -whereby the commonwealth 
 hangeth together, the life-breath (xpiritus ri/n/is) 
 which these many thousand creatures draw, likely of 
 themselves to prove nothing save a burden to them- 
 selves and a booty to their enemies, if the spirit and 
 soul of government be taken from thcm.f For to 
 rule and to be ruled, is not only in number of things 
 necessary, but convenient and commodious also. J I 
 vdW invert it : besides the commodiousness it bringeth, 
 it is of necessity, and cannot be missed. In the be- 
 ginning, when heaven and earth were first made, God 
 established a superiority and rule both in other 
 creatures before after their kinds, and afterwards in 
 man. Gen. i., he made 'two great lights, the greater 
 light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the 
 night.' Not long after, when he had created man, he 
 invested him presently into imperial authority. ' to 
 subdue the earth, and to rule over the fishes of the 
 sea, and over the fowls of heaven, and over every 
 beast that moveth upon the earth.' And why is it 
 called the host of heaven, in the second of Genesis ? 
 hut because there ai*e orders and degrees therein, 
 which being withdrawn from an army it hath no good 
 composition. And howsoever it may be true that the 
 government of man over man came from sin (for God 
 gave sovereignty to Adam over fishes and birds. Sec, 
 not over reasonable creatures made to his own like- 
 ness, and the first righteous men we read of were 
 rather shepherds and herdmen over beasts than kings 
 over nations, pmtoirs peconim, mar/is qumn. rerjes 
 fjcntium, and the name' of servant was never imposed in 
 Scripture till Noah bestowed it upon his accursed son, 
 Gen. is., ' Cursed be Canaan, servant of servants shall 
 he be unto his brethren,' whereupon Augustine § 
 gathereth, Nomen itaqtic iUmi culpa meruit, et non 
 natnra, that name was purchased by transgression not 
 by nature), yet the nature of manldnd standing as it 
 doth, corrupted so far that without the head of auth- 
 ority we could not live and converse together, God 
 hath devised the means for the repressing of our 
 mutual violences and injuries, which before we were 
 subject unto. Irenreus, in his fifth book against 
 heresies, giveth the reason why God appointed king- 
 doms ; because man, forsaking God, was waxen so 
 fierce that he thought those of his kind and blood to 
 be his enemies, and in all restlessness, murder, and 
 covetousness, bare himself without fear, God put upon 
 f* Persiiis ?at. 4. t Si meni5 ilia imperii siibtrahatnr. — Sencc. 
 
 X Arist. i. Pol. 
 
 Li. 9, Dei de civ., cap. 9. 
 
 him the fear of man (for he knew not the fear of tho 
 Lord), that fearing human laws they should not de- 
 vour and consume one tho other, as the manner of 
 fishes is. He addeth, by whose commandment men 
 are created, by his commandment kings also are or- 
 dained ;* some for the profit and amendment of their 
 subjects, and the preservation of justice ; some for 
 fear, and punishment, and reproof; some for illusion, 
 contumely, insolency, as those that rather disgrace 
 authority, despite their people, and shame themselves, 
 than otherwise. By this that hath been alleged, we 
 may easily confute the masterless and lawless Ana- 
 baptist, who striketh at the head of government in 
 general, and would frame a body of men, like the 
 body of Polyphemus, without his eye, or like the con- 
 fused chaos of old time, when height and depth, light 
 and darkness, were mingled together. As also those 
 turbulent, either people or states, who level at magis- 
 trates in particular ; allowing authority, I grant, but ' 
 such as pleaseth themselves ; whose nice distinctions, 
 like so many paring-knives, if we shall admit that the 
 king hath his institution from God, constitution from 
 the people ;f and that his kingdom is given him from 
 God, delivered from the people ;J: that he reigneth from 
 God through and for the people ;5 is elected of God, 
 but his election confirmed by the people, || by this 
 liberty which they take unto themselves in the instal- 
 ment of princes into their states, you shall see them 
 oftentimes not only pruning away the superfluous 
 boughs of misgovernment and tyranny in their supe- 
 riors, but cutting up the very root of lawful and pro- 
 fitable government. Let them be coupled with the 
 Anabaptists and rebels before named, who taking the 
 power of two swords unto them before it be given, 
 and bearing more crowns by three upon their heads 
 than they ought to do, cry in the church of Rome 
 against the Gods and Christs of the earth, as they 
 did sometimes amongst the heathen against God's 
 anointed Son, Ps. ii., 'Let us break their bands 
 asunder, and cast their cords from us.' For assum- 
 ing this to themselves, that schismatical and erroneous 
 princes may be deposed by the church, they will in- 
 terpret ears to be horns ; departure from a church 
 extremely corrupted, and corrupting others, schism ; 
 the service of the true God, and in a true manner, 
 heresy ; lawful and lineal succession in the throne, 
 both by blood and assent, without authorisement and 
 confirmation from them, unjustifiable intrusion. Of 
 all these we may say, that as they are very loose, 
 luxate, and palsy-shaking members in the body, that 
 will not move by the appointment and direction of the 
 head, so the unruliest and disorderliest people, that 
 
 * Cujus jussu homines nascuntur, ejus et jussu reges con- 
 stitimnfur. 
 
 t Kex instituitur a Deo, constituitur a populo. 
 
 X Datur illi regnnra a Deo, traditur a populo. 
 
 ? Regnat rex a Deo, per et propter papulum. 
 
 II Eligitur Rex a Deo, conflrmatur electus a populo. — 
 Vinilic iyran. qu. 3. 
 
46 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 will not submit their necks and souls to the yoke of 
 their natural sovereigns, whom I will not send to learn 
 obedience and subjection of the soldiers of Scipio, who 
 had never a man in his army (by his own report) that 
 would not for a word of bis mouth have gone up into 
 a tower, and cast himself headlong into the sea,* but 
 to the children of Israel tendcriug their service to 
 Joshua with more moderation, Josh, i., 'All that thou 
 hast commanded us, wc will do ; and whithersoever 
 thou sendest us, we will go ; as we obeyed Moses in 
 all things, so will we obey thee. And those that 
 rebel against thy commandment, let them die the 
 death.' The volume of the whole book, I am sure, 
 both the precepts and practices of all the servants of 
 God, harpeth upon this string. Yea, the Master of 
 thehouse,byhisown esample,taughtthoseof his house- 
 hold how to behave themselves in this case. For as 
 he obeyed his Father even unto the death of the cross, 
 his parents in the flesh in following their instructions, 
 the law in following all righteousness, so the emperor 
 of Rome, too, though he a stranger and himself free- 
 born, in paying tribute unto him, Mat. svii. 27. 
 Though we are defamed and slandered concerning the 
 emperor's majesty, yet Christians could never be 
 found to be either Albiuians, or Nigrians, or Cassians, 
 that is, rebels to their liege lords and masters, as Ter- 
 tuUian, in the name and cause of all Christianity, 
 wrote to Scapula. The Christian is no man's enemy, 
 much less the emperor's. But the matter is safe 
 enough. Rom. xiii., ' There is no power but of God, 
 and he that resisteth the powers that be resisteth 
 God's ordinances.' ' And the Lord is king, be the 
 earth never so impatient.' ' Promotion cometh 
 neither from the east, nor from the west, nor from 
 the south, but from the Lord of Hosts.' By him are 
 kingdoms disposed, princes inaugurated, crowns of 
 gold set upon their heads, sceptres and states esta- 
 blished, people mollified and subdued ; and by him 
 ■were Korah and bis confederates swallowed quick into 
 the earth, Zimri burned in his palace, Absalom hanged 
 by his hairy scalp, Ahithophel in a halter, for deny- 
 ing their fealty to God's Hentonauts. 
 
 As the master of the ship came to Jonah and 
 called him up, ' What meanest thou sleeper ?' &c., so 
 let masters and governors within this place, who sit 
 at the sterns of another kind of shipping, and have 
 rudders of city and country in their hands, lot them 
 awake themselves, that they may awake and rouse up 
 other sleepers, all careless, dissolute, indisposed per- 
 sons, who love the threshold of their private doors 
 upon the Sabbaths of the Lord, and their benches in 
 ale-booths, better than the courts of the Lord's house, 
 and neither in calms nor storms, when the ship 
 groaneth, the whole land monrncth, all the creatm-es 
 sigh and lament, will either fast, or pray, or sorrow^ or 
 do anything with the rest of their brethren. Awake 
 
 * Nullus est horum qui non conscensa turri, semct iu 
 mare preripitaturus sit, si jussero. — Plutar. 
 
 these drowsy Christians, awake them with eager re- 
 prehension, ' What mean you ? If reprehension will 
 not serve, prick them with the sword, and raise them 
 up with severe punishment. How long shall the 
 drunkard sleep within your gates in the puddle and 
 sink of his boozing, and lose both honesty and wit, 
 without controlment ; the adulterer in chambering 
 and wantonness upon his lascivious bed of pleasure, 
 decked with the laces and carpets of Egypt ; the 
 idolater and superstitious upon the knees and in the 
 bosom of the whore of Babylon ; profaners of our 
 sanctitiod sabbaths, in the sabbath, and rest, and jubi- 
 lee of their lewd pastimes ; the usurer and oppressor 
 of others, whose jaws are as knives, and his teeth of iron, 
 in his ' bed of mischief,' as the psalm calleth it, and 
 in the contemplation and solace* of his ill gotten goods ; 
 the swearer in the habit and custom of abomi- 
 nable oaths (for these be the faults of your city, as 
 common as the stones in your streets) ; how long shall 
 the}' sleep and snort herein without reprehension ? 
 It is your part to reform it who are the ministers of 
 God, not only for wealth, but for wrath also, unless 
 you bear the sword in vain ; you are the vocal laws 
 of the land, lc<ies loquentes, and justice iu life iij,-^\jyji» 
 diy.aiov, to punish with rigour, where it is conveni- 
 ent. We also of the ministry have a place of 
 preferment in the ship, and owe a duty to God, though 
 in another kind. We have a sword iu our mouths, 
 too, as you in your hands, whose edge is of more than 
 steel, and cutteth deeper than into flesh and blood ; 
 yet such are the earthly spirits of men fallen asleep 
 amongst us, that the sword of the Spirit, without the 
 sword of the magistrate, cannot stir them up. How 
 long have we called and lifted up our voices on high, 
 to those that sleep iu drunkenness, and lie in their 
 vomit worse than dogs ! ' Awake drunkards, wee]> 
 and howl, your wine shall be pulled from your mouths,' 
 and they awoke not, but to follow drunkenness again, 
 and to join the morning and the evening together till 
 the wine have enflamed them. How long to those 
 that sleep in fornication ! Awake adulterers and un- 
 clean persons, else God shall throw you into a bed of 
 shame and uncover your nakedness, and make you a 
 reproach and scorn so far as your name is spread ; yet 
 they open not their eyes, but to await for the twilight, 
 and to lie at their neighbour's door for wife or daugh- 
 ter ! To those that are at rest, and nestled in idola- 
 try in the service of strange gods, awake idolaters, you 
 that say to the wood'and stone, awake, help us ; awako 
 and rise up yourselves, else God is a jealous God, 
 and will visit your sins with rods, and your oflenoes 
 with scourges ! To all other sleepers iu sin, sabbath- 
 breakers, swearers, liars, extortioners, usurers, wliat 
 mean you sleepers '? It is now time that you should 
 arise from sleep, Eph. v., ' Yea, the time is almost 
 past.' ' Now is salvation nearer than when you first 
 believed,' Rom. xiii., and now is damnation uearcr 
 * At niihi plaudo ipse doini. — Horace. 
 
Ver. 6.] 
 
 LECTURE VII. 
 
 47- 
 
 than -when you were first threatened. The night is 
 past of bh'ndness and ignorance forepast, the bright 
 morning star hath risen, and hid himself again within the 
 clouds of heaven.* The glorious Sun of righteousness 
 hath illuminated the whole sphere of the world, from 
 the east to the west, and though his body be above, 
 the light of his beams is still amongst us, and we 
 may truly say, the day is come, yea, the day is well 
 nigh spent. The natural sun of the firmament run- 
 neth his race with speed, like a giant refreshed with 
 wine, to make an end of his course, and to finish all 
 times. You are now brought to the eleventh hour of 
 the day, there is but a twelfth, a few minutes of time 
 between you and judgment ; what mean you sleepers ? 
 Will you go away in sleep, and shall your life pass 
 * Alluding, I suppose, to Edward VI. — Ed. 
 
 from you like a dream ? Came you naked of good- 
 ness from your mother's womb, and will you back 
 naked ? Brought you nothing into the work! with you 
 of the best and blessedest riches, and will you carry no- 
 thing out ? Or do you tarry to be started with the 
 shrillest trumpet that ever blew, and the fearfuUost 
 voice to sleepers that ever sounded. Arise, yc dead? 
 "What mean you, sleepers ? The night is coming 
 wherein no man can work, j-ea, the daj' is comincf 
 wherein none shall work acceptable to God, profitable 
 to man, behoveful to himself, he neither can nor shall 
 work anything. That working that is, shall be the ever- 
 lasting throbbings and throes of his heart for his end- 
 less miseries, the eyes labouring for tears which shall 
 ever run down, and the teeth gi-inding one the other 
 without ceasing. 
 
 LECTUEE VII. 
 Arise, call upon God, &c. — Jonah I. 6. 
 
 BEFOPiE, I have shewed and commended the dili- 
 gence of the shipmaster, and proved that there 
 must be some power and superiority, to restrain in- 
 feriors by fear, to reprove sleepers and all kinds of 
 ofJ'endcrs. The praise of this governor farther ap- 
 peareth, that he doth not only reprehend Jonah, 
 ' What meanest thou sleeper ?' but urgeth and pro- 
 secuteth him, ' arise ' ; and instructeth him what he 
 ought to do, ' Call upon thy God,' and openeth the 
 uncertainty and hazard whereinto they were fallen, 
 ' If so be that God will think of us ' ; and that the 
 imminent danger toucheth not their goods alone, but 
 their lives also, as appeareth by the end of his speech, 
 ' That we perish not.' Thus he is not content to pull 
 him as it were by the ear with checking him, but he 
 shaketh him by the arm too, to sot him on his feet ; 
 he entereth into his conscience with wise and godly 
 advice, and pricketh the inwardest vein of his heart, 
 with commemoration of their danger, if God stay it 
 not. He hath laid his hand upon a plough, and his 
 eye goeth not from it ; he sticketh not in the begin- 
 nings of his calling, but groweth onward by degrees, 
 till he cometh to the full stature of a good magistrate. 
 Give me a shepherd thus zealous of his flock, and I 
 will say he is better than seven other shepherds, 
 and a man of principality so careful of his duty, more 
 than eight principal men that neglect theirs. It was 
 not enough for Eli, you know, to chide his sons, 
 1 Sam. ii., ' Why do you such things, for of all this 
 people I hear evil reports of you. Do no more so ; 
 it is not a good report that I hear of you ;' because 
 he did no more but so, and proceeded not in the 
 chastisement and reformation of them, God chargeth 
 him in plain terms, that he ' honoured his children 
 above him,' and threateneth to 'cut ofl' his arm, and 
 the arm of his father's house.' Afterwards he telleth 
 
 Samuel, chap, iii., that he will do a thing in Israel, that 
 whosoever heard of, his two ears should tingle.' He 
 would ' judge the house of Eli for ever, because his 
 sons ran into slander, and he stayed them not : and 
 the wickedness of his house should not be purged with 
 sacrifice and with ofl'ering whiles the world stood.' 
 And if you hearken for the sequel of all this, his two 
 sons, Hophni and Phineas, died both in one day, and 
 himself receiving a tidings worse than death, brake 
 his neck. All this we hear of, fathers, and masters, 
 and magistrates, and ministers, and yet our cars 
 tingle not ; we suffer our sons, our servants, our 
 people, our flocks, to run into slander themselves, to 
 redouble that slander upon our own heads, to multi- 
 ply it against God, his gospel, his church, and we 
 stay them not. The rest of our tongues within their 
 walls and wards, and the rust of the sword within the 
 scabbard, the admonition of the one winking with both 
 the ej-es, and the correction of the other fast asleep, 
 shew how unworthy we are to be trusted in our places, 
 and how unlike the master of the ship here spoken of. 
 Behold I have sought one by one to match this ex- 
 ample of gentility, and I have found one man of a 
 thousand that may contend with him. 
 
 The government of Nehemiah, throughout the whole 
 book, is a singular precedent to all rulers. 
 
 1. In the building of the walls of Jerusalem; he 
 would not be checked by Sanballat and his mates, 
 when they despitefully asked him, ' What do you ? 
 will you rebel against the king ?' Neh. ii. He then 
 answered, ' The God of heaven will prosper us, and 
 we will rise up and build : but as for you, ye have no 
 portion, nor right, nor memorial in Jerusalem.' 
 
 2. When they determined by conspiracy to fight 
 against Jerusalem and slay the builders of the walls, 
 he placed them with spears and bows, and gave them 
 
4S 
 
 KIKG ON JOXAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 tliis enconragement, chap, iv., ' Be not afraid of them, 
 but remember (he great Lord and fearful, and fight for 
 your brethren, your sons, your daughters, your wives, 
 and your houses. So they did the work of the Lord 
 with one hand, and held the sword with the other, 
 wrought by day, and watched by night ; yea, they 
 were so careful in their watch, he, and his servants, 
 and his brethren, and the men of the ward which fol- 
 lowed him, that no man put off his clothes, save that 
 they put them off for washing.' 
 
 3. When the people were oppressed by their bre- 
 thren, their lands, houses, vineyards, gaged for corn, 
 their sons and daughters brought to subjection, he 
 rebuked the princes and rulers, chap, v., ' Ye lay 
 burdens every one upon his brethren, we have redeemed 
 them from the heathen, and ye will sell them again ; 
 that which ye do is not good, restore them their lands, 
 olives, vinej'ards, houses, remit the hundredth part of 
 the silver, corn, wine, oil, that yo exact of them.' 
 Yea, he ' called the priests, and caused them to swear 
 to do it. Moreover, he shook his lap, and said. Thus 
 let the Lord shake out every man that pcrformeth not 
 his promise, even thus let him be shaken out and 
 emptied.' 
 
 4. When the Sabbath was profaned amongst them 
 (for some in Judea trode wine-presses, and brought in 
 sheaves, and laded asses with wine, grapes, and figs, 
 and other of Tyre brought fish, and all wares, and sold 
 them on the Sabbaths in Jerusalem), he not only 
 rebuked their rulers, chap, siii., ' What evil is this 
 that ye do ?' and shewed them the danger, ' This did 
 our fathers, and God plagued the city ;' but he ' caused 
 the gates of the city to be shut before the Sabbath, 
 and set servants of his at the gates, and the chapmen 
 remained without the walls at night, and he protested 
 unto them, that if they tan-ied again about the wall, 
 he would lay hands upon them.' 
 
 5. When some of the Jews married their wives 
 from Ashdod, Ammon, and Moab, and their children 
 spake half in the speech of Ashdod, and could not 
 speak in the Jews' language, first, he reproved them ; 
 secondly, cursed them ; thirdly, smote certain of them ; 
 fourthly, pulled ofl' their hair, for a further reproach 
 unto them ; and, lastly, took an oath of them by God, 
 chap, xiii., 'Ye shall not give your daughters unto 
 their sons, neither shall ye take of their daughters for 
 your sons nor for yourselves.' 
 
 G. Eliashib the priest, kinsman to Tobiah, in the 
 absence of Nehcmiah from Jerusalem, having the 
 oversight of the chamber of the house of the Lord 
 (where the oflering and incense, vessels and tithes, for 
 the provision of Lcvites, singers, and porters, and the 
 ofl'erings of priests were wont to be laid), ho made a 
 chamber thereof for his kinsman, Tobias the Horonite. 
 The order that Nehcmiah took for the amendment of 
 this abuse, is thoroughly pursued ; (1.) it grieved him 
 sore ; (2.) he cast out the vessels of Tobiah out of the 
 chamber, and then caused the chambers to be cleansed, 
 
 and the vessels of the house of God to be brought 
 thither again ; (3.) because the portions of the Levites 
 and singers had not been given to them, and every 
 one was fled to his land, he reproved the'rulers, ' Why 
 is the house of God forsaken?' (4.) he caused the 
 tithes to be restored, brought the Levites together to 
 their place again, and appointed faithful officers and 
 treasurers to distribute unto them. The petition that 
 he maketh unto the righteous Lord, who will not for- 
 get our labours, at the foot of every of those sei-vices, 
 is framed to this effect : ' Remember me, my God, 
 in goodness, and wipe not out my kindness concerning 
 this, and pardon me according to thy great mercies.' 
 Thus, Nehemiah, you see, was not unmindful of the 
 Lord, that the Lord might be mindful of him again, 
 neither in the building, nor in the warding of the walls 
 of Jerusalem, nor in relieving the burdens of his 
 brethren, nor in sanctifying the Sabbath, nor in 
 purging the people from commixtion with strangers, 
 nor in replenishing the chambers of God's house, with 
 maintenance for his ministers. All which he zealously 
 undertook, and constantly followed to the end, fasten- 
 ing his reproofs like nails that are driven in a sure 
 place, and shewing himself a careful magistrate both 
 in war and peace, in civil and religious affairs, towards 
 the children of the laud, and towards strangers that 
 trafficked within the borders thereof. 
 
 Undoubtedly your charge is great whom the Lord 
 hath marked out to places of government; and if ever 
 you hope, as Nehemiah wished, that God shall remem- 
 ber you concerning this or that kindness shewed in 
 his business, remember yon whose image you carry, 
 whose person you present, whose cause you undertake, 
 whose judgments you execute upon earth. And though 
 ye are not troubled with building and warding the 
 walls of your country, because ' peace is the walls, and 
 the strength of God our bulwarks and fortresses;' and 
 mine eyes would fail with expectation of that day, when 
 the chambers of the Lord's house, which Tobiah the 
 Horonite hath seized into his hands, should be restored 
 to their ancient institution for the maintenance of 
 Levites and singers ; yet in the oppressions of your 
 brethren, whose vineyards, fields, houses, liberty, 
 living are wning from them, and their sons and 
 daughters undone, if you do not in all respects, as 
 Nehemiah did, chap, v., lend them money and corn, 
 he and his servants of their own, and bestow the fees 
 of your places, towards their relief (' for he ate not the 
 bread of the governor in twelve ,years, and an hundred 
 and fifty he maintained daily at his boards with suffi- 
 cient allowance"), yet such as oppress too much, 
 exhort, reprove, cause them to respite, cause them to 
 remit, tie them by promise to do it, bind them by oath, 
 and if that will not serve (unless you be loath to throw 
 a stone against an adulterer, or to shake your lap 
 against an oppressor, because you are guilty in your 
 hearts of the like trespasses), shake the laps of your 
 garments against them, and with an unfeigned spirit 
 
Ver. 6.] 
 
 LECTURE VII. 
 
 49 
 
 beseecli the just judge, that such as will not restore, 
 may so be shaken out and emptied from all his mer- 
 cies. Likewise for the Sabbath of the Lord, the sanc- 
 tified day of his rest, help to bring it to rest, it is 
 shamefully troubled and disquieted ; the common days 
 in the week are happier in their seasons than the 
 Lord's Sabbaths. Then arc the manuary crafts exer- 
 cised, every man in his shop applying his honest and 
 lawful business ; the Sabbath is reserved as the unpro- 
 fitablest day of the seven, for idleness, sleeping, walk- 
 ing, rioting, tippling, bowling, dancing, and what not? 
 I speak what I know ; upon a principal Sabbath (for 
 if the resurrection of Christ deserve to alter the Sab- 
 bath from day to day, I see no cause but the coming 
 down of the Holy Ghost should add honour and orna- 
 ment unto it), I say, upon a principal Sabbath, not 
 only those of Jerusalem and Judah sold their wares, 
 but those of T}Te also which came from abroad, 
 brought in their commodities, and neither your gates 
 shut, nor foreigners kept out, nor citizens reproved, 
 nor anything done, whereby God's name and day might 
 be honoured. Go now and ask, if you can for blush- 
 ing, as Nehemiah did, ' Lord, remember us concern- 
 ing this kindness.' 
 
 It is not enough for you to bear the place of pre- 
 eminence in the ship, but you must reprove, as the 
 master here did ; nor enough barely to reprove, but 
 you must go forwards in hunting security from her 
 couch, by urging how hard it is to appease the anger 
 of God, if it be thoroughly inflamed, how dangerous 
 against the life and soul, if it be not prevented. It is 
 the fervency of the spirit, even of a double spirit, as 
 Elisha sometime wished, the spirit of magistrates, 
 which are more than single persons, perfect hatred to 
 sin, crushing both the egg and the cockatrice, courage 
 in the cause of the Lord, zeal to his house both kind- 
 ling and consuming your hearts, a good beginning, and 
 a good ending, which the Lord requireth. Will you 
 safeguard the ship in the ocean sea, and break her 
 within a league of the haven ? WiU you put your 
 hand to the plough of the best husbandry and thriv- 
 ing in the world, and then look back ? Will you lay 
 the foundation of the house, rear up the walls, and not 
 seek to cover it '? You know the parable, ' This man 
 began to build.' It had been better not to have known 
 the way of truth, than not to persist in it, nor to have 
 set your shoulders to the work of the Lord, unless 
 ye bold out. The leaf of a righteous man never fadeth, 
 Ps. i. ; whereupon the gloss noteth that the fall of 
 the leaves is the dying and decaying of the trees, lap- 
 sus foUorum, morlijicatio arhonun. When it repeuteth 
 a man to have begun well, it is a sinful repentance, 
 and much to be repented of. The fire upon the altar 
 of the Lord must always burn, never go out, and the 
 sedulity of God's lieutenants upon the earth must ever 
 be working, never wearied. All virtues run in the 
 race, one only receiveth the garland, the image of most 
 happy eternity, happy continuance.^ 
 
 I told you before that nature directed the mariners 
 to the acknowledgment of a God ; it is here further 
 ratified, with many other principles of nature, if they 
 were needful to be examined, as (1.) that God only is 
 to be invocated and called upon : Call iipoii t!i;/ God. 
 (2.) The unity of the Godhead is avowed. For the 
 shipmaster forgetting the multitude of gods, nameth 
 one singly without other associates : //' so be God. 
 (3.) That the fehcity of mankind dependeth upon the 
 serenity, gracious and favourable aspect of God, as I 
 gather by the phrase here used, if God icill shine upon 
 us. (4.) It is implied that our life and death are in 
 God's hands : thnt we perish not. But let those pass 
 a while. The matter we are now to examine is the 
 liberty and freedom which the shipmaster gave unto 
 Jonah, to call upon his proper God, not tying him to 
 that which himself adored. 
 
 We say, lieHijio religat, religion tieth man to some 
 god, whom, either by heavenly relation, or by their 
 phantasy and conceit, they have made choice of. 
 And therefore the Lord asketh with admiration, .Jer. 
 ii., 'Hath any nation changed their gods, which yet 
 are no gods '?' And Mai. iii., ' Will a man spoil his 
 gods ?' Nay, they are so fond and doating in afl'oction 
 upon them, that they will spare no cost to honour 
 them. If they worship but a golden calf, thoy will 
 strip their wives and daughters of their richest jewels 
 to shew their devotion. When Phidias told the 
 Athenians that it was better to make Minerva of 
 marble than ivory, because the beauty thereof would 
 longer continue,* thus far they endured him ; but 
 when he added, and it is better cheap, they enjoined 
 him silence. Alexander was so frank in bestowing 
 frankincense upon his gods, that his officers blamed 
 him. Micah, Judges xviii., accounted the loss of his 
 gods, which the children of Dan took from him, above 
 all losses : ' What had I more to lose '?' How did Sen- 
 nacherib and Rabshakeh deride all the gods of the 
 nations in emulation to their own gods, as appeareth 
 by their insolent speeches ? ' Where is the god of 
 Hamath, and of Arphad ? where is the god of Seph- 
 arvaim '? who is he, amongst all the gods of these 
 lands, that hath delivered their countries out of my 
 hands ?' Isa. xxxvi. and sxxvii. Nay, they forbear 
 not to speak blasphemy against the Lord of Hosts, 
 the God of Israel, which dwelleth between the 
 cherubims, and is very God alone over all the king- 
 doms of the earth : ' Go, say]to Hezekiah, Let not thy 
 God deceive thee whom thou trustest.' Therefore, 
 when Darius had conceived an opinion of the God of 
 heaven, he made a decree, Dan. vi., that in all the 
 dominions of his kingdom, ' men should tremble and 
 fear before the God of Daniel, for he is the living 
 God, and remaineth for ever, and his kingdom shall 
 not perish, and his dominion shall be everlasting.' 
 Nebuchadnezzar made the like decree before, Dan. iii., 
 when he saw the deliverance of the three [children, 
 * Valer. Max. lib. i. 
 
 D 
 
50 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 that ' whosoever spake any blasphemy against their God, 
 should be drawn in pieces, and his house made a jakes, 
 because there was no god that could deliver after that 
 sort.' Hence came it that David so much disgraced and 
 discountenanced the gods of the heathen, Ps. cssxv. : 
 ' I know that the Lord is great, and that our Lord is 
 above all gods, &c. As for the idols of the heathen, 
 they are but silver and gold, even the works of men's 
 hands ; they have a mouth and speak not, they have 
 eyes and see not, they have ears and hear not, neither 
 is there any breath in their mouths.' And for the 
 same cause did Elias scoff at Baal, 1 Kings xviii., 
 when he cried unto his prophets, ' Cry aloud, for be 
 is a god ; either he talketb, or pursueth his enemies, 
 or is in his journey, or perhaps sleepeth, and must be 
 awaked.' When Ahaziah sent for help of his sickness 
 to Beelzebub the god of Ekron, 2 Kings i., an angel 
 of the Lord met his messengers, and said unto them, 
 ' Is it not because there is no God in Israel, that ye 
 go to inquire of Beelzebub the god of Ekron ?' Thus 
 all the servants of God, angels and men, are zealously 
 and unmoveably bent for the advancement of his 
 name above all other gods, which idolaters hang upon. 
 Which maketh me the more to marvel, that the master 
 of the ship can permit Jonah to call upon his own God. 
 It hath been a question sometimes disputed, whether 
 divers religions at once may be borne with in one 
 kingdom. Which whether the remediless condition 
 of the time and place have enforced, or the negligence 
 of the magistrate dissembled, or the indifl'erent, luke- 
 warm ail'ection of a policy over-poUtic suffered to steal 
 in, I know not, but sure I am, that some countries 
 and commonwealths of Christendom stand upon feet 
 partly of iron, partly of clay, that is, there are both 
 Jews and Christians, Arians and anabaptists, papists 
 and protestants, and such a confusion of religions as 
 there was in ] label of languages. To give you my 
 judgment in few words, I wholly mislike it. For if 
 in our private houses we would not endure a man 
 that had his affection alienated and estranged from 
 ourselves, our wives, our children, or any friend of 
 ours, shall wo admit him in the commonwealth, which 
 bear a foreign and unnatural concept touching the 
 God we serve, the Princo'we obey, the country we are 
 nursed in ? The first of those ten words which God 
 spake in Sinai, standing at the entrance of all his 
 moral precepts, like the cherubims at the gates of 
 paradise, cricth unto the house of Israel, and all other 
 people, ' Thou shalt have none other gods besides me.' 
 Those other prohibitions in the law, Lev. xix., Deut. 
 xxii., ' Thou shalt not sow thy field with mingled seed. 
 Thou shalt not plough with an ox and an ass together ; 
 a garment of divers stufls, as of linen and woollen, 
 shall not come upon thee,' what do they intend ? I 
 may ask, as the apostle did of another sentence of the 
 law, 'Hath God care of oxen' and asses, garments 
 and grains ? And the ordinary gloss upon Leviticus 
 Baith, that these things, taken after the letter, seem 
 CI 
 
 ridiculous : Hue ail litcram viihiitur case ridieitJa. 
 The abuses they strike at, is ' an heart, and an heart,' 
 doubling in the worship of God, blending of Judaism 
 and Christianity, gospel and ceremonies, sound and 
 heretical doctrines, truth and falsehood in our* church. 
 Such mesten seed light upon that ground which I 
 wish no prosperity unto, and such medley garments 
 sit upon the backs of our enemies ! As for this realm 
 of ours, be it far and far from such corniption. For 
 he that threatened Laodicea, Rev. ii. iii., because 
 she was ' neither hot nor cold, to spew her out of his 
 mouth,' commended Ephesus for ' hating the Nicolai- 
 tanes,' reproved Smyrna for maintaining them, and 
 ' the doctrine of Baalam,' blamed Thyatira for ' suffer- 
 ing Jezebel to teach and deceive his servants, to make 
 them commit fornication, and to eat meat sacrificed 
 to idols ;' how can we think that he will not as strictly 
 examine and search out the complexions of other 
 lands, whether they be hot or cold, zealous or remiss 
 in his service ? The gospel of Christ, being planted 
 in the church of Galatia, might not abide, you know, 
 the copartnership of Jewish ceremonies. Gal. iv., nor 
 their observation of idays and months ; which being 
 nothing in comparison of an adversaiy, shouldering 
 religion, are termed by one who thought he had tho 
 Spirit of God, ' impotent and beggarly elements ;' 
 yet they had been elements in their time, and God 
 had used them befi're, as the first letters of the book, 
 to school his people with. But their office was ended. 
 That fulness of time which brought Christ into the 
 world, and fulness of knowledge and grace which 
 Christ brought with him, was their dimin'ition. 
 Therefore, besides nn anathema again and again in- 
 geminated to those that preached otherwise, and fool- 
 ishness heaped upon their heads like burning coals, 
 that were bewitched with such preaching, he protesteth 
 unto them, not hiding his face, or dissembling his 
 name, ' Behold I, Paul, say unto j-ou, that if ye be 
 circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing.' If he 
 could not sustain a little leaven in the lump, as there 
 he calloth it, what would he have said of poison ? I 
 mean of an impious, blasphemous, sacrilegious man- 
 ner of worship, when this was rather curious, frivolous, 
 and ceremonious ? When Moses and Christ together 
 were so offensive unto him, he would never have heard 
 of a reconciliation between Christ and Belial, light 
 and darkness, righteousness and unrighteousness, 
 believers and infidels, the temple of God and idols, 
 the cup of tho Lord and the cup of devils, the table 
 of the Lord and tho table of devils ; in the commu- 
 nion whereof ho noteth an impossibility, in both his 
 epistles to the Corinthians. 
 
 I will not stand to dispute how impossible it is for any, 
 either person or state, to 'serve two masters,' tho one not 
 subordinate to tho other, but fiatly repugnant ; say, for 
 example, God and JIammon, orl\Ielchom, or Baal, orany 
 tho like abomination. Must they not use a balance and 
 • Qu. ' one '? — Ed. 
 
Ver. 6.] 
 
 LECTURE VII. 
 
 51 
 
 a balance, a conscience and a conscience, that do so, 
 and go after two ways ? But what danger ensucth 
 upon such confected religions, and halting consciences, 
 as Elias named them, they may best learn both by 
 word and deed, from that zealous God, who hath 
 taken express order against ' strange gods,' and 
 executeth his fierce wrath upon those that have offered 
 but ' strange fire,' and ordained his la^' strictly to be 
 kept, without ' declining to the right hand or to the 
 left,' and himself would be served alone without co- 
 rivals of his glory, ' with all our heart, soul, and 
 strength,' as he hath often enjoined. ' There is but 
 one Lord, one Mediator, one Spirit, one baptism, one 
 supper, one faith,' Eph. iv., all in unity. The body 
 and state is then strongest, when the multitude of 
 believers have but one heart and one soul amongst 
 them all. Acts iv. ; and shall one people within the 
 same land, and under the same government, sunder 
 and distract themselves into many religions ? Or can 
 the Lord be at unity with that people, where immu- 
 nity is given, to deal in the manner or matter of his 
 service, otherwise than he hath prescribed '? Naziau- 
 zen* writeth, that many people lying round about 
 them, as a circle about the centre, did much observe 
 and marvel at the Cappadocians, not only for their 
 sound faith, but for the gift of concord which God 
 bestowed upon them. For because they thought 
 aright of the Trinity, and defended it jointly, against 
 the Arians, they were defended by the Trinity them- 
 selves. Clemens Alexandriuus wisheth much happi- 
 ness to the king of the Scythians,! whosoever that 
 Anacharsis were, who took a citizen of his, and for 
 imitating some Greekish effeminate sacrifices offered 
 to the mother of the gods, hung him up by the neck, 
 and shot him through with arrows, because he had 
 both corrupted himself amongst the Grecians, and 
 infected others with the like disease. The counsel 
 which Majcenas gave to Augustus the EmperorJ is 
 very sage, and the reasons by him alleged such as 
 touch the quickest vein of the question in hand. Put 
 his words into the mouth of some other man, whose 
 lips an angel hath touched with a coal from the altar 
 of the Lord, and the Holy Ghost sanctified, they are 
 then right worthy to be accounted of. Thus he 
 exhorteth : The divine Godhead see that thou rever- 
 ence thyself, lhf^h Siiov rrdi-rri -ravTu:, &x., according 
 to the laws of thy country, and cause others to do the 
 like. And those that change anything in matters 
 appertaining thereunto, Tou; o- i^ivi^rmrai tI, &c., 
 hate, and correct, not only in behalf of the gods, whom 
 whosoever neglectcth, he will never regard aught else ; 
 but because such as bring in new gods, draw others 
 also to alteration and change. And hence come con- 
 spiracies, seditions, conventicles, things not expedient 
 
 * In Movodia. Quos circa plures observant populi, ut 
 centrum circulns circumscriptiis. 
 
 t Multa bone eveniant Scytliiarum regi, &c. — In protrept. 
 X In Dion. Cas. 
 
 to a government. Eeligion is the truest band betwixt 
 man and man, the knot of all communion and con- 
 sociation.* Now what conjunction of minds can 
 there be ? what atonementf of judgments, what in- 
 ward peace, sincere charity, hearty God-speed, in that 
 disparity of religions, where one house hath Jews, 
 another Samaritans, some calling upon God, some 
 upon angels and saints, creeping to crosses, bowing 
 to images ; so burning in emulation for their several 
 services, as fire and water shall sooner agree than 
 their judgments and afl'cctions '? Let our laws be 
 grounded upon the law of God, and it will be the 
 greatest safety of our land, to enact, as the Athenians 
 sometimes did, J that whosoever should speak one 
 word of their god, beside their laws, should be punished 
 unmercifully, ' A'Trami-ri'roii, for it. 
 
 It hath been a favourable compromission of men 
 more partial than wise, that the questions betwixt Rome 
 and the reformed churches might easily be accorded. 
 I find it not ; and I will be bold to say, as Tull^' some- 
 times of the stoics and academics, that the contention 
 between us is not for bounds, but for the whole pos- 
 session and inheritance, J whether God or man, grace 
 or nature, the blood of Christ or the merits of saints, 
 written verity or unwritten vanities, the ordinance of 
 the Most High in authorising princes, or the bulls of 
 popes in deposing them, shall take place. We have 
 altar against altar, liturgy against liturgy, prayers 
 against prayers, doctrine against doctrine, potentate 
 against potentate, pope against prince, religion against 
 religion, subjection against subjection, faith against 
 faith, so diametrically opposed, as the northern and 
 southern poles shall sooner meet together, than our 
 opinions (standing as they do) can be reconciled. Look 
 upon France and Nether Germany for the proof hereof. 
 The eff'usion of so much Christian blood, the eversion 
 and dissipation of so manj' noble houses, the commo- 
 tions and tumults of so many years, whence have they 
 sprung? The reason, or pretence at least, of those 
 murders, massacres, wastes, tragedies, hath been con- 
 trary religions. If this be the fruit, then, shall every 
 subject in a realm be privileged in his bouse to have 
 a god to himself, a priest to himself, a worship to 
 himself, as Micah had in Ephraim ? Shall be believe, 
 and pray, and obey ? Shall he both fear God and 
 honour his king, as himself listeth ? But what will 
 ye do in this case ? Their minds are as free as the 
 emperor's. Every man is a king in his own house, as 
 Telemachus said ; bis conscience is bis castle and for- 
 tress ; nothing is so voluntary as religion, || wherein, 
 if the mind bo averse, it is now no religion. We may 
 shift the bodies of men from place to place ; we can- 
 
 * ' ATdff))5 %r>tiuii'iaz aw'exrixov. — Pluiar. advers. Cold. 
 t Tliat is, ' at-ono-ment,' or agreement. — Ed. 
 I Joseph, cont. Ap. ii. 
 
 I Non de termiuis sed do tota possessions contentio — 
 Acadeni. Quizst. 
 
 II Nihil tarn voluntarium quam religio. — Lactant. 
 
52 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 not change their minds.* We shall sooner enforce 
 stocks and stones to speak unto us. Advice will do 
 more than threatening ;t and faith cometh rather by 
 persuasion than by compulsion. ; I grant it. There- 
 fore, first speak to the conscience by good counsel ; 
 but if the ear of the conscience be stopped with wax, 
 shake the whole house about her, and raise her uji ; 
 speak to the ears of the body, inheritance, liberty ; 
 let the body tell the conscience, I am afflicted ; the 
 inheritance, I am diminished ; liberty, 1 am restrained 
 for thy sake. These are arguments and persuasions 
 that have done good, as Augustine§ atfirmeth of the 
 Donatists and Circumcellians in Africa, that being ter- 
 rified by pains, they began to enter into consideration 
 with themselves, whether they sufl'ered for justice, or 
 for obstinacy and presumption. But you will say that 
 some men are not bettered hereby. Shall we, there- 
 fore, saith Augustine, il reject the physic, because the 
 sickness of some is incurable ? For of such it is writ- 
 ten, ' I have smitten your children in vain ; they re- 
 ceive no correction.' And for the better managing of 
 the whole cause, he addeth this judgment : If they 
 were terrified, and not taught, it would seem tyranny ; 
 again, if taught and not terrified, it would harden them 
 in an inveterate custom, and make them more slug- 
 gish to receive their salvation. As for that objection 
 of liberty of conscience, he answereth it in another 
 place. It is in vain that thou sayest, Leave me to my 
 free will ; for why proolaimest thou not liberty in ho- 
 micides, and whoredoms as well '? God bath given, 
 indeed, free will unto man (free from coaction), but it 
 was not his will, meantime, that either the good will 
 of man should be without fruit, or his evil will without 
 punishment. 1" Tertullian is of the same mind with 
 Augustine, that it is meet that heretics should be com- 
 pelled to do their duty, not allured. I say compelled, 
 if allurement will not serve, for they must not ahvay 
 be prayed and entreated. He that hath a phrensy 
 must be bound, and he that hath a lethargy must be 
 pricked up, and he that hath strengthened himself 
 in heresy, whether he keep it privately to himself, or 
 diffuse it amongst others, must violently be pulled 
 
 * Calanus, an Indian ]ihilo.sopl]ei-, to Alexander. 
 
 t Mnnendo magis quam minaiido. — Aiiff. Ep. G5. 
 
 X Fides suadenda uon imponeuda. — £em. Ser. 66, in cant. 
 
 § Ad Viticenlium. 
 
 II Kumquid ideo negligenda est medicina, quia nonnullo- 
 luin tst insanabilia pestilontia. — Lib. 0. cont. Crescon. c. 51. 
 
 % Sod ncque, bonam esse voluit infructuosam, neque ma- 
 lam iini^unilam. — Adeer. Gnostic. 
 
 from it. These persons hath Augustine distinguished ;* 
 for there are some heretics troublesomely audacious, 
 others anciently sluggish, and taken with a sleepy 
 disease ; neither of these may in wisdom be forborne. 
 There are some makers, others but followers,! prose- 
 lytes, disciples in heresies, and these are either weak 
 or indurate ; so, then, fu'st counsel, and afterwards com- 
 pel them, if that will not serve to bring them to the ser- 
 vice of God, according to that form which the laws of our 
 country have set down ; though I wish not one hair of 
 their heads diminished, but when they strike at our 
 head, and bad rather pour blood into their veins than 
 let it out, I but when the atrocity of their acts can no 
 longer be tolerated ; yet were I worthy to give ad- 
 vice, I would have a wi-iter go with his inkhorn from 
 man to man, and mark them in the foreheads that 
 mourn for the welfare of our realm, and as bondmen 
 to their brethren they should hew wood and draw water 
 to the host of Israel, as Joshua used the Gibeonites 
 for their guile. Josh. ix. Who will pity the charmer 
 that is stung by the serpent, because it was the folly 
 of the charmer to go too near ? Or who will favour 
 that man that nonrisheth a gangrene within his body, 
 and seeketh not help to remove it? We nurse up 
 lions' whelps for our own overthrow, as Amilcar 
 brought up his sons for the ruin of Rome ; we jilay 
 too boldly at the holes of asps ; we embolden the 
 faces, encourage the hearts, strengthen the hands of 
 them that keep an Ep^/isw;, a daily record of all our 
 actions, and have taken to use whatsoever hath boon 
 spoken or done against them these many halcyon 
 years of ours, meaning to exchange it, ten for one, if 
 ever they see the day of their long expected altcratiou. 
 But the cause is the Lord's. Whatsoever they look 
 for, let us vindicate his dishonour, who hath made 
 this country of ours a sanctuary for true religion, a 
 refuge and shade in the heat of the day for persecuted 
 professors, who have been chased like bees from their 
 own hives, a temple for himself to dwell in. Let us 
 not make that temple a stews, a common receipt for 
 all comers, that both atheists, papists, anabaptists, 
 and all sorts of sectaries, may hold what conscience- 
 they will, and serve such god as like themselves. 
 
 * Tvirbulcnta audncia, vetusta soeordia, seu vetcrnosa 
 consnctudo. — Ad Vincent. 
 
 t Coiiditnres, affectatore.'!. — De Bapt. cont. Donat. \\h. vi.. 
 cap. 44. Hjerctici, liajresiarcha;, dissomhiatores. — Frasmuf 
 declar. ad ccs. Paris , tit. 23. 
 
 \ SufTuudere malis sanguiuem, quam ofl'undere. — Tcrtut. 
 in Apolog, 
 
 LECTURE YIII. 
 
 C(dl upon thij God, if so he thai (Joel uiU think upon us, that tvc perish not. — Jonah I. 0. 
 
 I HAVE noted before, out of these words, both the 
 carefulness of the shipmnster cuntinned towards liis 
 charge, and the liberty, or rather license he give unto 
 
 Jonah to serve his peculiar God. Touching which- 
 indulgence of his, I shewed my ojiinion, whether it be 
 expedient that a governor should tolerate a distraction 
 
Vek. (j. 
 
 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 53 
 
 of his subjects into divers religions. Methinkoth there 
 are two things more implied in this member, ' Call 
 npon thy God,' carrying the reasons why he called 
 upon Jonah after this sort ; for either he ali'ected the 
 person of Jonah, supposing, perhaps, that some merit 
 and grace in the man might more prevail by prayer 
 than the rest; or else he affianced the God of Jonah, 
 and as one weary or distrustful of his own, hoped there 
 might be another God more able to deliver them. I 
 will not enter into conjectures too far ; but surely it 
 is likely enough that either by the looks, or speech, or 
 attire, or behaviour, or some forepassed devotion, or 
 other the like notice, the master conceived a good 
 opinion of Jonah. The forehead sometimes shcweth 
 the man, as the widow of Shunam by the very usage, 
 countenance, and speech of Elisha, was able to tell 
 her husband : 2 Kings iv. 9, ' Behold, I know now 
 that this is an holy man of God, that passeth by us 
 continuaUy.' If this were his reason, it was not greatly 
 amiss, because there is a great diti'erence between man 
 and man ; for neither the priority of birth, which Esau 
 had of Jacob, Gon. xsv., nor the height of stature 
 which Eliab had of David, 1 Sam. xvi., nor the pomp 
 and honour of the world, which Haman had of Mor- 
 decai, Est. iii., nor all the wisdom of Chaldea, which 
 the astrologers had of Daniel, nor the antiquity of 
 days which many daughters of Sion had of the blessed 
 virgin, nor the prerogative of calling which the Scribes 
 and Pharisees had of poor lishennen, nor the country 
 which Annas and Caiaphas had of Comehus, nor 
 eloquence of speech which TertuUus had of Paul, nor 
 any the like respect, is able to commend a man in such 
 sort, but that his inferiors in that kind, for more vir- 
 tuous conditions, may be magniiied above him. It 
 may be, the master of the ship was so persuaded of 
 Jonah, that though he were but one to a multitude, a 
 stranger amongst strangers, a scholar and puny amongst 
 merchants, and soldiers, whose state and carnage was 
 ever}' way beyond his, yet he might have a spirit, 
 blessing, and wisdom beyond all theu's, and therefore 
 repaireth unto him, ' Ai-ise, call upon thy God.' How 
 only and incomparable.was the favom- which Abraham, 
 the great i\xther of many people, found in the eyes of 
 God, who being but dust and ashes, as himself con- 
 fessed. Gen. xviii., pleaded with his Maker as one 
 would reason with his neighbour in the behalf of 
 Sodom, with six sundi'y replies, fi-om fifty to ten right- 
 eous persons, which number, if it had been found, 
 Sodom had escaped ! How dear was the soul of Lot, 
 in that fearful destruction. Gen. xix., on whom the 
 Lord bestowed his life, and the life of his wife and 
 childi-en, and the safety of Zoar, a little city not far 
 oft', because he had entreated for it ! The angel plucked 
 him into the house from the fury of the Sodomites, 
 and not less than plucked him out of the city (who 
 made but slow haste), bidding him flee to Zoar to save 
 his life, for he ' could do nothing till he was come 
 thither.' Noah and his httle familv. Gen. vi., the 
 
 remnant of the earth, as the son of Sirach tcrmeth 
 them, the only buds of the world that were to seed 
 seed for a new generation of men, at the time of tho 
 flood were more precious unto the Lord than all the 
 people under heaven besides, which had tho breath of 
 hfe withm them. How often did he gratify Moses, 
 the beloved of God and men, with the lives of the 
 childi-en of Israel, when his anger was so hot, that he 
 entreated his servant to ' let him alone, that he might 
 consume them,' Exod. xxxii. ; yet contented in tho 
 end to be entreated by him, and to pleasure him vrith 
 their pardon, ' I have forgiven it according to thy 
 request,' Numb. xiv. Oh what a let is a righteous 
 man to the justice of God, and even as manacles upon 
 his hands, that he camiot smite, when ho is driven to 
 ciy unto one, ' Let me alone,' and to another, ' Till 
 thou art gone, I can do nothing.' And did he not 
 grace the person of Job more than his three friends, 
 when he bade Eliphaz, with the other two, to go and 
 ofl'er a burnt-oUering for themselves, and his servant 
 Job should pray for them, and he would accept him. 
 Job xlii. And is it not an ai-gument past gainsaying, 
 that Moses and Samuel were according to his own 
 heart, when he reviveth their names, as from theu- 
 ashes, and blesseth their memory to Jeremiah his 
 prophet, chap. xv. 1, with so favovu-able account? 
 ' Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet could 
 not my afl'ection be toward this people.' Tho like 
 whereof we find in Ezekiel, chap. xiv. 14, ' Though 
 these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were amongst 
 them, they should save neither sons nor daughters, 
 but deliver their own souls by their righteousness.' 
 Eden was chosen to be the garden of the Lord, when 
 all the ground of the earth besides was paled out. 
 Noah's ark floated upon the waters, when all other 
 ships and boats of the sea were overwhelmed ; Aaron's 
 rod budded, and brought forth almonds, when all the 
 rods for the other tribes remained dry and withered. 
 One sheaf hath stood upright, and one star hath sparkled, 
 when eleven others have lain upon the ground, and 
 been obscured. 
 
 The apple of the eye is dearer unto a man than the 
 whole frame and circle of the eye about it ; the signet 
 upon the right hand in more regard, either for matter 
 or for the form, or for the use whereto it serveth, than 
 all his other ornaments ; a writing in the palms of his 
 hands, more carefully presei^ved than all his other 
 papers and records. Doubtless there are some amongst 
 the rest of their brethren, whom God doth tender as 
 the apple of his eye, wear as a signet upon his finger, 
 engrave as a writing in the palms of his hands, and 
 with whom is the seci-et of the Lord, and his hidden . 
 treasures, though his open and ordinary blessings be 
 upon all flesh. Moses hath asked meat in a famine, 
 and water in a drought, for the children of Israel, 
 when their bowels might have piped within them like 
 shalms, and their tongues cloven to the roof of their 
 mouths, if he had not spoken. Elias hath called for 
 
54 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 rain when tho earth might have gasped for thirst, and 
 discovered her lowest foundations if he had heen silent. 
 Phinehas hath stayed a plague, which would not have 
 ceased till it had devoured man and beast, if such a 
 man had not stood up. Paul, in the 27th of the Acts, 
 obtained by the mercy of God the hves of his com- 
 panions that sailed with him towards Rome in that 
 desperate voyage. As a morning star in the midst 
 of the cloud, and as the moon when it is full ; as the 
 flower of the roses in the spring of the year, and as 
 lilies by the springs of waters, and as the branches of 
 the frankincense in the time of summer ; as a vessel 
 of massy "gold, set with all manner of precious stones ; 
 and as the fat that is taken from .the peace ofl'erings : 
 so is one Enoch that walked with God, when others 
 walk from him, one llahab in Jericho, one Elias that 
 boweth not his knees to Baal, one David in Meshech, 
 one Esther in Shushan, one Judith in Bethulia, one 
 Joseph in the council of the Jews, one Gamaliel in 
 the council of the Pharisees, one innocent and right- 
 eous man in the midst of a froward and crooked 
 generation. ' The prayer of the righteous availeth 
 much, if it be fervent ; the prayer of faith shall save 
 the sick, for tho Lord shall raise him up, and if he 
 hath committed sin, it shall be forgiven him,' James 
 V. It may minister occasion to the wicked, to rever- 
 ence and embrace the righteous, even for policy's sake. 
 For ' the innocent shall deliver the island, and it shall 
 be preserved by the pm-eness of his hands,' Job. xxii. 
 Many a time there may be, when as stout a king, and 
 as obstinate a sinner, as ever Pharaoh was, shall call 
 for Moses and Aaron, and beseech them. Pray to the 
 Lord for me. In pestilences, deaths and droughts, 
 wars, sicknesses, and shipwrecks, or any other calami- 
 ties, it lieth in the holiness of some few, the friends 
 and favourites of God, to stand in the gap betwixt 
 him and their brethren, to entreat his majesty for the 
 rest, and to turn a curse into a blessing, as Joseph 
 brought a blessing to all that Potiphar had. Genesis 
 xxxix. This, then, may be a reason of the speech 
 here used, ' Call upon thy God,' a likelihood presumed 
 by the governor, that they might speed the better for 
 Jonah his sake. 
 
 Another reason I take it was, that he distrusted his 
 own god, and tho gods of his whole society, and might 
 be induced to hope better of that God which Jonah 
 served. For ' what taste is there in the white of an 
 egg?' or what pleasure to a man that cometh to a 
 river of water to quench his thirst, and findeth the 
 channel dried up ? What stay is there in a staff of 
 I'ced, or in a broken stafl', tho splinters whereof, to 
 recompense his hope, run into tho hands of a man and 
 wound him ? What trust in broken cisterns which 
 can hold no water ? This comparison God himself 
 makcth with great indignity, in the second of Jere- 
 miah, ' My people hath committed two evils : they 
 have forsaken mo, tho fountain of living waters, and 
 have digged them pits, even broken pits, that can hold 
 
 no water.' The change is very unequal, worse than 
 the change of Glaucus, who gave his armour of gold 
 for armour of brass, and the loss unsupportable. Fof 
 what equality between a natural fountain, which ever 
 floweth, because it is ever fed in the chambers of the 
 earth, and artificial cisterns, or pits fashioned by the 
 hands of man ? cisterns that are broken and cannot 
 hold, I say not water of life and perennity, but no 
 water at all ? But when they saw their foUy herein, 
 ' as a thief is ashamed (saith God) when he is found, 
 so was the house of Israel ashamed, they and their 
 kings, their princes, their priests, and their prophets, 
 because they had said to a tree, Thou art my father, 
 and to a stone. Thou hast begotten me.' He yet pro- 
 ceedeth against them, ' They have turned their back 
 to me, and not their face, but in then- time of trouble 
 they will say. Arise and help us.' You see the fits 
 and pangs of idolaters. First they dig broken pits, 
 afterward they are ashamed ; first they fly to the tree 
 and stone fur s'jccour ; but, when they are vexed, they 
 seek after the help of the true God. Clemens Alex- 
 andrinus* marvelleth why Diagoras and Nicanor, with 
 others, should be surnamed atheists, who had a sharper 
 sight in discerning the false gods than theii- fellows. 
 Amongst whom Diagoras, having something to boil, 
 took his Hercules carved of wood, and thus spake unto 
 him. It is now time, Hercules, that as thou hast 
 served Euristheus in twelve labours, so thou shouldst 
 seiTe me in the thirteenth ; and so threw him into the 
 fire as a piece of wood : a practice not unlike the 
 counsel, which I have read, gi\on to Clodoveus the 
 French king. Worship that which thou hast burnt 
 incense unto, and buni that which thou hast worship- 
 ped, Adora (/nod iiict'xdisti, incende quod adorasti. 
 The children of Israel, in the book of Judges, chap, x., 
 finding theii' error and folly in idolati'y, made a recan- 
 tation of it ; for whilst they served the Lord, he 
 delivered them fi-om the Eg^^itians, and Amorites, 
 and childi-eu of Amnion, and Philistines, Sidonians, 
 Malachites, IMahonites, ' they cried unto the Lord, 
 and he saved them out of their hands.' But when 
 they worshipped strange gods, they were no more deli- 
 vered, nay, they were vexed, oppressed, and sore 
 tormented ; then the Lord upbraided them, ' Go and 
 cry unto your gods which you have chosen ; let them 
 save you in the time of your tribulation.' And to that 
 exprobation they yielded, saying, ' AVe have sinned 
 against thee, because we have forsaken om- own God, 
 and have served Baalim : do thou unto us whatsoever 
 plcaseth thee, only dehvcr us this day.' The like 
 iiTision he used before in Jeremiah, to those that 
 honoured stocks and stones : ' But where are thy gods 
 which thou hast made thee ? let them arise, if they 
 can help thee in the time of tliy misery.' A forcible 
 admonition to those whom a truth cannot di-aw from a 
 doctrine of lies, from the work of their own hands, and 
 
 * In prolrcjit. Qui crrurem lunic Je diis falsis acriis cete- 
 ris perspcwcrunt. 
 
Yer. 6.] 
 
 LECTURE Via. 
 
 55 
 
 worship of their owu phantasies ; whom Clemens 
 Alexaudrinus not unfitly matched with those barbarian 
 tyrants, who bound the bodies of the living to the 
 bodies of the dead till they rotted together ; so these 
 being living souls, are coupled and joined with dead 
 images, vanishing in the blindness of their minds, and 
 perishing in the in^•eutions of their own brains. And 
 as the natural pigeons were beguiled by the counterfeit, 
 and flew imto pigeons that were shaped in the painters' 
 shop, so stones, saith he, flock unto stones, stocks 
 unto stocks, men unto pictures, as senseless of heart 
 as stocks and stones that are carved. But when they 
 have tired themselves in their supposed imaginary 
 gods, whom do they worship ? Praxiteles made 
 Venus to the hkeness of Cratina, whom he loved. 
 All the painters of Thebes painted her after the image 
 of Phryne, a beautiful but a notorious harlot. All 
 the carvers in Athens cut Mercury to the imitation of 
 their Alcibiados. It may be the pictui'es of Christ 
 and the blessed virgin, and the saints which they have 
 placed in theu' windows, and upon the walls of theii' 
 houses, and fastened to then- beds, and carry privily 
 in their bosoms, as Piachel hid her father's idols in the 
 camels' straw, are but Pigmalion's pictures, works of 
 their owu devising, or draughts of their lovers and 
 friends, as unlike the originals as Alcibiades was to 
 Mercury, Phi-yne and Cratina to Venus. Lactantius* 
 scattereth the objections made for images in his times, 
 and renewed in om-s, hke loam. For when it was 
 alleged that they worshipped not the images them- 
 selves, but those to whose likeness and similitude they 
 were formed, I am sure, saith he, your reason is, 
 because you think them to be in heaven, else they 
 were not gods. Why then cast j'ou not yoiu- eyes 
 into heaven '? Why, forgetting the feature of your 
 bodies which are made upright, that your minds may 
 imitate them, and not answering the reason of your 
 name {' AvSiu-oi), pore ye down upon the earth, and 
 bow yom-selves to inferior things, as if it repented you, 
 non. quadiiipedes esse ncttos, that you were not born 
 four-footed beasts ? Again, images were devised to 
 be the memorials and representations, either of the 
 absent or of the dead. Whether of these two do you 
 think your gods ? If dead, why so foolish as to wor- 
 ship them ? If absent, as Utile they deserve such 
 honour, because they neither see our actions, nor 
 hear the prayers which we pour before them. When 
 they fm-ther rephed, that they ali'orded their presence 
 nowhere so soon (or not at all) as at their images, 
 he answereth. It is just as the common people deemeth, 
 that the spii-its and ghosts of the dead walk at their 
 graves and relics, and are most conversant in church- 
 yards. I pass his further insectatiou, how senseless 
 a thing it is, to fear that which itself feareth falling, 
 firing, stealing away, which being in timber was in 
 the power of a contemptible ai'tificer to be made some- 
 thing or nothing ; when no man feareth the workman 
 * Lib. ii. de orig. erroris adver. Geut. 
 
 himself, which must of force be greater than his work, 
 when the birds of the air are not afraid of them, be- 
 cause they roost and build, and leave their filthiuess 
 upon them ; and the figments themselves, if they had 
 any sense or motion, would run to thank and worship 
 the caiTer, who, when they were rude and unpolished 
 stones, gave them then- being. When St Augustine* 
 heard them say in his days, that they took not the 
 idol for a god, he asketh them, What doth the altar 
 there, and the bo«ing of the knee, and holding up the 
 hands, and such like gesticulations ? They seemed 
 in then- own conceits to be of a finer religion (such 
 are the pruners and purifiers of popery, the cleanly 
 Jesuits of these times, which were able to distinguish, 
 
 1 worship not the coi^poral image, only I behold the 
 portraiture of that which I ought to worship), but he 
 stoppeth their mouths with the apostle's sentence, and 
 sheweth what damnation wiU light upon them, ' which 
 turn the truth of God into a lie, and worship the 
 creature more than the Creator, which is to be blessed 
 for ever.' 
 
 For, to return where I fir-st began ; besides the 
 folly of the thing, the mischief is behind : ' Go, cry 
 unto j'our gods which _you have chosen, and let them 
 deliver you in the time of your tribulation.' What a 
 woeful discharge and dismission were this, to be left 
 unto such gods, whose heads the hands of a carver 
 hath polished, and if their eyes be full of dust, and 
 their clothes eaten upon their backs with moths, they 
 cannot help it ? The beasts are in better case than 
 they, for they can get them under a covert, or shadow, 
 to do themselves good, Baruch vi. Then they may 
 cry as the apostles did upon the motion of the like 
 departure, ' Lord, whither shall I go ?' for as Christ 
 there had the words, John vi., so hath the blessed 
 Trinity alone the power and donation of eternal life. 
 When Sennacherib and.Rabshakeh bragged that both 
 the kings and the gods of the nations were destroyed 
 by them, Hezekiah answered the objection, ' Truth 
 it is, Lord, that the kings of Asshur have destroyed 
 their nations and then- lands, and have set fire on theu- 
 gods, for they were no gods, but the work of men's 
 hands, even wood and stone ; therefore they de- 
 stroyed them. Now therefore, Lord our God, 
 save thou us out of his hand, that all the kingdoms of 
 the earth may know that thou, Lord, art only God,' 
 
 2 Kings six. This ai-gument Moses tried upon the 
 golden calf, Exod. xxxii., whereof Israel had said, 
 ' Behold thy gods, Israel.' To shew that it was no 
 god, ' he burnt it in the fu'e, ground it to powder, 
 strawed it upon the water, and then caused the people 
 to drink it.' To conclude the point. It is most true 
 which the prophet resteth upon, Ps. Ixxxvi., ' Amongst 
 the gods there is none like unto thee, Lord ; and 
 there is none that can do Uke thy works.' And as 
 there is but one truth, encountered with as many 
 falsehoods as there were gobbets and shreds of dis- 
 
 t Ser. vi. de verbo. Domini, apud Mat. 
 
56 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [CUAP. L 
 
 membered Pentheus, so is there but one true God, 
 opposed by as many false as baply there are false- 
 hoods. 
 
 It may be the master of the ship, finding a defect 
 and miscaiTiage of their former labours, that there was 
 no succour to be bad where they sought comfort, that 
 though they had all praj'ed, they are not released, 
 standcth in a wavering touching the gods which they 
 called upon, and thinketh there may be a god of more 
 might whom they know not ; so as in eficct, when he 
 thus spake unto Jonah, be set up an altar, and tendered 
 honour unto an ' unknown God.' As if he had said, 
 I am ignorant whom thou servest, but such an one he 
 may be, as is pronest to do us good, and best able to 
 save our ship. For as ' an idol is nothing in the 
 world,' and there is no time in the world wherein that 
 nothing can do good, so there are manj' times when 
 idolaters, that most doat upon them, as Jeremiah 
 speaketh, arc brought to perceive it. Isaiah, in the 
 second of his prophecy, speaketh of a day when men 
 shall not only relinquish, but ' cast away their idols of 
 silver and gold, which they had made to themselves 
 to worship, unto the moles and bats,' children of 
 darkness, fitter for those that are either blear-eyed, or 
 that have no eyes to see withal, than for men of under- 
 standing, ' and go into the holes of the earth, and 
 tops of cragged rocks, fi-om the fear of the Lord, and 
 glory of his majesty, when he shall arise to judge the 
 earth.' You see the fruit of idolaters, that as they 
 have loved darkness more than the light, so they leave 
 their gods to the darkness, and themselves enter into 
 darkness, a taste and assay beforehand of that ever- 
 lasting and utter darlmess that is provided for them. 
 
 If so ho God trill tliiiik upon iin. Now that this was 
 the mind of the master of the ship, to distrust his 
 gods, I gather by this which followclh, wherein the 
 uncertainty of his faith is bewrayed, and his hope 
 haugeth (as the crow on the ark, betwixt heaven and 
 earth, finding no rest), without resolution of any com- 
 fort. Hi forte, 'if so be,' is not a phrase fit to pro- 
 ceed from the mouth of faith ; it is meeler to come 
 from Babylon, whereof the prophet writeth : Jor. li., 
 ' Bring balm for her sore, si forte sanetiir, if haply 
 she may be healed;' her wounds were so desperate 
 and unlikely to bo cured. It is meetcr to bo applied 
 to the sores of Simon Magus, whom Peter counselled 
 to repent him of his wickedness, and pray unto God, 
 Acts viii. ; ' Si forte remittal ur,' if so bo the thought of 
 his heart might be forgiven him. The nature and lan- 
 guage of faith is much diflercnl: it nestcth itself in the 
 wounds of Christ, as doves in the clifts of rocks, that 
 cannot be assaulted ; it standcth as firm and stcdfast, 
 as mount Hion, that cannot be removed ; it castcth an 
 anchor in the knowledge of the true God, and because 
 he is a true God, it doubteth not of might and mercy, 
 or rather mercy and might (as the heathens call their 
 Jupiter, OptiruHS ma.rimns, first by the name of his 
 odness, and then of his greatness). Ilis mercies it 
 
 doubteth not of, because they are passed by promise, 
 indenture, covenant, oath, before immoveable wit- 
 nesses, the best in heaven, and the best in earth. 
 His promises are no less ascertained, because they 
 are signed with the finger of the Holy Ghost, and 
 sealed with the blood of his anointed and beloved. 
 'By faith ye stand,' saith the apostle to the Corin- 
 thians, 2 Cor. i. ; it is the root that beareth us, the 
 legs, and supporters, and strong men that hold us up. 
 If we listen to the prophet Habakkuk, chap. ii. we, 
 may j-et say more, ' For by faith we live ; ' it is the 
 soul and spirit of the new man ; we have a name that 
 we live, but indeed are dead to God-ward if we believe 
 not. For ' if any withdraw himself therehence, the 
 soul of God will take no pleasure in him.' ' Woe 
 unto him that hath a double heart, and to the wicked 
 lips, and faint hands, and to the sinner that goeth 
 two manner of ways ; woe unto him that is faint- 
 hearted, for he belicveth not, therefore shall he not be 
 defended,' Eetlus. ii. It is not the manner of faith 
 to be shaken, and wave like a reed to and fro, nor of 
 a faithful man to be ' tossed of every wind, as a wave 
 of the sea that is ever rolling.' And therefore we are 
 willed to ' come to the thrtne of grace with boldness,' 
 Msra 'raiiriaiag, Heb. iv. ; and ' to draw near with a 
 true heart in assurance of faith,' Ek ^y.^io^po^la, Heb. 
 X. ; and not ' to cast away that confidence, which 
 hath great recompense of reward ; and when we ask, 
 to 'ask in faith, without reasoning or doubting,' MtjJev 
 diax^itc/Mvoi, James i. ; and to ' trust perfectly,' 
 TiXiiuc, 1 Peter i., 'in that grace which is brought 
 unto us by the revclutiou of Jesus Chi'ist.' Our life 
 is a warfare upon earth ; a tried and expert warrior, 
 one that bare in his body the scars of his fiiithful ser- 
 vice, keeping the terms of his own art, so named it, 
 Job vii. ; and we are not to ' wrestle against flesh 
 and blood, but against principalities and powers, and 
 worldly governors, the princes of the darkness of this 
 world, against spiritual wickednesses which are in high 
 places,' Eph. vi. Our enemies, you see, are furnished 
 as enemies should be, with strength in their hands, 
 and malice in their hearts, besides all other gainful 
 advantages : as that they are spirit against flesh ; 
 privy and secret against that that is open ; high 
 against that that is low and far beneath them. Now 
 in this comliat of our souls, our faith is not only our 
 prize, exercise, and masteries which we arc to prove 
 (as it is called), ' the good fight of faith,' 1 Tim. vi., 
 but a part of our armour which wo are to wear, our 
 target to defend the place where the heart lietb, 
 Eph. vi. ; 'our breastplate,' 1 Thcs. v.; and more 
 than so ; for ' it is our victory,' 1 John v., and con- 
 quest against the world of enemies. So faith is all in 
 all unto us. ' Blessed be the Lord, for he hath 
 showed his marvellous kindness towards us in a 
 strong city.' He hath set us in a fortress and bul- 
 wark of faith, so impregnable for strength, that 
 neither height nor depth, life nor death, things pre- 
 
Ver. G.J 
 
 LECTUKE VIII. 
 
 57 
 
 sent nor things to come, nor all the gates and devils 
 of hell, nor the whole kingdom of darkness, can pre- 
 vail against it. 
 
 I grant there are many times when this bulwark is 
 assaulted and driven at with the fiery darts of the 
 devil ; when the conscience of our own infirmity is 
 greater than the view of God's mercy ; when the eye 
 of faith is dim, and the eye of flesh and blood too 
 much open ; when the Lord seemeth to stand far otf, 
 and to hide himself in the needful time of trouble ; 
 to be deaf, and not to answer a word ; to hold his 
 hand in his bosom, and not to pull it out, when this 
 may be the bitter moan that we make unto him, ' My 
 God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? ' and this 
 our doleful song which we sing to our souls in the 
 night season, 'Will the Lord absent himself for ever? 
 and will he shew no more favour? is his mercy clean 
 gone for ever ? doth his promise fail for evermore ? 
 hath God forgotten to be gracious ? doth he shut up 
 his mercies in displeasure ? Lord, how long wilt thou 
 hide thyself? for ever? and shall thy wrath burn like 
 tire ? ' Ps. Ixxsix. These bo the dangerous conflicts 
 which the capta'ns of the Lord's armies, and the most 
 chosen children of his right hand, sometimes endure. 
 The lions themselves sometimes roar with such pas- 
 sions, how shall the lambs but tremble? If the souls 
 of the perfect, which have been fed with the marrow 
 of fatness, and drunk of the fulness of the cup, have 
 sometimes fainted in themselves for want of such 
 relief, much more imperfect and weak consciences, 
 which have tasted but in part how gi'acious the Lord 
 is. I answer in a word, the faithful fear for a time, 
 but they gather their spirits again, and recover warmth 
 at the sunshine of God's mercies; ' their feet are al- 
 most gone,' and their 'steps well near slipped,' but 
 not altogether; they find in the sanctuary of the Lord 
 a prop to keep them up ; at length they confess 
 against themselves, This is my infirmity; they curb 
 and reprove themselves for their diffidence, and what- 
 soever they say in their haste, 'that all men ai-e liars,' 
 and perhaps God himself not true, yet by leisure they 
 repent it. The apostle doth pithily express my mean- 
 ing, 2 Cor. iv., aTo^(,'j/iivoi, d>X' clx i^a.'^oiov/Mviii, 
 staggering, but not wholly sticking. Hnsitantcs sed 
 noil jirorstis liaiviitcs* Again, they fear the particu- 
 lar, they distrust not the general ; it may be victory 
 on tlieir side, it may be overthrow, it may be ship- 
 wreck, it may be escape, it may be life, it may bo 
 death, whether of these two they know not, and for 
 both they are somewhat indifl'erent. 'As when Shiraei 
 cursed David, the speech that the king used for his 
 comfort was this, 2 Sam. xvi., ' It may be the Lord 
 will look upon my tears, and do me good for his curs- 
 ing this day.' As who would say, if otheinvise, the 
 care is taken, I refer it to his wisdom. Amos hath 
 the like speech, chap, v., 'It may be,' si Jurte, ' the 
 Lord God of Israel will be merciful to the remnant of 
 * Ar. Mont. 
 
 Joseph ; ' he meaneth in preventing their captivity. 
 But whether captivity or deliverance, they are at peace, 
 as persuading themselves that if the mercy of God fail 
 them in one thing, it may embrace them otherwise ; 
 for they know that ' all things work together for the 
 best to them that love God,' as the apostle writeth, 
 Kom. viii. Though such be the hope of sons and 
 daughters, yet the case of strangers is otherwise. 
 For they are secure neither in particular nor in gene- 
 ral ; they measure all things by their sense, and as 
 the manner of brute beasts is, consider but that which 
 is before their feet ; and having not faith, they want 
 the evidence and demonstration of things that are not. 
 And therefore the master of the ship, as I conceive it, 
 knowing that life alone which belongeth to the earthly 
 man, and perhaps not kenning the immortahty of tho 
 soul, or if he thought it immortal by the light of rea- 
 son, in some sort (as the blind man recovered, saw 
 men like trees, with a shadowed and misty light), yet* 
 not knowing the state of the blessed, setteth all the 
 adventure upon this one success, and maketh it tho 
 scope of all their prayers and pains, ne pcmaiim, 
 'That we perish not.' 
 
 For such is the condition of heathen men ; they 
 know not what death the righteous die, as Balaam 
 plainly distinguished it ; they are not ' translated ' 
 like other men, nor 'dissolved,' nor 'taken away,' nor 
 ' gathered to their fathers and people,' nor ' fallen 
 asleep,' which are the mild phrases of Scripture, 
 whereby the rigour of death is tempered ; their life is 
 not hid for a time, to be found out again, but when 
 they are dead in body, they are dead in body and 
 soul too ; their death is a perishing indeed, they aro 
 lost and miscarried, they come to nothing ; their life, 
 their thoughts, their hope, all is gone ; and when 
 others depart this life in peace, as Simeon did, and 
 go as ripely and readily from this vale of misery, as 
 apples fall from the tree with good contentation of heart, 
 and no way disquieted, these, as if they were given, 
 not lent to their lives, donati rit/i: noii commoddti* 
 must be drawn and pulled away from them, as boasts 
 from their dens, with violence. Jerome reportcth of 
 Nepotian's quiet and peaceable departure from his life, 
 thou wouldst think that he did not die, but walk forth, 
 intellii/eres ilium non emnri sed cmif/nire.f And Ter- 
 tuUian hath the like sentence, it is but the taking of a 
 journey which thou deemest to be death, profectio est 
 quani pittas mortem.i Whereas the emperor of Rome,§ 
 for want of better learning, ignorant of the life to 
 come, sang a lamentable farewell to his best beloved, 
 nor long before they were sundered :— 
 
 My fleeting, fond, poor darling,]! 
 Body's guest and equal, 
 Where now must be thy lodging. 
 Pale, and stark, and stripped of all. 
 And put from wonted sporting. 
 
 * Senec. t Ad Heliod. 3. t Do patien. 
 
 § iElius Adrianus. || Auiinula vagula blandula, &c. 
 
58 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 Compare with these wretched creatures, some 
 plainly denying the immortality of their souls, others 
 disputing, doubting, and knowing nothing to purpose, 
 till their knowledge cometh too late ; others objecting 
 themselves to death rather in a vain-glorious ostenta- 
 tion than upon sound reason ; I say, compare with 
 them on the other side. Christian consciences, neither 
 loving their lives more than a good cause, and yet 
 without good cause not leaving them, and ask them 
 what they think of this temporal life: they will an- 
 swer both by speech and action, that they regard not 
 how long or how short it is, but how well-conditioned, 
 non quanta sed quails. I borrow his* words, of whom 
 I may saj', concerning his precepts and judgments for 
 moral life, that he was a Gentile-Christian, or as Paul 
 to Agrippa, almost a Christian ; as in the acting of a 
 comedy, it skilleth not what length it had, but how 
 well it was played. Nou quain tliu sed quain bene sit 
 acta refert. Consider their magnanimous but withal 
 wise resolutions, such, I mean, as should turn them 
 to greater advantage. Esther knew, chap, ir., that 
 her service in hand was honourable before God and 
 man, and her hope not vain, therefore maketh her 
 reckoning of the cost before the work begun : ' If I 
 perish, I perish ;' her meaning assm-edly was, If I 
 perish, I perish not ; though I lose my life, yet I 
 shall save it. If there were not hope after death, Job 
 would never have said, ' Lo, though ho kill me, yet 
 will I trust in him,' chap. siii. And what availeth it 
 him to ' know that his Redeemer lived,' ch.ap. xix., 
 but that he consequently knew the means whereby his 
 life should be redeemed ? If the presence of God did 
 not enlighten darkness, and his hfo quicken death 
 itself, David would never have taken such heart unto 
 him : ' Though I should walk through the valley of 
 the shadow of death, I would fear no evil; for thou art 
 with me, and thy rod and thy stall' comfort me,' Ps. 
 xxiii. If his shepherd's staff had failed him against 
 the lion and the bear which he slew at the sheep-fold, 
 or his sling against Goliath, that he had fallen into 
 their hands, yet this staff and strength of the Lord 
 could have restored his losses. The sentence that all 
 these bare in their mouths and hearts, and kc^pt as 
 their watchword, was this, ' Death is mine advan- 
 tage,' Philip, i. The apostle taketh their persons 
 upon him and speakcth for them all : ' Therefore we 
 faint not, because we know, that if our outward man 
 perish, yet the inward man is renewed daily,' 2 Cor. 
 iv. God buildeth as fast as nature and violence can 
 destroy. 'We know again,' chap, v., 'that if our 
 earthly house of this tabernacle be destroyed, we have 
 a building given of God, that is, an house not made 
 with hands, but eternal in the heavens.' Upon the 
 assurance of this house, not made' of lime and sand, 
 nor yet of flesh and blood, but of glory and immor- 
 tality, he ' desireth to be dissolved, and to be with 
 Christ,' and ' by bis rejoicing that he hath, he dieth 
 * Senoc. 
 
 daily,' though not in the passion of his body, yet in 
 the forwardness and propension of his mind ; and he 
 ' received the sentence of death in himself,' as a man 
 that cast the worst, before the judge pronoimced it. 
 I may say for conclusion, in some sort as Socrates 
 did, Noil ririt, cut iiiliil est in mente nisi ut vivat, he 
 liveth not, who mindeth nothing but this life ; or as 
 the Roman orator well interpreteth it, cui nihil est in 
 ritd jucundius vita, who holdeth nothing in his life 
 dearer than life itself. For is this a life, where the 
 house is but clay, the breath a vapour or smoke, the 
 body a body of death, our garment corruption, the 
 moth and the worm our portion, that as the womb of the 
 earth bred us, so the womb of the earth must again 
 receive us ? and as the Lord of our spirits said unto 
 us. Receive the breath of life for a time, so he will say 
 hereafter, ' Return, ye sons of Adam, and go to de- 
 struction.' 
 
 By this time you may make the connection of my 
 text. The master of the ship and his company, 
 1, worship and pray unto false gods, that is, build the 
 house of the spider for their refuge. 2. Because they 
 are false, they have them in jealousy and suspicion : 
 ' call upon thy god.' 8. Because in suspicion they 
 make question of their assistance: 'if so be.' 4. Be- 
 cause question of better things to come, they are con- 
 tent to hold that which already they have in posses- 
 sion, and therefore say, ' that wo perish not.' With 
 us it fareth otherwise. Because our faith is stedfast, 
 and cannot deceive us, in the corruption of our bodies, 
 vexation of our spirits, orbity of our wives and chil- 
 dren, casualty of goods, wTcck of ships and lives, we 
 are not removed from our patience, we leave it to the 
 wisdom of God to mend all our mishaps ; we conclude 
 with Joab to Abishai, 2 Sam. s., ' The Lord do 
 that which is good in his eyes ;' honour and dis- 
 honour, good report and evil report,' 2 Cor. vi., in 
 one sense are alike unto us ; and ' though we be un- 
 known, yet we are known ; though sorrowing, yet we 
 rejoice ; though having nothing, yet we possess all 
 things ; though we be chastened, yet wc are not 
 killed ; nay, though we die, yet we live ' and are not 
 dead ; wo gather by scattering, we win by losing, we 
 live by dying, and wc perish not by that which men 
 call perishing. 
 
 In this heavenly meditation let mc leave you for this 
 time; of that blessed inheritance in your Father's house, 
 the penny, nay, the pounds, the invaluable weight and 
 mass of gold, nay, of glor}' after your labours ended 
 in the vineyard, meat and drink at the table of the 
 Lord, sight of his excellent goodness face to face, 
 pleasures at his right baud, and fulness of joy in his 
 presence for evermore. Let us then say with the 
 psalmist, ' My soul is athirst for the living God : Oh, 
 when shall I come to appear in the presence of our God?' 
 For what is a prison to a palace ; tents and booths to 
 an abiding city ; the region of death to the land of the 
 living ; the life of men to the life of angols ; a body 
 
Yee. 7.] 
 
 LECTURE IX. 
 
 50 
 
 of humility to a body of glory ; the valley of tears 
 to that holy and heavenly mount Siou -syhereon the 
 Lamb standeth, gathering his saints about him to the 
 
 participation of those joys which himself enjoyeth, 
 and bj' his holy intercession purchaseth for his 
 members '? 
 
 LECTUEE IX. 
 
 And tlicij said ccertj one to liisfdhnv, Come, and hi us cast lots, i(v.- — Jonah I. 7. 
 
 AS the manner of sick men is in an hot ague or 
 the like disease, to pant within themselves, and 
 by gi'oauing to testify their pangs to others, to throw 
 off their clothes, and to toss from side to side in the 
 bed for mitigation of their pains, which, whether they 
 do or do not, their sickness still remaiueth till the 
 nature thereof be more nearly examined ; and albeit 
 they change their place, they change not their weak- 
 ness ; so do these mariners, sick of the anger of God, 
 as the other of a lever, disquieted in all their affec- 
 tions, and fearing, as the other pant ; praj'iug, as the 
 other groan ; casting out their wares, as the other oti' 
 their clothes ; and removing from action to action, 
 from fear to prayer, from prayer to ejection of their 
 wares, from thence to the excitation of Jonah ; in all 
 which they find no success, till they inquire more 
 narrowly into the cause of their miseries, and there- 
 fore they betake themselves to a new device of cast- 
 ing lots. For when there is no other remedy in all 
 their forepassed means, they begin to suspect some 
 higher point of sacrilege against the majesty of the 
 Godhead, which ca'nnot be expiated and purged by 
 their goods alone, but by some man's life amongst them. 
 Wherein you have another principle of nature to con- 
 sider of, that sins are the cause of our calamities, in 
 that the tempest here raised is imputed to the wicked- 
 ness of some in the ship, not to be quieted and stilled 
 again unless the mouth of the waves may be stopped 
 with that impious person that hath committed it. 
 Go, then,! and say with the priests in Malachi, chap, 
 ii. 17, ' Every one that doth evil, is good in the sight 
 of the Lord, and he delighteth in him ;' whereas, 
 nature itself, lying more close to a man than the mar- 
 row to his bones, informeth the hearts of these 
 mariners, that the mother and original of all their 
 woe is some notorious wickedness. Let the censure 
 of an heathen philosopher be added hereunto, What 
 wicked man soever thinketh he pleaseth God in his 
 wickedness, he is chiefly and notoriously wicked for 
 that very opinion, hoc, ipso prim km sceleratm est, be- 
 cause he esteemeth the gods either to be foohsh or 
 unrighteous. The verse now in hand openeth their 
 means used for the detection of the transgressor, and 
 layeth before our eyes, in order, these four points. 
 
 1. Their consultation, ' They said every man to 
 his fellow. Come.' 
 
 2. Their resolution, ' Let us cast lots.' 
 
 3. The reason of their counsel held and resolved, 
 ' That we may know for whose cause this evil is done.' 
 
 4. The issue or success which their deliberation 
 took, ' The lot fell upon Jonah.' 
 
 1. In the consultation, by occasion of the phrase, 
 ' every one to his fellow,' eir ad coUegam, I observe 
 the unity and consent that was amongst them ; for 
 they proceed to their business, as the tribes of Israel 
 brought David to Hebron, 1 Chron. i., with ' a single 
 heart,' in conle nun dupUci ; ' with a perfect heart,' 
 in corde peifccto; 'with one heart,' in cordc una; 
 yea, they are joined and composed together as Jeru- 
 salem was built ; not like the foxes of Samson, back 
 to back, every man fancying a course to himself ; nor 
 as the manner of a disordered army is, which Curtius* 
 dcscribcth thus, Alius jungere aciem, alius dividere, 
 stare quidam, cl nonnidii circumvehi. Some will have 
 the army joined, others disjoined ; some will stand, 
 others ride about ; but with such conjunction of souls, 
 as if they grew together upon one stock, they consult, 
 resolve, execute the best means to help themselves. 
 One common cause, one common fear (which for the 
 most part is the master of disorder and disturbance), 
 hath so concorporated and linked these men together, 
 though they are not the sons of one nation, that as 
 the angels of the mercy-seat did turn face to face, so 
 they applied and fitted invention to invention, opinion 
 to opinion, verdict to verdict, as if the blessing of Goil, 
 Ezek. xxxvii., had lighted upon them : ' The wood of 
 Judah and the wood of Joseph shall be joined in one 
 tree, and they shall be no more two peoples, nor 
 divided henceforth into two kingdoms.' 
 
 These being strangers and foreigners one to the 
 other, can hold agreement. We in a common danger 
 (say, for example, a Spanish invasion), though we be 
 threatened beforehand, as Benhadad threatened Ahab, 
 1 Kings XX. 3, ' Thy silver and thy gold is mine; also 
 thy women, and thy fair children are mine,' &c., 
 though our land, our substance, our sons and daugh- 
 ters, our crown and kingdom, were to be forfeited, 
 alienated, passed unto strangers ; though whips pro- 
 vided for our torture, and knives for our slaughter, 
 how do we consult ? Vir ad amicum suum / or rir 
 ad collegam ? A man with his friend or companion, 
 with mutual aspect in our faces, or mutual assent in 
 our hearts ? Not so ; but rather as if the curse of 
 the Almighty were fallen amongst us : Zech. xi., ' I 
 will break my staff of bands, and dissolve brotherhood,' 
 a man with his rival, evil-wilier, enemy, one jealous 
 and suspicious of the other, one seeking the peace of 
 * Lib. viii. 
 
60 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 the land, another wishing in bis heart that it might be 
 overrun. In such distraction and variance of minds, 
 if our state were as strong as the kingdom of Satan, 
 as it is but a kingdom of flesh and blood, and of 
 mortal men, it -would fall to ruin. Our Saviour, you 
 know, giveth the rule in the Gospel, and the devils 
 keep it, as the sm-est principle and maxim in their 
 policy, not to sever their forces. Seven could agree 
 together in Mary Magdalene, a whole legion in an- 
 other man ; whereas amongst us, in one people, and 
 in one family, there is not consent between seven 
 persons. There is a day when Herod and Pilate are 
 made friends, and cleave together in their devices 
 against Christ, as the scales of leviathan ; perhaps 
 they fear the dissolution of their authorities and 
 dominions, if Christ be not overthrown. Curtius 
 ■writeth in bis history, of certain barbarous people, 
 that though they were ever banding in arms before, and 
 one provoking the other, j-et when Alexander the Great 
 came upon them, the quality of the danger wherein 
 they were joined, joined also their hearts and forces 
 together.* If there were nothing else to move our 
 countrymen to the ensuing of peace, yet the quality, 
 methinks, of the danger, common to both parts, should 
 invite them thereunto. For howsoever they discon- 
 tent themselves with the government which God hath 
 appointed, and cry with the children of Israel, ' Give 
 us a king, give us a king,' and not Samuel, nor all the 
 Samuels in the -world, can dissuade them with the 
 tyranny -which the king shall practise upon them, their 
 -\\ives and children, vineyards, fields, servants, asses, 
 sheep, but they still cry, ' Nay, but there shall be a 
 king over us,' yet it may be, when they have their wish, 
 the fable will be moralized, and veritied upon them, 
 a stork -n-as given them ; and then they would see in 
 how much better case they lived before, than now 
 under the king of the Persians, as Alexander told his 
 soldier ;f and though -we are now divided into two 
 companies, like Laban's sheep and goats, some black 
 and some speckled, some papists, some protestants, it 
 may be their goods will be taken for protestants, their 
 houses and inheritance for protestants, their heads for 
 protestants, and both theirs and ours laid, as the heads 
 ofthesonsof Ahab by Jehu, 'J Kings x., upon two heaps. 
 2. Comr, let us cast lots. As many other things, 
 so this fact of theirs doth express the force of a most 
 unusual tempest ; for there had been tempests upon 
 the sea, when there -n'ere no ships ; and both tem- 
 pests and ships, when there were no lots cast, a 
 thousand times ; and many a ship perhaps upon the 
 sea at this present, that felt the -nTath of the storm, 
 and yet- entered not into any the like consultation. 
 But God, the disposer of all things, having his fugi- 
 tive prophet in chase, putteth it into the hearts of the 
 
 * Quos alias bellare inter so solitos, tunc periculi societaa 
 jiinxorat, lib. is. 
 
 t Quanto raitiore sorte, qiiiim sub rego Persarum. — 
 Ciirl. 8. 
 
 mariners, (1.) that there is some man whose iniquity 
 hath brought their lives in question, (2.) that there 
 must be some means for his deprehension. Now 
 what should they do in a matter of fact '? There were 
 no witnesses to detect, and neither the conscience of 
 the ofl'ender, nor haply his countenance, nor any the 
 like presumption to disclose it ; and if an oath had 
 been ministered, which is the end of the controversy, 
 perchance it might have been falsified, as Lysander 
 sometimes spake, I'ui'ri tiilis, riri sacranwntis. Chil- 
 dren must be deceived by dice and blanks, men by 
 oaths ; therefore they put it to lots, as indiiferent 
 umpires and arbitrators for all parties, as who would 
 say, Because art faileth, we will go by chance, and in 
 a matter of secresy, let God be judge, and give sen- 
 tence. For so doth Tully define sortition, that it is 
 nothing else but haphazard, where neither reason nor 
 counsel can take place.-* It was a custom amongst 
 the Gentiles to do many things by lots. Valerius 
 Maximus writeth of the Romans, that by an ancient 
 ordinance amongst them, if they commended anything 
 to their gods, it was by prayer ; if they desired or 
 craved, it was by -^'ow ; if they rendered or repaid, 
 by thanksgiving ; if they inquired, by the inward part 
 of beasts, or lots ; if they did anything solemnly, by 
 sacrifice. He further reporteth, that it befell Lucius 
 Paulus, . their consul, by lot to fight against Perses, 
 king of Blacedon ; and that going from the court to 
 his own house, and finding Tertia his young daughter 
 very sad, he kissed her, and asked^her what she ailed. 
 She answered, that Persa (her little whelp) was dead, 
 which saying of hers he took as a token of good luck 
 (for the atfinity of the names) to encourage him the 
 rather against Perses. The Greeks at the siege of 
 Troy cast lots who should fight with Hector, and the 
 lot fell upon Ajax, as appeareth by a part of his own 
 oration unto them, sortenhjiw meaiii roristis. In the 
 third of Joel, the Lord complaineth against the nations 
 that they had ' cast lots upon his people ; ' in the pro- 
 phecy of Obadiah, against Esau, that when ' strangers 
 entered in the gates, and cast lots upon Jerusalem, 
 he was as one of them ; ' in the evangelist St Matthew, 
 the soldiers divide the garments of Christ by lots. 
 But without further testimony, it is here apparent, 
 that it was in use amongst most nations, because 
 the whole company of the ship, being of divers 
 languages, all agree upon the same course : ' Come, 
 let us cast lots.' Aquinasf setteth down some, forms 
 of lots used amongst them, that either they had tickets 
 of paper, some of which were written, some blank, 
 sclii-diilir scrii)l(r, rcl non scripta , wherein they con- 
 sidered who had the one, who the other ; or else 
 festawsj and cuts, wherein they observed who drew 
 the greater, who the lesser, fesluar imapiales ; or they 
 threw dice and hucklcboncs, wherein he that threw 
 
 * Sortiri nihil est aliud quira spectare temeritatem et 
 casum, &c. — De Vivin. lib. i. cap. 1. 
 
 t xxii. qu. 95, ar. 8. % That is, ' chips.'— Ed. 
 
Ver. 
 
 LECTCKE IX. 
 
 61 
 
 most was victorer, taxiUomin projectio ; or else tbey 
 opened a book, and by tbat which a man first lighted 
 upon, they decided the strife, //ici a;)Ci//o, answerable 
 whereunto are the tables and books of fortune in om- 
 times. Others allege more sorts of them, as little 
 stones, AiSidia, scores, and tales of wood, HuXjj^/o/a, 
 signed with letters and characters, stamps of clay, 
 beans, pellets, and many the like varieties, ijlchuhj , 
 faha, (jlohuU : in the using of all \vhicb instruments 
 their manner was, first, to bide them out of sight ; 
 as in Homer, they hid their lots in Agamemnon's 
 helmet ; then to shako them together confusedly, and 
 afterwards to draw them forth, and to receive as their 
 lots specified. The Hebrews write, that when the 
 land of Canaan was divided amongst the children of 
 Israel, tbey had twelve scrolls of paper, signed with the 
 names of twelve tribes, and twelve other signed with 
 twelve portions of laud, all which being put into a 
 pitcher, and mingled together, the princes for their 
 several tribes drew two apiece, and together with their 
 names received their inheritances. 
 
 It is a question amongst divines, whether it be 
 lawful in Christianity to use lots, yea or no? For the 
 solution whereof, we must both distinguish the kinds, 
 and set limits and bounds, which must not be exceeded. 
 Touching the kinds, most of the schoolmen, summists, 
 and other divines, do thus number them ; that either 
 they are of consultation, wherein they inquire of some- 
 what that must be done ; or of division, wherein the 
 question is, what shall be share to every man ; or of 
 divination and prediction, wherein they are curious to 
 search out future accidents. Consiilloria, qiiwrit quid 
 aficnduin. Dirisorici, quid cuique dicidendum. Diri- 
 natoria, qidd futurum. Of the former two they make 
 no great scruple, because they are justified and ap- 
 proved to us by many examples of Scriptures, as in 
 choosing one goat for the sacrifice, Lev. xvi., the 
 other for the scape-goat ; in dividing the land of pro- 
 mise. Num. xxxiii. ; in finding out Achan with the 
 accursed thing, Joshua vii. ; in taking Saul to the 
 kingdom, 1 Sam. x. ; in preferring Matthias to the 
 aposlleship, Acts i. (though Beda* seemeth to mislike 
 the like imitation in our times, 'because the election then 
 held was before Pentecost, when they had not received 
 such full measui'e of the Holy Ghost, which afterwards 
 obtained, they chose the seven deacons, not by lot, but 
 by common consent of all the disciples. Augustine, in 
 an epistle to Honoratus, f putteth this case : that if in 
 a time of persecution the ministers of the gospel should 
 vary amongst them, who should abide the heat of the 
 fire, that all fled not; and who should fly, lest, if the 
 whole brotherhood were made away, the church might 
 be forsaken ; if otherwise they could not end their 
 variancy, he boldeth it the best course to try by lot 
 who should remain behind, who depart;! and he 
 
 * Comment in Act. t Epist. 180. 
 
 X Qunntura mihi videtur, qui maneant et qui fugiant, 
 Borte legendi sunt. 
 
 addeth for the proof of his opinion the judgment of 
 Solomon : Prov. xviii., ' The lot causetla contention 
 to cease,' aflirming, moreover, that in such doubts 
 God is able to judge better than men, whether it be 
 his pleasure to call the better able unto their martyr- 
 dom, and to spare the weaker; or to enable these 
 weaker, for the endurance of troubles, and to with- 
 draw them from this life, who cannot by their lives be 
 so profitable to the church of God as the others. 
 He proposes the like case in his books of Christian 
 leai'ning,* the question standing between two needy 
 persons, whether of the two shall be relieved, when 
 both cannot. I find many other cases, both observed 
 by antiquity, and some by the civil laws allowed, 
 wherein the use of lots hath been admitted ; f as in 
 creation of magistrates, in contracting marriages, in 
 undertaking provinces and lieutenantships, in leading 
 colonies, that is, new inhabitants to replenish foreign 
 parts, in entering upon inheritances ; and if in a suit 
 of law it cannot be agreed upon between the parties 
 contending who the plaintift', who the defendant is, 
 both seeking for judgment ; in the manumission and 
 freeing of some few in a multitude, when all crave 
 the benefit ; in singling out one of many heirs, J that 
 cannot agree for the keeping of the deeds and con- 
 veyances. 
 
 But to bridle our licentiousness herein, who must 
 live by laws, not by examples, and ought not to turn 
 particular facts into general practices, it shall not be 
 amiss (as God set marks about the mount) to pro- 
 pose a few conditions carefully to be observed. 
 
 Fint, We must never fall to lottery but when neces- 
 sity enforccth us ; all other lawful means first assayed, 
 and the wisdom of man unable to proceed, unless a 
 more excellent wisdom fi'om heaven help the defect of 
 it ; for he that is taken by lot must be past the com- 
 prehension of human judgment, as Ambrose noteth upon 
 the first of Luke, touching the ministry of Zacharias 
 in his course to burn incense: Qui soite eliijitur, hu- 
 mano judicio non comprehenditur. 
 
 Secondlij, We must use great reverence and reli- 
 giousness in the action ; sancta sancte, holy things 
 must be done in an holy manner. Beda calleth for 
 this in his commentaries upon the first of the Acts, 
 handling the election of Matthias. If any think that 
 in a time of necessity (else not) the mind of God 
 must be known by lots, according to the example of 
 the apostles, let them remember that the apostles 
 meddled not therewith, but the brethren being first 
 assembled, and their prayers poured forth unto God : 
 Non nisi collfctofi'iilrum aelu, et pivcilius ad Dfumfusis. 
 
 Thirdlij, We must avoid impiety and idolatry therein, 
 ascribing the event of our wishes neither to the stars 
 nor to any other celestial body, which cannot want the 
 ingestion and intermeddling of devils ; neither to for- 
 
 * Lib. i. c. xxviii. 
 
 t See \Vol]ih upon the 9th of NehemiaL, Comment, lib. iii. 
 
 j Tliencc K/.)i^'(K),a/'a. — Ulpian. 
 
G2 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 tune, whicli is vanity at the least (though Aquinas 
 make that the most) ; neither to devils, nor to any 
 other the like spiritual cause, which savoureth of mere 
 idolatry, but only unto him ol' whom Solomon testifieth, 
 ' The lot is cast into the lap, but the whole disposition 
 thereof is of the Lord,' Prov. svi. 
 
 Fonrtklij, We must not apply the oracles of God in 
 liis sacred Scriptures to our earthly, temporal, transi- 
 tory losses,* wherein they intolerably offend, that for 
 every trifle stolen from them, or casually gone, are 
 strongly conceited, by reciting the verse of the psalm, 
 ' When thou sawest a thief, thou rannest with him,' 
 and using an hollow key, or by using a sieve and a 
 pair of shears, not without blasphemous invocation of 
 the names of some saints, to make themselves savers 
 again. Doubtless the devil, whom they gratify in this 
 sorcery, who also produced scriptures [scriptum cfit), 
 and the names of saints to as good purpose as they 
 do (Paul we know), hath sifted these men to the bran, 
 and left not a grain of good Christianity in them. 
 Augustine's judgment (me seemeth) is over favourable 
 unto them, who though ho rather wished they should 
 take their lots from the leaves of the Gospel than run 
 to inquire of devils, yet he mislikod that custom that 
 the oracles of God should be converted to secular 
 affairs and the vanities of this life : Taiiwii ista mihi 
 lUsplicet consuctudo. We may justly control them 
 from the same psalm : ' What hast thou to do to take 
 my covenant within thy mouth, seeing thou hatest to 
 be directed by it '? thou gavest thy mind to evil, and 
 with thy tongue thou forgest deceit : thou sittest and 
 imaginest against thy brother, and slanderest thy 
 mother's son.' Thus indeed they do ; for he is the 
 thief whom either they in their jealousy think upon, 
 or the devil and father of lies in his malignity oflereth 
 unto them. 
 
 Fifthlij, The ends of our lots must be respected : 
 the honour of God, as the moderator of all such 
 ambiguities ; the furnishing of his church, if two or 
 more be fit, with the fitter; the pi-eserving of justice; 
 the avoidance of greater mischiefs, otherwise in the rea- 
 son of man unevitablo, as envies, suspicions, tumults, 
 factions, seditious, arising without such competent and 
 equal judges. 
 
 Lastli/, We must eschew all fraud and deceit in per- 
 mitting our causes to heavenly arbitrament, lest we pro- 
 cure at least the reproof that Ananias bare, Acts v., 
 ' How bath Satan filled your hearts, that you should 
 lie unto the Holy Ghost ? You have not lied unto 
 men, but unto God ;' undoubtedly he hath a girdle of 
 truth about his reins that will heavily repay it. 
 Therefore the fact of Temon the priest, recorded b^' 
 Pausanias,! can never be pardoned amongst religious 
 ears, who, in a controversy for land between Cresphon 
 and the issue of Ai'istoderaus, to be tried by lotterj*, 
 
 * Ad nogotia smcularia et vitm Inijus vanitatera, diviiia 
 oraculaconvertoro. — Atiff. ad inquisil. Jan. Epist. 119, cap. 20; 
 see more there. t 'n Messenicis, 
 
 in favour of Cresphon, who had bribed him, beguiled 
 the right heirs. The lots were of clay, to be cast 
 into a pot of water, wherein as they sooner or later 
 resolved, so the matter should be ended. But Cres- 
 phon's being hardened in the fire, the other but against 
 the sun, it is not hard to say whether longer endured. 
 Within these borders must our lofs be held ; and then 
 there is little question but as in nature they are things 
 indifferent, so being bettered by such conditions, they 
 may rightfully be borne with.* 
 
 Concerning cards and dice, as usual pastimes to 
 some as the fields to walk in, dividing to men the 
 wager or stake pawned down betwixt them, if any 
 have pronounced with so much severity as to comprise 
 them with the number and train of unlawful lots, and 
 utterly to abandon them, for mine own part I hinder 
 them not, let them proceed to their judgments. Yet 
 amongst sober and discreet companions, who use 
 them to no bad end, and neither are so gross on the 
 one side to make fortune their goddess {tcfacinuis for- 
 tuna deam, d'c), in assigning good or evil luck unto 
 her, nor so saucy on the other to call the majesty of 
 God from heaven to determine their doubts (for they 
 look not so high in such frivolous and gamesome 
 quarrels ; but as they carelessly undertake them, so 
 they further them as lightly, and as merrily end them, 
 with no other purpose of heart save only to pass the 
 time, if not so well as they might, which scarcely any 
 recreation is so happy to challenge, yet not so ill as 
 the most do, to exercise wit, to cherish society, to 
 refresh the mind for a space from serious occupations), 
 I think it, under correction, no great offence. Which 
 temperate excuse of mine notwithstanding far be it off 
 that it should be racked to the patronaging of Temon's 
 cozenage, those studied frauds and fallacies I mean, 
 which the world useth in packing of cards, shifting 
 and helping of dice (they term it), to the hurting of 
 others' estate and their own consciences. Neither do 
 I allow them for a trade or vocation of life. To erect 
 dicing and carding houses, or commonly to haunt such, 
 as places to thrive by, is to set up temples to fortune 
 anew, rather to devils, and to lay a foundation which 
 deserveth no milder a curse than the re-edifying of 
 Jericho. A young man reproved by Plato for playing 
 at dice, answered him. It is a small thing to play at 
 dice, parvum cs/ alca liideiv ; but the philosopher re- 
 plied. It is no small fault to make it an habit, ni iioii 
 ]iamim assucscerc. 
 
 The last thing that I mislike in them is that, that 
 Alexander the Great both blamed and amerced in his 
 friends, that when they played at dice, they played 
 not, but riotously wasted and consumed their whole 
 ability. In which profusion of substance, when the 
 matter engaged jcopardeth the stock and state of 
 man, his passions must needs be stin-ed, and a troop 
 
 * S(jr8 non est nliquid mali, soil res in humana dubita- 
 tione divinam indicans voluntatem. — Ohs. in Psal. xxx. ex 
 August. 
 
Tek. 7. J 
 
 LECTURE IX. 
 
 63 
 
 of wretclied sins commonly ensueth : swearing, for- 
 sweai-ing, banning, defying, heart-burning, figbting, 
 spUling of blood, unsiipportable sorrows of heart, 
 cursed desperation, weeds able to disgrace the law- 
 fullest recreation wheresoever they are foimd, as the 
 harpies deiiled the cleanest meats. 
 
 The third sort of lots serving to divination, the law of 
 God iu a thousand express prohibitions and commina- 
 tions, and the laws of men both ci\41 and canon, mainly 
 impugn, as by their edicts, penances, anathemas, hath 
 been pubhshed to the world. They had many sorts 
 of predictions, prcsensions, foroseeings,* and none of 
 them all, but either with the manifest invocation of 
 devils, or with their secret insinuation at the least. 
 In conjuring, and witchery, it is too open ; but in 
 their necromancy, and such like prophesyings by signs 
 and characters in the lire, air, water, gi'ound, entrails 
 of beasts, flying, crying, feeding of birds, lineaments 
 of the band, proper names, numbers, verseS, lead, 
 wax, ashes, sage leaves, and the rest, it is somewhat 
 more secret, but no less certain. The artificers and 
 masters of which faculty, are most to be excused that 
 used least earnest ; at whom a wise manf marvelled, 
 that they laughed not one upon the other when they 
 met, as being privy to themselves of enriching the 
 ears of the world with fables, to emich their own 
 houses with treasure. Aures divitant alienas, stuis ut 
 aiiio locupletent domos. But how scrupulous and 
 fearful others were, how deeply enthi-allod to the col- 
 lusions of Satan, is most ridiculous to consider ; as 
 that Pub. Claudius should be condemned by fuU par- 
 liament, because, in the tirst Carthaginian war, being 
 in fight by sea, and asking how the birds fared, to 
 take his good speed therehence, upon knowledge given 
 him that they would not come out of their coop to 
 feed, he answered so irreligiously, as 'it was taken, 
 Behold they will not eat, let them drink, and go with 
 a mischief, J and so cast them all into the sea. Who 
 would ever have thought that C. Marius, being con- 
 demned by the senate of Eome, seeing an ass to for- 
 sake his provender, and go to the water to drink, 
 should take occasion thereby to forego the land, and 
 betake himself to sea for safety of his hfe ?§ Yet was 
 the accident imputed both to the providence of his 
 gods that du-ected htm, and to the skill that himself 
 had in interpreting religion. Augustine writeth,'] 
 that one came to Cato, and told him in great sooth, 
 that a rat had gnawn his hose ; Cato answered him, 
 it was no marvel, but much more if his hose had 
 gnawn the rat. Fabius Maximus refused his dictator- 
 ship, because he heard a rat but squeak. K a man 
 should forsake but his meat or bed for the squeaking 
 of many rats, or a scholai- his books because a rat 
 had eaten the leaves thereof, in our times, who would 
 
 * See Aret. in probl. loc. Ixvii. t Cato. 
 
 t Quia esse nolunt, bibant et in malum abeant. — Val. lib. 
 i. cap. 4. 
 
 i Cap. 5. II De doct. Christ, ii. 19. 
 
 not laugh at then- folly ? This was their misery and 
 servihty, who went ' from the living to the dead ;' from 
 the mouth of the Lord to the mouths of enchanters, 
 birds, beasts, devils ; from ' the law and the testimony ' 
 to those lawless, curious, idolatrous, pernicious, 
 magical devices. 
 
 The manner of our charmers is not much behind 
 these in impurity and profaneness. Wherein what 
 reason can be given of applying holy writ to unholy 
 actions, of uttering unsignificant words which carry 
 no sense, of drawing unproportionate figures, of tying 
 to foolish and unnecessary conditions, but a very 
 secret operation, whereby the devil doth infuse him- 
 self into such workings ? For curing the toothache, 
 or the like disease, a -wiiting must be read or kept, 
 but great regard be had, whether it be written in 
 paper or parchment, in sheep or in goat skin, with 
 the right or the left hand, whether by a virgin or com- 
 mon person. Sometimes Christ himself is abused and 
 his sacred word, with apocryphal, imaginary, false 
 allegations ; as that Jesus spake to his wife, when he 
 was never married, and such like blasphemies. You 
 will say, they use good prayers in their chambers. 
 I answer with Augustine, they are either magical or 
 lawful : if magical, God \vill none of such prayers ; if 
 lawful, yet not by such orators.* I deny not but a 
 good event hath sometimes ensued, thy loss recovered, 
 thy teeth em-ed : what then ? Dost thou not know 
 the power of Satan, that he ' transformeth himself 
 into an angel of light,' worketh by strong delusions, 
 l^ing wonders, that, if it were possible, the very elect 
 should be seduced ? Augustine wi-ote to Faustus the 
 Manichee, You work no miracles, which if you did, 
 yet in you we would beware your very miracles. f It 
 is the deserved judgment of God upon those that have 
 recourse to these unla\rful helps (wherein though they 
 understand not themselves sometimes, what they write 
 or speak, the devil understandeth well enough), to 
 lead them to the god of this world, the prince of dark- 
 ness, who ruleth in the childi-en of disobedience, 
 because they fly fi-om the revealed will of God, to 
 prestigiatory and fraudulent impieties. The Lord 
 demanded in the 1st of Kings chap, xxii., ' Who shall 
 entice,' that is, persuade and deceive, ' Ahab, that he 
 may go and fall at Ramoth iu Gilead ? One said thus, 
 another thus. Then there came forth a spiiit, and 
 said, I will entice him. "^Vherewith ? I will go and 
 be a false spirit in the mouth of all his prophets. 
 Then the Lord said. Thou shalt entice him, and shall 
 prevail : go forth and do so.' Such is the counsel 
 that the Lord holdeth in heaven, to bring to confusion 
 all those whom the lode-star of his written word can- 
 not lead, but they will take to themselves crooked 
 and perverse ways, which go down to the chambers 
 
 * Si magicffi, non vult tales ; si licitae, non vult per tales. 
 — Lib. viii. i!e ch', Dei. cap. 19. 
 
 t Miracula non lacitis, quas si faceretis, tamen in vobis 
 caveremus. Lib. liii. 
 
6i 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 of death. 1 uow conclude all these with that 
 memorable saj-ing of Augustine, He that desireth 
 neither to Hve happily hereafter, nor godly in this 
 present world, let him purchase eternal death by such 
 rites : taliiiis sacris mortem qiuirat aternam. Thus 
 much of the course resolved upon, ' Come let us cast 
 lots.' 
 
 3. The reason why they resolved upon lottery was, 
 that they ' might know for whose sake the evil was 
 upon them.' Who are they that inquu-e thus '? vir 
 ad anticum siuim, every one in the ship; no doubt 
 Jonah amongst the rest, as quick to dissemble his 
 fault as bo that was most innocent. Look fi-om the 
 crown of the head to the sole of the foot, fi-om the 
 master of the ship to the ship-boy, they had all de- 
 served this tempest ; full of idolatry, impurity of life, 
 fitter, for their wickedness, whom the jaws of hell than 
 the waves of the sea should swallow up. Yet as if 
 they wore free from stain, they will try by lots, for 
 whose cause the evil is upon them. So is the nature 
 of man wedded to itself, leaving her eyes at home in a 
 box, in discerning her own infirmities, but in the faults 
 of others as quick-sighted as eagles. Then every eye 
 hath a double ball to see with,* and they stand with- 
 out the head (which is the worst kind of eye) nearer 
 to pother men than to themselves. Jonah, I gi-ant, 
 was the man whom the anger of God, as an arrow 
 from a bow, levelled at ; yet did not the others know 
 so much, and therefore had little reason to think, that 
 there was not matter enough each man in himself to 
 deserve the punishment. This translation of faults 
 from ourselves to others, was a lesson learned in para- 
 dise, when the first rudiments and catechism of aU 
 rebellions was delivered to the children of men. For 
 Adam being charged with the crime of disobedience, 
 he put it to the woman, the woman to the serpent, as 
 if both the former had not been touched. When Saul 
 caused lots to be cast between him and Jonathan on 
 the one side, and all Israel on the other, 1 Sam. xiv., 
 to find out the man who, contrary to their vow, had 
 eaten any thing before night, ho saith not unto God, 
 Declare the ofiender, which he should have done, but 
 by an arrogant speech in favour of his own integrity, 
 ccdo intciirwii, Shew me the innocent person. Jona- 
 than, I confess, was guilty in this one offence, if it 
 ■were an oll'encc ; yet was the innocence of Saul dis- 
 credited in many] others. Shimei, a dead dog, as 
 Abishai termed him, fovgettolh his own people, I moan 
 the sius of bis own bosom, and raileth at David with 
 a tongue as virulent as asps, 1 Sam. xvi., ' Come forth, 
 come forth, thou man of blood, thou man of Belial ; 
 thou art taken in thy wickedness, because thou art a 
 nnirderer.' How did the friends of Job break a bruised 
 reed, and add atlliction to the atilicted, making their 
 whole conference with him an invective against bis 
 wickedness, and conveying in withal a secret apology 
 and purgation of their own justice ! It appoareth by 
 * I'uiiuUi duiili'x ruliiiiiiat. — Ovid. 
 
 our Sa\dour's answer, in the Gospel of Luke, chap, xiii., 
 that there were some amongst the people wliich sup- 
 posed those GaUleans, whose blood Pilate had mingled 
 with their sacrifices, greater sinners than the rest ; and 
 those eighteen, upon whom the tower of Siloam feU 
 and slew them, sinners above all men that dwelt in 
 Jerusalem. Our Savioiu' answereth them by occupa- 
 tion, ' I tell you, nay ; but except you amend your 
 hves, you shall likewise perish.' 'WTien the barbarians 
 of IMalta saw the viper hanging upon Paul's band, 
 Acts xxviii., they inferred presently (men more %-iper- 
 ous and pestilent themselves), ' This^man surely is a 
 murderer, whom, though he bath escaped the sea, yet 
 vengeance doth not sutler to live.' It was the usual 
 manner of the Scribes and Pharisees to sew pillows of 
 self-liking under their o-wn armholes, and to take no 
 knowledge of beams in their own eyes, but evermore 
 to except against their brethren, as men not worthy 
 the earth they trod upon : ' Why eateth your master 
 with publicans and sinners ? ' ' This man is a friend 
 to sinners.' Again, ' If this man were a prophet, he 
 would surely have known who and what woman this 
 is that toucheth him : for she is a sinner :' when the 
 woman with a box of spikenard anointed his feet. 
 Such doctrine preached the Pharisee that went into 
 the temple to justify himself, Luke x-siii. (a lying pro- 
 phet against his own soul), ' I thank God I am not as 
 other men, nor as this publican." He spake like 
 Caiaphas, truer than he was aware of : he was not as 
 the publican, in confession of his misdeeds ; nor the 
 publican as he, in arrogation of justice. Thus Dio- 
 genes treadeth down the pride of Plato, but with 
 greater pride ; and the pharisee reproveth the sin of a 
 publican, but with greater sin. Mdlu mens, muliis 
 animus ; an evil mind in itself is an evil mind towards 
 all others. You see the disease of mankind, worthy 
 to be searched and seared with severe reprehension, 
 how strange we are to our own, how domestical and 
 inward to other men's ott'ences ; how blind in ourselves, 
 how censorious and lynx-eyed against our brethren ; 
 how willing to smooth our own pates with the balm of 
 assentation and self-pleasing, how loath to acknowledge 
 that which we brought from the womb, 'I am a sinful 
 man ;' but to go further with Paul, etfo jn-imus, ' I am 
 chief,' 1 Tim. i., to bo greatest in the kingdom of 
 heaven, we will scarcely do it. Well, it is a sentence 
 of eternity, hanging as in a table over the judgment- 
 seat of God, and his eyes are never removed from'it, 
 ' Ho that commondcth himself is not allowed, but he 
 whom the Loi'd commcndctb,' 2 Cor. x. ; and this 
 other is not unlike unto it : ' He that condemuoth 
 another man is not his judge, but God hath appointed 
 a judge both for small and great.' ' Who art thou," 
 saith James, chap, iv., ' that judgost another ?' If he 
 bo alter unto thee, another from thyself, and without 
 thy skin, judge him not. ' He that judgeth his brother, 
 judgeth the law' (whoso office it is to judge), and 
 offereth injury to the lawgiver himself. ' For there is 
 
Vek. 7.] 
 
 LECTURE 5. 
 
 C5 
 
 one lawgiver, wliicli is able to save, and to destroy. 
 "^Tio art tbou that judgest another man's servant ?' 
 Rom. xiv., lie standcth or falleth unto his own master 
 (not nuto thee), yea, contrary to thy thought and will, 
 ' he shall be established, for God is able to make him 
 stand.' But why dost thou judge thy brother ? He is 
 not thy servant, but thy brother ; yom- condition is 
 alike. ' We shall all appear before the judgment-seat 
 of Christ. Judge nothing therefore before the time, 
 until the Lord come, who will lighten things that arc 
 hid in darkness, and make the counsels of the heart 
 manifest ; and then shall every man have praise of 
 God,' 1 Cor. iv. 5. First, then, because he is another ; 
 (2.) because he serveth his own Lord ; (3.) because 
 he is thy brother ; (4.) because the lawgiver hath 
 power of life and death in his hands, and his law must 
 judge ; (5.) because the time of judgment is not yet 
 come : for all these reasons and persuasions, judge 
 not another man. Judge him by law, if thou be a 
 magistrate ; judge him by charity and discretion, if a 
 private Christian ; and be not only an eye to observe, 
 and a tongue to condemn, but an hand to support 
 him: j'et rather, if I may counsel thee, 'judge thy- 
 self, that thou be not judged with the world.' Say 
 with Bernard upon the Canticles,* I will present my- 
 
 * Ser. a. Volo vultui ir.-e judicatua prceseutari, non ju- 
 dicandud. 
 
 self before the countenance of God's wrath abeady 
 I judged, not to be judged. For if we would judge our- 
 selves (the apostle tellcth us), wo might escape judg- 
 ment, 1 Cor. si. Call thy soul to daily account of 
 thine own misdeeds. Thus did Sextius, when the day 
 was ended and the night come, wherein he should take 
 his rest, he would ask his mind what evil hast thou 
 healed this day'?* what vice hast thou stood against? 
 in what part art thou bettered ? Say not, as Peter 
 did of John, John sxi., Hie autem quid- what shall 
 he do ? as one careful of other men's estates ; but, 
 Domiiie, quis ir/o sum / ' Lord, who am I, that thou 
 shouldst regard me with such favom- ?' 1 Chron. svii. 
 Domine, miserere mci peccatoris, ' Lord, be merciful 
 unto me a sinner,' Luke xviii. Thus knock at the 
 breast of thine own conscience, break up those iron 
 and heavy gates, which bar up thine own sins. Look 
 not into the coffers and corners of other men's in- 
 firmities. Otherwise thy dissembled sins which thou 
 hoardest up within thy bones, and art afraid to sot 
 before thine eyes, shall be written in the brow of thy 
 face, brought to light, and blown abroad with the 
 sound of trumpets, that all the world may say, Lo, 
 this is the man that justified himself in his lifetime, 
 and would not confess his sin. 
 
 * Quod malum hodio sanasti ?—Scnec. de ira, lib. iii. 
 
 LECTURE X. 
 
 And the lot fell iijiun Jonah. — Jonah I. 7. 
 
 OF the four parts before specified and collected out 
 of this verse, the last only remaiueth to be ex- 
 amined, to wit, the success of the lots, which the last 
 member thereof doth plainly open unto us. Let me 
 once again remember the proverb unto you : ' The 
 lots are cast into the lap ; but the whole disposition 
 thereof is of the Lord.' In a matter merely casual, 
 for aught the wisdom of man can judge (as TuUy * 
 sometimes said to a man who spake rashly and unad- 
 visedly, Hoc non est considerare, sed quasi sortiri quid 
 loquare, this is not to speak with discretion, but as it 
 were by lot and haphazard), the trial standeth here- 
 upon, who threw more, who less, who drew black, 
 who white, and so forth, the choice of the whole 
 bunch lying before him ; and his own hands, his 
 carvers and ministers in the action, each man feigning 
 that hope to himself for his evasion, which the son of 
 Sirach mentioneth, Ecclus. xvi.. In populo mar/no non 
 af/noscar ; qua est anima inea in tarn immcnsd crea- 
 turd ? I cannot be known in so great a multitude ; 
 and what is my own soul amongst a hundred '? yet 
 doth the finger of the lot directlj' and faithfully point 
 him out, for whose cause the storm was sent. The 
 strong persuasion that these men had, that their lot 
 * Acad. qu. 2. 
 
 would not err in the verdict thereof, givcth a singular 
 testimony and approbation to the providence of the 
 Godhead, as being an universal, imperial art, which 
 all the affairs in the world are subject unto, that in 
 the greatest and smallest things, in matters of both 
 choice and chance, as they seem to us, the wisdom 
 and knowledge of God is at hand to manage them, 
 according to the apostle's speech, Eph. i., 'He 
 workcth all things after the counsel and purpose of 
 his will ;'* so, first, he hath a will ; secondly, a counsel 
 to go before his will ; thirdlj', an efl'ect and accom- 
 plishment to succeed it ; lastly, as general and patent; 
 a subject as the world hath. There are philoso- 
 phers, and have been, which thought that the gods 
 had no regard of human afl'airs, whose opinion 
 (saith Tully), f if it be true, what piety can their 
 be, what sanctity, what religion ? Others, though 
 they went not so far as to exempt all things, yet; 
 they withdrew the smaller from the heavenly pro- 
 vidence, for it was thought most injmuous to bring 
 down the majesty of God so low, as to the hus- 
 banding of bees and pismires,! ^s if in the number 
 
 * Voluntatis propositum opcratur omnia. | Do nat. De. 2. 
 t Usque ad apium formicarumquo, perfcctionen. — AcaJ. 
 qu. 2. 
 
 E 
 
66 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 of gods there were some Myrmecides * to carve 
 and procure the smaller works. Elsewhere, he also 
 recitelh their improvident speeches to the same pur- 
 pose ; as, for the smaller things, that gods neglect 
 them ; they go not so far as to take view of every 
 parcel of gromid, and little vine that every one hath,f 
 Eeither if blasting or hail hath endamaged any man, 
 doth Jupiter observe it; yea, they make a scorn, that 
 those who are quiet and at ease in heaven, should 
 trouble themselves about petty occasions. J The 
 peripatetics, another sect, and college of philoso- 
 phers, housed that providence ahove the moon, and 
 thought it had no descent beneath the circle there- 
 of, to intend inferior businesses. What, do the epi- 
 cui-es in Job say less ? Chap. xxii. (Eliphaz at least 
 in their names) ' How should God know ? can he 
 judge through the dark clouds ? the clouds hide him 
 that he cannot see ; and he walketh in the circle of 
 heaven.' Averroes, surnamed the Commenter, a 
 Spanish physician, that he may seem to be mad with 
 reason, by reason fortificth the former judgments, for 
 he thinketh that the knowledge and understanding of 
 God would become vile, vUesccn-t Dei intellcctiis, if it 
 ■were abased to these inferior and infirmer objects ; as 
 if a glass were defoi-med, because it presenteth defor- 
 mities ; or the beams of the sun defiled, because they 
 fall upon muddy places ; or the providence of God 
 vilified : ' Who though he hath his dwelling on high, 
 yet he abaseth himself to behold things in heaven 
 and in earth,' Ps. cxiii. ; as ' he spake the word, and 
 all things were created,' so he sustaineth and beareth 
 up all things by the power of his word, Heb. i. His 
 creation was as the mother to bring them forth, his 
 providence the nurse to bring them up ; his creation 
 a short providence, his providence a perpetual crea- 
 tion ; the one setting up the frame of the house, the 
 other looking to the standing and reparation thereof. 
 I cannot determine this point in terms more grave 
 and significant than Tully§ hath used against the 
 atheists and epicures of that age. He is curiosus 
 et ph'HUS ner/otii Deiis, a cm-ious God, exquisite in 
 all things, full of business ; he is not a reckless, care- 
 less, improvident God, or a God to halves and in 
 part, above and not beneath the moon ; or, as the 
 Syrians deemed, upon the mountains, and not in the 
 valleys, in the greater and not in the lesser employ- 
 ments ; he is very precise and inquisitive, having a 
 thousand eyes, and as many hands ; yea, all eye, all 
 hand, both to observe and to despatch withal ; ex- 
 aminuig the least moments and tittles in the world 
 that can be imagined, to an handful of meal and a 
 cruse of oil in a poor widow's house, the_ calving of 
 
 * Minutonim oporum fabricator. He maile a cliariot that 
 was covered under the wing of a gnat, and a sliij) under a 
 lice's wing. 
 
 \ Neque agollos singnlorum, ncc viticulas persequunlur. 
 .—/>c nat. De. 2. 
 
 J Ea eura quictos solicitas ? § De Nat. De. 
 
 hinds, the feeding of young lions and ravens, the 
 falling of sparrows to the ground, clothing of lilies 
 and grass of the field, numbering of hairs, and (to 
 return to that from which I first digressed), the suc- 
 cess of lots. I cannot conceive how the land of 
 Canaan could be divided, as it was. Num. xxvi., xxxiii., 
 between manj' and few (for so was the order by God 
 set, ' that many should have the more, and few the 
 lesser inheritance'), unless the hand of the Lord had 
 been in the lap to reach unto every tribe and family 
 what was convenient and proportionate ; otherwise, 
 the fewer might have had the more, and the more the 
 less inheritance. And was it not much, think you, 
 that when Samuel had anointed Saul king over Israel, 
 he would afterwards go from his right, leave a cer- 
 tainty, and put it to the hazard of lots, whether Saul 
 should be king or no, but that he assm-ed himself, 
 the providence of the Lord would never forsake his 
 intendment, 1 Sam. s. Therefore of all the tribes of 
 Israel, Benjamin, of all the families of Benjamin, 
 Matri ; of all the kindred of Matri, the house of Ci? ; 
 and of all the house of Cis, Saul was chosen to the 
 kingdom. In the book of Esther, chap, iii., the day 
 and the month were by lot appointed, when all tha 
 people of the Jews, old and young, women and chil- 
 dren, within the city of Shushan, and throughout all 
 the provinces of the kingdom, should be destroyed ; 
 but did the Almighty sleep at this wicked and bloody 
 designmeut ? or was his eye held and blindfolded that 
 he could not see it ? No ; that powerful and dread- 
 ful God, who holdeth the ball of the world in his 
 hand, and keepeth a perfect calendar of all times and 
 seasons, had so inverted the course of things for his 
 chosen's sake, that the month and day before pre- 
 fined, became most dismal to those that intended 
 mischief. Without further allegations, this may 
 suffice as touching the success of the lots, and con- 
 sequently the providence of God in the moderation 
 thereof. 
 
 It is now a question meet to be discussed, the 
 offender being found, whether it stand with the justice 
 of God to scourge a multitude, because one in the 
 company hath transgi'essed '? For though I condemned 
 their arrogancy before, in that, not knowing who the 
 olfender was, they ' wiped their mouths ' (each man 
 in the ship), with the harlot in the Proverbs, and 
 asked in their hearts, Is it 1 ? yet when the oracle of 
 God hath not dissolved the doubt, and set as it were 
 his mark upon tlie trouble and plague of the whole 
 ship, they bad some reason to think, that it was 
 not a righteous part to lay the faults of the guilty 
 upon the harmless and innocent. This was the cause 
 that they complained of old, that the whole fleet of 
 the Argives was overthrown, 
 
 Unius ob noxam et furias Ajacis Oilei, 
 for one man's offence. Nay, they were not content 
 there to rest, but they charged the justice of GoJ 
 with an accusation of more weight. 
 
Ver. 7.] 
 
 LECTURE X. 
 
 G7 
 
 Plerumqiie nocentes, 
 Prrcterit ; exanimatque indiguos, inqueuocentes.* 
 
 as though oftentimes he freed the nocent, and laid the 
 burden of woes upon such as deserved them not. It 
 appeareth in Ezekiel, chap, xviii., that the children of 
 Israel had taken up as ungracious a by-word amongst 
 them, ' The fathers have eaten the sour grape, and 
 the children's teeth are set on edge,' and they con- 
 clude therehence, ' The ways of God are not equal,' 
 Jer. xxxi. It was an exception that Biou took against 
 the gods, that the fathers' smart was devolved to their 
 posterity ; and thus he scornfully matched it, as if a 
 physician, for the grandfather's or father's disease, 
 should minister physic to their sons or nephews. f 
 They spake evil of Alexander the Great, for razing the 
 city of the Branchides, because their ancestors had 
 pulled down the temple of Miletum. They mocked 
 the Thracians, for beating their wives at that day be- 
 cause their forerunners had killed Orpheus. And 
 Agathocles escaped not blame for wasting the island 
 Corcyra, because in ancient times it gave entertain- 
 ment to Ulysses. Nay, Abraham himself, the father 
 of the faithful, heir of the promises, friend of God, 
 dispnteth with the Lord about Sodom to the like 
 effect: Gen. xviii., 'Wilt thou also destroy the right- 
 eous with the wicked '? ' Again, ' Be it far from thee 
 for doing this thing, to slay the righteous with the 
 unrighteous, and that the just should be as the unjust; 
 this be far from thee. Shall not the Judge of all the 
 world do right ? ' In the book of Numbers, chap, 
 xvi., when God willed Moses and Aaron to separate 
 themselves from the congregation, that he might at 
 once destroy them, they fell upon their faces, and said, 
 ' God, the God of the spirits of every creature, hath 
 not one man only sinned, and wilt thou be wroth with 
 all the congregation ? ' In the first of Chronicles, 
 chap, xsi., when for the offence of David in numbering 
 his people, the plague fell upon them and slew seventy 
 thousand of them, the king with the elders fell down 
 and cried unto the Lord, ' Is it not I that commanded 
 to number the people ? It is even I that have sinned 
 and committed this evil ; but these sheep, what have 
 they done ? Lord my God, I beseech thee, let 
 thine hand be upon me and upon my father's house, 
 and not on thy people for their destruction.' 
 
 I answer this heinous crimination and grievance 
 against the righteousness of God in few words, from 
 the authorities of Ezekiel and Jei'emiah before al- 
 leged : ' Behold, all souls are mine, saith the Lord, 
 both the soul of the father and also of the son are 
 mine : the soul that sinneth, it shall die. yo house 
 of Israel, is not my way equal, or are not your ways 
 unequal ? ' If it were a truth which the poet sang to 
 his friend, 
 
 Delicta majorum immeiitus hies, 
 
 Romaue, X 
 thou shalt bear the faults of thy forefathers without 
 * Liicret. t riut. de sera num. viu. I Ilorat. 
 
 thine own deservings, the question were more diificult. 
 But who is able to say, ' My heart is clean,' though I 
 came from an unclean seed '? Though I were born of 
 a Morian, I have not his skin ; though an Amorite 
 were my father, and my mother an Hittite, I have 
 not their nature ; I have touched pitch, and am not 
 defiled ; I can wash mine hands in innocency, and 
 say with a clear conscience, I have not sinned ? But 
 if this be the case of us all, that there is not a soul in 
 the whole cluster of mankind that hath not oifended, 
 though not as principal touching the fact presently 
 inquired of, as Achan in taking the accursed thing, 
 Korah in rebelling, David in numbering the people, 
 yet an accessary in consenting or concealing ; if neither 
 principal nor accessary in that one sin, yet culpable 
 in a thousand others committed in our lifetime (per- 
 haps not open to the world, but in the eyes of God as 
 bright as the sun in the firmament ; for the scorpion 
 hath a sting though he hath not thrust it forth to 
 wound us, and man hath malice though he hath not 
 outwardly shewed it) ; it may be some sins to come 
 which God foreseeth, and some already past which he 
 recounteth ; shall we stand in argument with God, 
 as man would plead with man, and charge the Judge 
 of the quick and dead with injurious exactions, I have 
 paid the things that I never took, I have borne the 
 price of sin which I never committed ? You hear the 
 ground of mine answer. We have all sinned, father 
 and son, rush and branch, and deservedly are to ex- 
 pect that wages from the hand of God which to our 
 sin appertaineth. And touching this present com- 
 pany, I nothing doubt but they might particularly be 
 touched for their proper and private iniquities, though 
 they had missed of Jonah. Bias to a like fare of 
 passengers, shaken with an horrible tempest as these 
 were, and crying to their gods for succour, answered 
 not without some jest in that earnest, Hold your 
 peace, lest the gods hap to hear that you pass this 
 way ; * noting their lewdness to be such as might 
 justly draw down a greater vengeance. 
 
 Besides, it cannot be denied, but those things which 
 we sever and part in our conceits, by reason that dis- 
 tance of time and place hath sundered them, some 
 being done of old, some of late, some in one quarter 
 of the world, some in another, those doth the God of 
 knowledge unite, and vieweth them at once, as if they 
 were done together. Say, that being young thou 
 wert riotous, gluttonous, libidinous, given to drinking 
 and surfeiting, giving thy strength to harlots, shall 
 not thine old age rue it "? Ai"t thou not one and the 
 same person, both in thy younger and older years, in 
 the waxing and in the waning of thy days '? Shall 
 the difi'ercnce and change of times exempt thee from 
 the gout, dropsy, and the like distemperature ? Thy 
 grandfather, and two or three degrees beyond, thy 
 father, and thyself, 
 
 Et nati natorum, ct qui nascentur ab illis, 
 * Silete, ne vos hue illi uavigare sentiant. — Bruson. 
 
68 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. T. 
 
 thy cliildreu's children, and nephews to come, you are 
 all but one house (^-EVafWra from JE(icns), springing 
 from one root, the head of the familj', in his sight and 
 account who esteemeth a thousand generations but as 
 one day. Plutarch himself was wise enough to answer 
 the argument. There is not the like comparison be- 
 twixt lather and son, as betwixt a workman and his 
 work, neither can they alike be separated ; for that 
 which is born or begotten is not only from the father, 
 but of him, as a part belonging unto him.* The 
 Castilians' blood in France spilled at the massacre, 
 may rightfully be required of the Guisian race in the 
 fourth or fifth generation to come. This is the cause 
 that David curseth the wicked on both sides ; both in 
 their descent, — ' Let their children be vagabonds, and 
 beg their bread, — and in their ascent, — ' Let the ini- 
 quit}' of his father be had in remembrance, and let not 
 the sin of his mother be done away.' The like is 
 daily practised in the community and fellowship of 
 diverse parts within the same body ; as in a matter 
 of felon}', the hand only hath taken and borne away, 
 but the feet are clapped in iron, the belly pinched with 
 penury, the bones lie hard, and the best joint is en- 
 dangered for it. Sundry parts, though distinguished 
 both iu place and office, feel the punishment which, 
 they may fondly say, the hand only deserved. Yea, 
 the eye may be sore, and a vein pricked in the arm 
 to cure it ; the hoof tender and weak, and the top of 
 the horn anointed for remedy thereof. Even so, in 
 the body of a city, the body of an army, the body of 
 a church, the body of a ship, though haply few 
 ofl'end, yet their iniquity is brought upon the head of 
 a whole multitude. The kings are mad, the Greeks 
 are plagued, t 
 
 Xio),}.a-/.i xai ^■u/j.-aaa rroXic y.ay.oZ civOPo: i'zav^cTj'^ 
 the whole city oftentimes reapeth the fruit of one 
 wicked man amongst them. What injury is done 
 therein ? is it more than one city ? and is not that 
 citizen a member of their body '? Is not Socrates one 
 and the same man at the head and at the foot ? Is 
 not England one and the same laud at Berwick and at 
 the Mount ? Is not London one and the same city 
 at Ludgate and at Aldgate ? § These may be the 
 reasons why the whole number of passengers is plagued, 
 both in the loss of their wares and the hazard of their 
 lives, for the principal transgression of Jonah: (1.) 
 they were wicked thtnisclves, because they were idola- 
 trous, aud what other corruptions they had the Lord 
 knoweth ; (2.) they were all but one bodv, under the 
 same discipline and government, lied together by 
 orders aud laws for sea, as by joints, by reason they 
 had entertained aud consorted themselves with dis- 
 obedient Jonah. Other causes there may be, secret 
 
 * Cum ex ipso, non ab ijiso geuitum est, velut jiars quas- 
 dam. — De aer. num. vind. 
 
 t Ilorat. \ Ilesifid. 
 
 § This seutonco wduM m rni to iiHliciUe that thu luctures 
 were nioilitiud tor i'o-di;livery iu Loiulua. — Ku. 
 
 unto God, which I dare not search out. Why should 
 I climb into paradise, or pry into the ark, to behold 
 his counsels? When he hath set darkness aud clouds 
 about his pavilion, why should I labour to remove 
 them ? We know not the reasons of man}' a thing 
 belonging to our common life, how it cometh that our 
 clothes are warm about oui' backs, when the earth is 
 quiet through the south wind. Job. xxxvii., aud shall 
 we reach after hidden knowledge ? A plague began 
 in Ethiopia,* lilled Athens, killed Pericles, vexed 
 Thucydides ; or to match the example, a plague be- 
 ginneth in France, taketh shipping at Newhaveu, land- 
 eth in England with Englishmen, harboureth itself in 
 London, aud never departeth therehence again. W'ill 
 you know the reason hereof? It may be 'that the 
 works of God may be made manifest,' as Christ spake 
 of the blind man, John ix. ; or to shew his power 
 that he hath over his clay ; to exercise his justice ; 
 to practise and prove our patience, whether we will 
 ' curse him to his face,' as (it may be) the devil hath 
 informed against us ; or to apply the continual physic 
 of atliiction and chastisement unto us, that we run not 
 into desperate maladies. For there are four kinds of 
 men which, by four kinds of means, come to heaven : 
 (1.) some buy it at a price, which bestow all their 
 temporal goods for the better compassing thereof ; 
 (2.) some catch it by violence, they forsake fathers, 
 mothers, land, living, life, all that they have, for that 
 kingdom's sake ; (3.) some steal it, thej' do their good 
 deeds secretly, and they are openly rewarded ; (4.) 
 others are enforced to take it, aud by continual afilic- 
 tions made to fall into the liking thereof. t Or what- 
 soever else be the cause, which the sanctuary of heaven 
 hath reserved to itself, aud buried in light that may 
 not be approached unto, this I am sure of, that the 
 challenge of the apostle shall stand like a wall of brass 
 against ail the objections iu the world, Xiimquid iiii- 
 quikis apiiil Drum / ' Is there any unrighteousness 
 with God ? ' Itom. ix. Aud so far was it otT 
 that these mariners received loss by their loss, that it 
 was their occasion to briug them to the knowledge 
 and fear of the true God, as hereafter shall appear 
 unto you, in the tendering of their vows, and other 
 the like religious duties. 
 
 Tluii said they unto him, Tell us for uJiom; cause 
 eril is upon us, &c. Having presumed that the 
 lots could not lie, being governed and guided by the 
 wisdom of God, they gather themselves together like 
 bees, and all make a common incursion upon Jonah. 
 For by likelihood of their demands (because the}' are 
 many in number, and many to the same eti'ects as 
 some supposed) it is not improbable that their whole 
 troop assaulted him, and each one had a pull after his 
 fashion ; and as they had sundry heads and mouths, 
 so they had sundry speeches to express cue and tho 
 
 * Philar. 
 
 t Moi-(,-aiitur, rajiiuut, fuiaulur, oouqi(jlliuitur. — Bonavcnt. 
 in Luc. 
 
Ver. 7.] 
 
 LECTURE X. 
 
 69 
 
 same thing, and therefore one asked, Uncle renh, 
 ' Whence comest thou '?' Another, Qua term tua, '^What 
 is thy countiy '?' A third. Ex quo jjopulo, ' Of what 
 people art thou ?' when his people, country, and 
 dwelling-place differ not in substance. And certainly 
 I cannot blame them, if in such peril of their lives, 
 when the first-born of death, the next and immediat- 
 est death to sight was upon them, they all make an 
 head and open their mouths without order or course, 
 against the worker of their woes. When Aehan was 
 brought to the valley of Achor to be executed, he, his 
 sons, daughters, asses, sheep, the silver, garment, 
 wedge of gold, his tent, all that he had, there pro- 
 duceJ, it ig said, Josh, vii., that ' all Israel threw 
 stones at him, and burnt them with fire, and stoned 
 them with stones,' as being the very cause that Israel 
 could not stand against their enemies. In the con- 
 spiracy at Rome, against Julius Ca-sar, there were not 
 fewer (by report) than twenty-four daggers stabbed 
 into bis body, because ho was taken by the nobility 
 of Rome to be the perturber of their commonwealth, 
 and an enemy to the common liberty. An oath of 
 association was taken in many places of this land (I 
 know not if in the whole) within these few years, for 
 the pursuit and extirpation of those persons, together 
 with their confederates, and as I remember, their 
 families, who by treacherous machination should vio- 
 late the life and crown of our gracious sovei'eign. 
 Was it not grounded upon this presumption, that the 
 authors of common calamities and subverters of states, 
 can never be persecuted with too much violence ? 
 Traitors executed at Tyburn* of late, were sent, I say 
 not to their graves, but to their ends, such as they 
 were, too, too merciful for traitors, with such a shout 
 of the people, to seal their affections and assents, as if 
 they had gained an harvest, or were dividing a spoil, 
 and I doubt not but the angels in heaven rejoice when 
 they see such deliverances. 
 
 Others distinguish the questions, and make them 
 imply several things, as if they inquired of five sun- 
 dry matters. (1.) His fact; iiulica ciijus causa, tell 
 us not for whom, but ' for what, this evil is upon us. 
 (2.) His calling and course of life, his art,' profession, 
 qiKc opera tua' (3.) His travel and journoj', and the 
 company and society he last came from, uncle renis .^ 
 (4.) His region, qurr. terra tua '? (5.) His dwelling 
 city, ex quo populo ' which last maj' be referred to 
 the notifying of his service and religion, whereof it 
 was easy to guess by the city he came from. 
 
 In the general course of all which particulars, we 
 have a singular document and instruction of justice 
 from bai-barous nations. Jonah had been detected by 
 the suffrage of God himself, speaking ia the lot, and 
 doubtless by these men, held and reputed the princi- 
 pal malefactor in the ship. ' The lot fell upon 
 Jonah.' What needeth more conviction '? How 
 should their eyes now spare, or their bands longer 
 * D. Lopus and his fellows. 
 
 forbear him '? Methinkoth they should now cry out 
 against him, as the men of Job's tabernacle, ' Who will 
 give us his flesh to eat ?' Job xxxi. 31 ; or as the 
 priests and false prophets against Jeremiah, ' The 
 judgment of death belongeth to this man,' Jer. xxxviii. 
 4, ' Away with him, away with him from the earth, he is 
 not worthy to live.' They do not thus but in the ex- 
 tremest peril of their lives, having no time to bethink 
 themselves, driven to take counsel without counsel, as 
 fencers in the sand, consilium, in arena, who defend 
 themselves but as the blow falleth out ; j-et they de- 
 liberate in the cause, they evolve all circumstances for 
 the manifestation of his fact, and by a most exquisite 
 inquisition they proceed in judgment : What is thy 
 fact, thy trade, thy travel, thy country, thy people ? 
 TuUy affirmeth that a kind of justice there is amongst 
 robbers and pirates in dividing their booties, and 
 maintaining their fraternities : such a justice as An- 
 anias, the high priest, was a judge, who ' sat to 
 judge Paul according to the law, and caused him to 
 be smitten contrary to the law,' Acts xxiii. 3 ; a 
 painted judge and a painted justice. But it serveth 
 me thus far to collect, ,that even in the tents of 
 IMeshech, in the societies of the most wicked, there is a 
 counterfeit justice, an imitation of that virtue without 
 the which Jupiter himself, saith Plutarch, cannot 
 reign in heaven, much less can amity be maintained 
 betwixt man and man. The empress wisely admo- 
 nished her husband, when, sitting at play, and mind- 
 ing his game more than the prisoners, he pronounced 
 sentence upon them. The life of man is not as a 
 game at tables,* where a wooden man is taken up by a 
 blot and thrown aside, and the loss is not great, and 
 whether it be life or land, there is no great diflerence 
 in the account of God, for ' the bread of the poor 
 man is his life,' and he that oppresseth the poor 
 ' eateth him like bread.' Whether, therefore, it be 
 in the life or in the living of man, the office of justice 
 is not to wade to the ankles, but up to the chin, to 
 sound the bottom and depth of the cause, carefully to 
 confer all presumptions and inducements, prudently 
 to deliberate, enucleate all difficulties ; and though the 
 case be dangerous, as this was, and great prejudices 
 against the examinate, yet by a curious indagation to 
 have the proof of the fact clearly laid forth. We 
 have a precedent hereof in God himself, who, though 
 he be nearer to oflenders than the bark to the tree, 
 by the presence of his Godhead, which filleth heaven 
 and earth, yet when the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah 
 was great (to leave an example of justice to the sous 
 of men), ' I will now go down,' saith he. Gen. xviii., 
 ' and see whether they have done altogether according 
 to that cry, and if not, that I may know.' This dis- 
 cension of God to see and to know, what is it else but 
 the delivery of his justice by rule, by number, and by 
 balance, that first he will weigh and ponder the cause, 
 
 * Non est hominum vita luJus talorum. — .'Elianus. 
 
70 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 afterwards measure out his jutlgment ! Now to the 
 particulars. 
 
 1. In the first of these demands, whiclj is of the 
 fact (the other but conjectures tending to the proof 
 of it), they are not content with the sentence of the 
 lot, but they require further the confession of his 
 own mouth, iiidlca nobis, ' Tell us for what cause.' 
 The like did Joshua to Aehan. ' My son, give the 
 glory to God, and tell me what thou bast done, hide 
 it not.' It is a part of the glory of God, to justify 
 him and his judgments, to yield to the victory of 
 truth when he hath put a spirit as it were into lots 
 and laws, to guess aright, not to dissemble the force 
 thereof. Now, if any shall infer hereupon that, by 
 the examples of Joshua proceeding against Achan, 
 the mariners against Jonah, the trial of life, lands, 
 good name, should be brought from the laws of the 
 country, and put to the decision of lots ; besides the 
 rule of Jerome upon this place, jii-ii-ili'i/ia aliif/iilontm 
 noil facinnt lir/fin conniiuncni, that the privileges of 
 eingular men make not a common law, and the gene- 
 ral rule in all examples, that none is further to 
 be followed than the law abetteth and maketh it good, 
 eavmpla convciiiant cum Icf/c comiinirii, otherwise they 
 are to be admired rather than imitated ; and it is the 
 tempting of God to seek signs when they are not for 
 profit, but only for experience,* and we ought to be 
 very circumspect in executing judgment, and to leave 
 no lawful means unattempted, lest we justify the 
 wicked and condemn the innocent ; I say, besides all 
 these reasons, it appeareth from both the examples be- 
 fore specified, that neither Joshua nor the mariners 
 rested in the designation of the lots, but desired fur- 
 ther to be ascertained from their own confessions, ' Tell 
 us.' Whereunto we may add, that the lottery against 
 Achan was both occasioned by an unexpected over- 
 throw taken at Ai, and by the direction of God himself 
 in thcwhole manner thereof prescribed ; and as for Jonah 
 he was a figure of Christ, whose vesture was to be parted 
 by lots, and therefore the dcprehension of his ofl'ence 
 not to be brought into ordinary practice. 
 
 2. What i.v tliiiie occiiptilinu ! If Jonah had con- 
 fessed and opened his fact, other likelihoods and helps 
 to find it out had been needless, but it secmeth that 
 before he could shape his answers to the first question, 
 they thrust another upon him, and without intcrmis- 
 eiou a third, and yet more, like a peal of ordinance 
 thundering about his ears, that by the united strength 
 of so many probabilities, wound together like a four- 
 fold cord, Jonah may be entangled. 
 
 This first of the four probabilities is of great mo- 
 ment to scan the life of man. What is thine occupa- 
 tion, thy art, thy calling ? For (1.) some have no art 
 or trade at all ; (2.) some wicked and unlawful arts ; 
 (3.) others such arts as have an easy provocation to 
 injustice and ungodliness. 
 
 * Cum sigiia flns;itantur, non ad salutcm, scJ ad expcri- 
 entiam desiderata, Dcus tentatur. — Auy. 
 
 (1.) Those that have no art, are eiTant, vagabond, 
 wandering persons, as the planets in the zodiac, 
 never keeping a fixed place, and rather using their 
 feet than their hands, or whether they flit abroad or 
 gad at home, their calling and art is idleness ; for 
 otiiim ncr/otittm, idleness is a business. They are 
 more troubled, I doubt not, how to spend the day, 
 than these that have a trade wherein to be exercised ; 
 they live by the sweat of other men's brows, and will 
 not disquiet the temples of their own heads. Let me 
 freely speak without the offence of governors : there 
 are a number in this city, nwnerus tantum, a number 
 only, vei-}' artificial in this idle art (those that can 
 plead their age, impotency, and necessary necessities, 
 I am their advocate. I speak of pure and voluntary 
 beggars), who if they would work and have it not, it 
 is pity that you have your wealth, that your talent is 
 not taken from j'ou, and given to others who would 
 better use it to God's behoof (they should be ditis 
 c.rameii doimis,-'- the bees that swarm in rich men's 
 houses, much more in opulent aud wealthy cities, 
 many inferior towns are superior unto you in the pro- 
 vision thereof) ; but if they have work, and will not un- 
 dergo it, why are they suffered ? Spoiitaiiea hissitudo, a 
 willing and proffered laziness in the body of a man, 
 is an introduction and argimicnt of greater diseases, 
 and these willing or wilful rogues are not unapt, if 
 ever occasion be ministered, to pilfer your goods, cut 
 your throats, and fire your city for their better ad- 
 vantage of maintenance. AYhen Jephthah was cast out 
 of the house by his brethren, because he was the son 
 of a strange woman, ' be iled and dwelt in the land of 
 Toh,' and there gathered 'idle fellows' unto him, and 
 they went out with him. Judges xi. The unbelieving 
 Jews in the Acts, chap, xvii., look unto them a company 
 of wandering companions, such as stand idle in the 
 market place, Ayoja/w, wicked men, and gathered a 
 nniltitude, and made an uproar in the whole city, and 
 came to the house of Jason to fetch out Paul and 
 Silas. You see how ready they are to serve such 
 turn, to raise a tumult, to make a conspiracy or re- 
 bellion, to aisociatc themselves to any that will but 
 lead Ibcm. It were your wisest part to deal with such 
 lewd and unordinate walkers, slanders, sitters in the 
 ways of idleness, as Philip of Maeedon dealt with two 
 of his subjects, in whom there was little hope of grace : 
 he made one of them ran out of the country, aud the 
 other drive him, allmun c ^lacedoiiia fujerr, alterum 
 pc'iscqiii jiissii ; SO his people was rid of both. 
 
 (2.) Now there be other arts utterly unlawful to be 
 followed, the \cry naming whereof doth condemn them, 
 as conjurors, charmers, moon-prophets, tellers of for- 
 tune (our English Egyptians), robbers by land, pirates 
 by sea, cozeners, harlots, bawds, usurers, which 
 presently censure a man, as soon as they arc but 
 heard of, to be wickedly disposed. 
 
 (3). There are manj- besides, which, though they 
 * Ilorat. 
 
Ver. 8.] 
 
 LECTURE Xr. 
 
 71 
 
 have use lawful enough in a commonwealth, yet there 
 is but a narrow path betwixt fire and water, as Esdras 
 speaketh, and one may easily miss to do his duty 
 there. You look, perhaps, that I should rehearse 
 them. Though some are become more odious by 
 reason of grosser abuses in them, yet I wiU cover 
 theii- face and keep them fi'om the light (as they 
 covered the face of Haman to keep him from the eyes 
 of men), because there is too much abuse to be espied 
 in all our arts. Money hath man'ed them all ; they 
 are all set to sale, as Jugurtha spake of Eome, 
 but want a chapman. Divines sell the liberty of a 
 good conscience for fovour and preferment; lawyers 
 sell not only their labours, but the laws and justice 
 itself; physicians sell ignorance, unskilfulness, words, 
 unsufEcient di'ugs ; all men, of all kinds of trades, for 
 the most part, sell honesty, truth, conscience, oaths, 
 souls for money. Our arts are ai'ts indeed ; that is, 
 cozenages, impostures, frauds, circumventions. Our 
 EngUsh tongue doth well express the nature of the 
 word ; we call them crafts, and those that profess 
 them craftsmen ; we may as well term them foxes, as 
 Christ termed Herod, they are so bent to deceit. 
 Others, not content with so vulgar a name, call them 
 mysteries ; indeed, the ' mystei^ of iniquity ' is in 
 them ; misty, obscure, dark handling, which God 
 shall bring to light in due time. Call we these call- 
 ings ? Sure they are such, whereof the sentence shall 
 
 be verified, ' Many are called ' unto them, ' but few 
 elected,' to partake the mercies of God. Oh hearken 
 to the counsel which the apostle giveth, that ye may 
 justify and wari'aut your vocation before God and 
 man. ' Let every one abide in the same calling 
 wherein he was called,' 1 Cor. vii. 20 ; and to make 
 it significant, ' Let every one, wherein he was called, 
 therein abide with God.' Let him not staj', hkc a 
 passenger, for a night, but continue and hold himself 
 not only in the name, but in the nature and use of his 
 calling ; that is, let him ' walk worthy of it, as in the 
 sight of God,' who is a witness and judge to all his 
 proceedings. Let him not add unto the challenges 
 and constitutions of God the callings of the devil, as 
 simony, bribery, forgery, hypocrisy, perjm'ies, (for 
 these are the devil's challenges), and let not those 
 arts and professions, which were given for the orna- 
 ments and helps of our life, be tm-ned into snares and 
 gins to entrap our brethren. In the audit of om' Lord 
 and master, so far shall we be from giving the accounts 
 of faithful seiwants, Luke six., ' Lord, thy piece hath 
 gained other ten,' which we have so falsified and de- 
 faced with the sleights of Satan, that we cannot dis- 
 charge oiu'selves as the unfaithful reprobate servant 
 did, ' Behold, thou hast thine own,' Mat. xxv. : our 
 lawful and honest vocation, wherein we were fii'st 
 placed, we have so disguised with our own coiTupt 
 additions. ~ 
 
 LECTURE XI. 
 
 Whence earnest tlwu .' which is thy country .' ami of iihat people art thou .' — JoxAU I. 8. 
 
 THESE thi'ee questions now rehearsed, though in 
 seeming not much difl'erent, yet I distinguished 
 apart, making the fu'st to inquire of his jom-ney and 
 travel (for confirmation whereof some a little change 
 the style, Quo vadis ? Whither goest thou ? asking not 
 the place from which he set forth, but to which he 
 was bound), or of the society wherewith he had com- 
 bined himseh' ; the second, of his native countiy ; the 
 third, of his dwelling place. For the country and 
 city may difler : in the one we may be born, and Hve 
 in the other ; as, for example, a man may be bom in 
 Scotland, dwell in England ; or, bom at Bristow, 
 dwell at York. Wherein that of TuUy, in his books 
 of laws, taketh place, I verily think that both Cato 
 and all free denizens have two countries, the one of 
 nativity, the other of habitation, unain naturcc, alteram 
 ciritatis ; as Cato, being born at Tusculum, was re- 
 ceived into the people of the city of Kome. Therefore, 
 being a Tusculan by birth, by city a Eoman, he had 
 one country by place, another by law, alteram loci 
 jiatriam, alteram juris. For we term that om' country 
 where we were bom, and whereinto we are admitted. 
 So there is some odds between the two latter questions. 
 There was gi-eat reason to demand both from whence 
 
 he came, and whither he would, because the travels of 
 men are not always to good ends. For the Scribes 
 and Pharisees travel far, if not by their bodily paces, 
 3'et by the afl'ections of their hearts ' they compass sea 
 and land,' to an evil purpose, ' to mnke proselytes, 
 children of death worse than themselves.' As the 
 pope and the king of Spain send into India (they pre- 
 tend to save souls), indeed to destroy the breed of that 
 people, as Pharaoh the males of the Hebrews, and to 
 waste their countries. They walk that walk ' in the 
 counsel of the ungodl}', and in the ways of sinners,' 
 but ' destruction and unhappiness is in all their ways.' 
 Thej- walk that walk in the ways of an harlot, but 
 ' her house tendeth to death, and her paths to the 
 dead ; they that go unto her return not again, neither 
 take hold of the ways of life,' Prov. ii. Thieves 
 have their ranges and walks ; suryunt de nocte 
 latrones* they rise in the night time, they go or ride 
 far from home, that they may be far from suspicion, 
 but ' their feet are swift to shed blood,' and they be- 
 stow their pains to work a mischief. Alexander 
 journeyed so far in the conquest of the world, that a \ 
 
 * Herat. 
 
 ■f Cffiuus in Curt. 9. 
 
72 
 
 KIXG ON JONAH. 
 
 [Ciur. I. 
 
 soldier told him, "We have done as much as mortality 
 ■was capable of; thou preparest to go unto another 
 world, and thou seokest for an India unknown to the 
 Indians themselves, that tlion maj-cst illustrate more 
 regions by thy conquest than the sun ever saw : to 
 what other end I know not, but to feed his ambition, 
 to enlarge his desire as hell, and to add more titles to 
 iis tomb, tilidiim sepidchro. They have their travels 
 and peregrinations that walk on their bare feet, with a 
 staff in ilicir hand, and a scrip about their neck, to 
 Saint James of Compostella, our Lady of Loretto, the 
 dust of the holy land. What to do"? The deal to 
 visit the dead ; to honour stocks, and to come home 
 stocks ; to change the air, and to retain their former 
 behaviour ; to do penance for sin, and to return 
 laden with a greater sin of most irreligious supersti- 
 tion, mceter to be repented, if they knew their sin. Of 
 such I may say, as Socrates sometimes answered one 
 who marvelled that he reaped so, little profit by his 
 travel. Thou art well euough served, saith he, because 
 thou didst travel by thyself, for it is not mountains 
 and seas, but the conference of wise men, that giveth 
 wisdom ; neither can monuments and graves, but the 
 Spirit of the Lord, which gooth not with those gad- 
 ders, put holiness into them. They have their walks 
 and excursions which go from their native country to 
 Eomc (the first time to see naught, the second to be 
 naught, the third to die naught, was the old proverb). 
 The first and last now-a-days are not mnch different ; 
 they go to learn naught, they drink up poison there 
 like a restorative, which they keep in their stomachs 
 along Italy, Franco, other nations, not minding to 
 disgorge it, till they come to their mother's house, 
 where they seek to unlade it in her bosom, and to end 
 her happy days. Jonah, for aught these knew, might 
 have come from his country a robber, mm'derer, 
 traitor, or any the like transgressor, and therefore 
 have run from thence, as Onesimus from his master 
 Philemon, to escape justice ; whereupon they ask him, 
 ' Whence comest thou ?" that they may learn both 
 the occasion and scope of his journey. And if you 
 observe it well, there is not one question here moved 
 (though questions only c(mjcctural), but scttcth his 
 conscience upon the rack, and woundeth him at the 
 heart by every circumstance, whereby his crime might 
 be aggi-avatcd. Such is the wisdom that God inspireth 
 into the hearts of men, for the trial of his truth, and 
 in the honour of justice, to fit their demands to the 
 conscience of the transgressors, in such sort, that they 
 shall even feel themselves to be touched, and so closely 
 rounded in the car, as they cannot deny their offence. 
 ' There are diverse administrations, yet but one spirit ;' 
 warriors have a spirit of courage to fight, coimsellors 
 to direct and prevent, magistrates to govern, judges 
 to discern, examine, convince, and to do right unto all 
 people. For the questions hero propounded, were in 
 effect as if they had told him, thou dislionourest thy 
 calling, thou breakest thy commission, thou shamest 
 
 thy country, thou condemnest thy people, in that thou 
 hast committed this evil. 
 
 They ask him first, ' What is thine art ?' that be- 
 thinking himself to be a prophet, and not a mariner, 
 as these were, not a master in the ship, but a ' master 
 in Israel,' set over kingdoms and empires, ' to build 
 and pull down, plant and root up,' ho might remem- 
 ber himself, and call his soul to account. Wretched 
 man that I am, how ingloriously have I neglected my 
 vocation ! They ask him next, ' Whence comest 
 thou ?' that it might be as goads and prickles at his 
 breast, to recount in his mind, I was called on land, 
 I am escaped to sea ; I was sent to Assyria, I am 
 going to Cilicia ; I was directed to Nineveh, I am 
 bending my face towards Tarshish ; that is, I am fljing 
 from the isresence of my Lord, and following mine 
 own crooked ways. Thirdly, they ask him ' of his 
 countiy ;' that he might say to himself, What, are 
 the deeds of Babylon better than the deeds of Sion ? 
 Was I born and brought up, instructed and an in- 
 structor in the land of Jewry, in the garden of the 
 world, the royallost, peculiarest nation that the Lord 
 hath, and have I not gi-ace to keep his commandment ? 
 Lastl_y, they inquire ' of his people ;' a people that 
 had all things but flexible and fleshy hearts ; the law, 
 promises, covenant, service of God, temple of Solomon, 
 chau- of Moses, thrones of David, patriarchs, prophets, 
 Messiah ; yet one of this people, in the midst of 
 such prerogatives, as a cedar-tree amidst her branches, 
 hath lived so long amongst them, that a barbarous 
 tongue is set to accuse him. 
 
 3. Those two questions following (that I ma}" join them 
 both together), seem to inquire, the one more gene- 
 rally, the other more in jjarficular ; the one of the 
 place, the other of the people and inhabitants. There 
 may be a good country and an evil people,* or con- 
 trariwise, an evil coimtrj- and a good people. Touch- 
 ing the place, I will not dispute whether they thought 
 that the anger of then- gods, as thej" reputed them, 
 did principally persecute and infest some certain 
 countries ; that albeit he committed no harm for his 
 own part, yet he should suffer for the country's sake, 
 and bear the smart of that inveterate hatred, where- 
 with the place itself was maligned. This I Icnow, 
 that both in the dwelling-place where a man rcposeth 
 himself, in regard of the influence of heaven ; .and in 
 the inhabitants, for the disposition of their minds, 
 there is as great diversity, as betwixt uoith and south 
 for change of weathers. Erasmus, in fho preface to 
 St Augustine's epistles, giveth this judgment of that 
 learned father, that if it had been his lot to have been 
 born, or but to have Uvod in Italy, or France, that 
 wit would have yielded more abundant fruits unto us. 
 But Afric was rude, gi'cedj- of pleasure, an enemy to 
 study, desirous of cm-ious devices, nulis ciat Africa, 
 vohiptatiim avida, stiidionim iiiimica, (fc. Plato re- 
 joiced that he was born at Athens, rather Uian in 
 * Terra bona, gons mala. — Ar. Mont. 
 
Ver. 8.] 
 
 LECTURE XI, 
 
 73 
 
 auothcr place. Themistocles was upbraided bj- one 
 of Soriphus, that the commendation and fame he gat, 
 was for his country's sake, because he was born an 
 Athenian ; though Themistocles answered, that neither 
 had himself been worse, if he had been born in Seri- 
 pbus, nor the other better, if he at Athens. AMio 
 marvelleth to see swellings in the throat, rjids tumidinn, 
 rfuttur i(c., in cold places where the snow continually 
 lieth ? It is the nature and site of the place that 
 bringcth them. They made small reckoning heretofore 
 to lie in Crete, to forswear in Carthage, to gormandise 
 and surfeit in Capua or Semiplacentia, to lust un- 
 naturally in Sodom, and to be proud at this daj' in 
 Spain, to poison in Italy, to ovor-drink in Germany ; 
 it is, they say, the custom and fashion of those coun- 
 tries, and then is easily verified that which Seneca 
 ■wi-ote ;* we thrust one another into vices, and how 
 then can they be reclaimed to good, whom no man 
 stayeth, and the whole people driveth forward ? In 
 such places it is a fault to be innocent and honest 
 amongst ofienders. Est^e inter noccntcs iiino.riiim criwen 
 est. Senecaf giveth the reason, Xeccssc est ant imiteris, 
 out odeiis ; one of the two must needs be done, either 
 thou must imitate or hate, both which are to be avoided, 
 lest either thou become like the evil, because they 
 are many, or an encmj- to manj", because they are 
 nnhko thee. Canst thou walk upon coals, or take tire 
 in thy bosom, and not burn ? canst thou be a brother 
 to dragons, and a companion to ostriches, without 
 savouring of their wilduess ? live with the froward, 
 and not learn frowardness ? dwell amongst thieves, 
 and not ran with them ? converse with idolaters, and 
 not eat of such things as please them ?' The daughters 
 of men man-ied the sons of God, and the daughters of 
 Hcth brought much woe to Rebecca, no doubt for the 
 lewdness of their behaviour. When the disciple in 
 the Gospel asked leave of his master to go and bury 
 his father, it was denied him ; some give the reason, 
 lest his unbelieving kindred, which were likely enough 
 to be at the fnnei-al, as eagles flock to the carcase, 
 should contaminate him again ; therefore he was 
 answered, ' Let the dead bury the dead, do thou follow 
 me ;' because I am life, tariy and live with me, and 
 let the dead alone, lest haply thou die with them. 
 Though there were many vrickcd kings in Israel, yet 
 there was none like Ahab, 1 Kings xxi., ' who did sell 
 himself to work wickedness in the sight of the Lord.' 
 Why ? The reason is there given. ' Jezebel his wife 
 provoked him.' For, chap, xvi., ' it was a light thing 
 for him to walk in' the sins of Jeroboam, except he 
 took Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal, king of Zidon, to 
 wife, by whom he was brought to idolatry.' No mar- 
 vel if Jehoram, king of Judah, did afterwards evil in 
 the sight of the Lord ; for the daughter of Ahab was 
 his wife, 2 Ivings -viii., and Ahaziah after him no better, 
 for he was the ' son-in-law of the house of Ahab.' All 
 these were in an error ; they looked to gather grapes 
 * Epist. 82. " t Epist. 7 
 
 of thorns, and figs of thistles ; whereas on the other 
 side, amieitiic pares aut facinnt aut quirmnt , friendship 
 either maketh or seeketh like in conditions. And so 
 is the nature of things, that when a good man is joined 
 with a bad, the evil is not bettered by the good, but 
 the good coiTupted by the evil.* 
 
 Thus far of the demands. The answer is annexed in 
 the 9th verse, ' I am an Hebrew, and I fear the Lord 
 God of heaven, which hath made the sea and the diy 
 land.' What is this to the matter ? Was it a fault to 
 be an Hebrew, and to fear the Lord God of heaven '? 
 Not so, but it appeareth in the next verse by a clause 
 thereof, that he confessed the whole crime, ' because 
 he had told them.' He might yet have concealed his 
 fault, and covered his iniquity with some defence, as 
 Adam his nakedness with fig-leaves, and amongst 
 bashes, by pleading the unlawfulness of his accusers, 
 the uncertainty of lots, as governed rather by chance 
 than by divine providence ; he doth it not, but maketh 
 an immediate confession of his sin, so inexcusalily 
 against himself, that if malice itself had spoken against 
 him, it could not have added much to the accusation. 
 For it was the least part of his ingenuity, simpty to 
 relate the rebellion (which is but named iu the verse 
 following, as it were at the second hand, and brought 
 in by a parenthesis) ; but his art, to be observed in- 
 deed, are those ornaments and garnishes of speech, 
 which he bringeth against himself, to decipher his 
 disobedience. 
 
 (1.) I am an Hebrew ; if a Cilician, or of any coun- 
 try in the earth besides, my fault were the less ; 
 (2.) and I do not only know and acknowledge (which 
 is wanting in others), but I fear, reverence, stand in 
 awe of, (-3.) not an idol, nor a devil, nor the work of 
 man's hands, but the Lord of hosts ; (4.) who, though 
 he sitteth in heaven, as in his palace of gi-eatest state, 
 where ho is best glorified by his creatures, and his 
 best creatures shall be glorified by him, yet is he 
 not housed within the circles of hearen ; for the 
 sea and the land also are his by creation ; the sea 
 wherein I am tossed, and the dnj land from whence I 
 flitted. 
 
 (1). My countrj- is not heathenish, rade, and bar- 
 barous, I am an Hehreiv ; (2.) my religion not loose 
 and dissolute, I fear, and bear a reverent estimation ; 
 (3.) I am not carried awa}' to dumb idols, I fear the 
 Lord God ; (4.) who is not a God in heaven alone, as 
 your Jupiter ; nor in the sea alone, as your Neptune ; 
 nor alone in the earth, as your Pluto ; but alone is the 
 God of lieaven, and doth not hold by tenure ; but (.5.) 
 himself hath made the sea anil the dry land, not only 
 the land of Israel, wherein ho principally dwelleth, 
 and which I relinquished, but the land of Tarshish also, 
 and the continent, and dry groimd belonging to the 
 whole world, and not the land alone, but all the waters 
 
 * Rerum natura sic est ut fiuotiea bonus raalo conjungitur, 
 non es bono malus mc4ioretur, sed ex malo bonus contami- 
 nctur.— Chri/sosl. 
 
74 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 of the main sea, which I took for my refuge and 
 sanctuaiy. 
 
 I am (in Hebrew, Hchnius sum. From the begin- 
 ning of the world to the time of Christ, are numbered 
 four propagations or generations : the first, from Adam 
 to Noah ; the second, from Noah to Abraham ; the 
 third, fi'om Abraham to David ; the fourth, from David 
 to Christ.* In the second generation was the name 
 of the Hebrews received ; in the thii'd, of the Israelites 
 from Jacob, sm'named Israel, whose grandfather Abra- 
 ham was ; in the fourth, of the Jews, after that Judah 
 and Benjamin (which for the unity of minds were as 
 it were one tribe), following Eehoboam the sou of 
 Solomon, of the tribe of Judah, made the kingdom of 
 Judah ; the other ten betaking them to Jeroboam, of 
 the tribe of Ejihraim, set up the kingdom of the Eph- 
 raimites, or of Israel. One and the same people 
 thrice changed their names. 
 
 Touching the first of these names, there are sundry 
 opinions brought whence it arose. 1. Some think they 
 ■were called Hebrews of Abraham,! with the alteration 
 of a few letters, Hchrai quasi Abrahai. 2. Some de- 
 rive them from Heber, who was the fourth' from Noah. J 
 3. The gi-ammarians fetch them from an Hebrew word 
 which signifieth over or beyond, because the posterity 
 of Shem went over the river Tigris, and abode in 
 Chaldea. This surname you shall first find given 
 to Abraham, Gen. xiv., where it is said that he which 
 brought news that Lot was earned out of Sodom with 
 the rest of the booty, told it to ' Abraham the 
 Hebrew ;' because forsaking Ur of the Chaldces, and 
 passing over Euphrates, he came into the land of 
 Canaan, therefore was he named of that country people 
 Ibreus, that is, one that passed over. So there is 
 no doubt made but of Abraham they are called 
 Hebrews, because he hearkened to the word of the 
 Lord, and went beyond Euphrates. Some have 
 gathered here, hence, that in calling himself an 
 Hebrew, ho maketh confession of his f lult, that as the 
 children of Shorn and Abraham passed over rivers, 
 so (by a boiTowed speech) he had passed over the 
 commandment of the Lord. For what is sin but 
 transgression, trausitio liitearuin,^^ the going beyond 
 those lines and limits that arc prcfincd us ? Others 
 observe that he implieth the condition of man's life 
 heroin, as ' having no abiding city,' but a travel 
 upon the face of the earth to pass from place to place, 
 as it is written of Israel in the psalm, ' they went 
 from nation to nation, and from one kingdom to an- 
 other people,' Ps. cv. ; and David confcsseth no less, 
 ' I am a stranger and sojourner upon the earth, as all 
 my fathers were.' Jerome would have us note that 
 he tcrmoth not himself a Jew, which name came from 
 the rending of the kingdom, but an Hebrew, that is, 
 
 * Carol Sigon. de rep. Ilcbr. 
 t Aug. 1. i. qu. super Geu. 
 
 % Hieron. in Oenea. et Aug. ii. retract, ct 16 dc civ. 
 Do. iii. Aret. in ep. ad Hebr. J TuU. 
 
 a passenger.* I take the letter of the test, without 
 deeper constructions, that his pm-pose simply was to 
 answer their last question, which was yet fr-esh in his 
 ears, touching the people from whence he came, and 
 by naming his nation, to make an argument against 
 himself of higher amplification, that lying in that 
 corner of the world, which was the diamond of the 
 ring, and as it were the apple of the eye, heart of the 
 body, being sprung of that root whereof it was said, 
 Dent, iv., ' Only this people is wise and of under- 
 standing, and a great nation ; for what nation is so 
 gi'eat, to whom the gods come so near, as the Lord is 
 near unto us in all that we call unto him for ? or what 
 nation so great that hath ordinances and laws so 
 righteous as we have ?' It might be his greater 
 offence to be sown good and come up evil, to be 
 richly planted in the goodliest vine, and basely de- 
 generated into a sour grape ; as it were a greater 
 shame not to be knit indissolubh" to the worship of 
 God in England than any other country almost, it 
 lying in Europe, as Gideon's fleece in the floor, exempt- 
 ed from the plagues of her neighbours, and specially 
 signed with the favour of God : Hungary and 
 Bohemia busied with the Turks, Italy poisoned with 
 the local seat of antichrist, Spain held in awe with a 
 bloody inquisition, nether Germany disquieted with a 
 foreign foe, France molested with an intestine enemy, 
 Ireland troubled with the incivility of the place, Scot- 
 land with her liital infelicity, England amongst all the 
 rest having peaceable days and nights, and not know- 
 ing any other banc but too much quietness, which 
 she hath taken from God with the left hand, and used 
 as the fountain of all her licentiousness. 
 
 After his countrj' he placeth his religion. ' I fear 
 the Lord God of heaven,' which is here put for the 
 general worship and service that belongeth to God. 
 For that which God saith, Isa. xxix., ' Their fear is 
 taught by the precepts of men', Christ intorproteth, 
 Mat. XV., by the name of worship, ' In vain do the.y 
 worship me, teaching for doctrine the precepts of men.' 
 Fear and worship in these scriptm-es are both one. 
 ' Come, children,' saith the psalmist, ' hearken unto 
 me, I will teach you the fear of the Lord.' And it is 
 a notable phrase that the Hebrews use to this purpose, 
 as in the speech of Jacob to Laban, Gen. xxxi., ' Ex- 
 cept the God of my father, the God of Abraham, and the 
 fear of Isaac had been with me, surely thou hadst sent 
 me awaj' empty ;' where it is further to be marked, that 
 when Laban sware bj- the God of Abraham and the 
 God of Nahor, Jacob sware by the fear of his father 
 Isaac, that is, by that God which his father feared, that 
 is, worshipped and served, ab.tlraclu}n pro coucrcto el 
 subjeeto. It implieth thus much, that the strength of 
 Israel is a dreadful God, clothed with unspeakable 
 majesty, as with a garment, and the glory of his face 
 shining brighter than all the hghts of heaven in their 
 
 * Nou dixit, Jiida'us. ni/nien ex discissione regni factum ; 
 sed IJclra-us i. c. orjcarijf, transiior. 
 
Ver. 8.] 
 
 LECTURE XI. 
 
 75 
 
 beauty, yea, the beliolding of bis countenance to a 
 mortal man present death ; the angels tremble, the 
 heavens melt, the mountains smoke, the sea flieth 
 back, the rivers are dried up, the fish rot, the earth 
 faintcth at the sight thereof, and therefore we ought 
 not approach his ground with our shoes on our feet, 
 v\'ith sensual and base cogitations, nor sit at his feast 
 ■when the bread of his fearful word is broken, without 
 our wedding garment, nor enter his house of prayer 
 with the saeriticc of fools, nor come to his holy mys- 
 teries with unwashed hands or hearts, not discerning 
 the body and blood of the Lord, nor ofl'er the calves 
 of our lips with lips unsanctified, nor tender any duty 
 unto him, without falling low upon our faces, and bow- 
 ing the knees of our hearts in token of our reverence. 
 It is a question moved, how Jonah could truly say, 
 ' I fear the Lord,' being so stubborn and refractory 
 against his express commandment. For answer 
 whereof, we must fly to that citj- of refuge which Da\id 
 had recourse mito, I mean the riches of God's mercy, 
 ' If thou shall mark, Lord, what is done amiss. Lord, 
 who shall stand "? But there is pardon with thee that 
 thou mayest be feared,' Ps. cxsx. If the abundant 
 goodness of God did not gloriously interpret our ser- 
 vice and sit by his justice, as the steward in the Gos- 
 pel sat at his accounts, when the debt is an hundred 
 to set down fifty, to cancel a thousand bills of our 
 trespasses, to remove our sins, in multitude as the 
 sand upon the sea shore, from the presence of our 
 Maker, as far as the east is from the west, to drown 
 them by heaps and bundles in the bottom of the sea, 
 to dve purple and scarlet into white, that is, to turn 
 sin into no sin, and even to justif}' the wicked, and, 
 in a word, to draw the books, and blot out our 
 offences as if they were not ; if all the life of Jonah 
 unto this day had been as free from sin as the first 
 fruits of Adam, j'et this were enough, this only one 
 transgi-ession, to have stained his former innocency, 
 to have razed out the memory of all bis foropassed 
 fear towards God, and made him guilty of the whole 
 law. It fareth with a faithful man oftentimes as it 
 did with Eutychus, Acts sx., of whom Paul said, 
 ' Trouble not yourselves, for his life is in him,' though 
 he seemed dead. There is a substance in an elm or 
 in an oak, when they have cast their leaves,' Isa. vi. 
 13, when we would think, by the bareness of the 
 boughs and dryness of the bark, they are quite withered. 
 There is wine found in an unlikely cluster, and ' one 
 saith. Destroy it not, for there is a blessing in it,' Isa. Ixv. 
 8, such are the trances and swoonings of faith at some 
 times, di-awing the breath of life so inwardly to itself, 
 that no man can perceive it, and unless the goodness 
 of God did embrace it, as Paul embraced Eutychus, 
 it could never recover strength again. David lay in 
 such a trance of adultery, Solomon in the trance of 
 idolatry, Peter in the trance of apostasj', and Jonah 
 in the trance of recusancy for the season, when thcj- 
 passed over their transgressions as in a sleep, and 
 
 never felt them. Doubtless God hath a purpose 
 herein, profitable both to those who arc taken with 
 such spiritual apoplexies, and to others also. As 
 Augustine wrote of Cyprian, erring in the doc- 
 trine of rebaptisation, there was something which 
 he saw not, that he might see somewhat more ex- 
 cellent, pivptcrea non vidil allquUl, itt aliqnld siijicr- 
 e)niiu'nlius rideret.^' But in respect of us there 
 are three reasons given by Irona;us,t why the in- 
 firmities of the saints are chronicled in the book 
 of God. 1. To let us understand that both they 
 and we have one God, who was ever ofl'ended with 
 sin, how gi-eat and glorious soever the persons were 
 that wrought it. 2. To teach us to abstain from sin ; 
 for if the ancient patriarchs, who went before us both 
 in time and in the graces of God, and for whom the 
 Son of God had not yet sufi'ered, bare such reproach 
 among their j^osterity, by reason their corruptions 
 are registered, what shall the}' sustain, who live in 
 the later and brighter ages of the world, | and have 
 continued bej'ond the coming of the Lord Jesus ? 
 3. To give us warning and instruction, that for them 
 there was a cure behind, the sacrifice of the lamb 
 which was not then slain, but for such as now shall sin 
 Christ dieth no more, but his next coming shall be in 
 the glory of his Father. Augustine upon the 51st 
 Psalm, handhng the fidl of David, maketh this enar- 
 ration upon it, coniinissuin atque cimscriptum est, is 
 it done and written for thine imitation ? No ; that 
 were an ai'gument of too much violence, to draw on 
 sin with the cart ropes of examples, and to take ad- 
 vantage at the ruins of God's saints. David commit- 
 ted murder and adultery, I may do the like; it were a 
 mark of a far more unrighteous soul than that which 
 thou seekest to imitate : Inde anima iniqiiior, qiiic cum. 
 projiicieii feccrit, quia David fecit, idco pejus quam David 
 fecit. Thence becometh the soul more unrighteous, 
 w^hich, taking occasion to do evil because David did so, 
 doth therefore worse than David did ; but to inform 
 thee thus much, that if thou takest the wings of the 
 morning, and fliest from one end of the earth to the 
 other, thou canst not find a soul so pure, which had 
 not sinned ; and if thou wilt make them thy precedents, 
 thou must follow the steps not of their falling down, but 
 of their rising again by repentance. 
 
 Whom did Jonah fear ? Jehovah ; the honour- 
 ablest title that he could bestow upon him, to make a 
 diflerenee betwixt him and idols ; nomen Tir^ayoa/j,- 
 /jMrov, a name but of four letters in the Hebrew tongue ; 
 but some of the Jews were so superstitious therein, 
 that they called it cJi/Exfcutjjroi/, a name which might 
 not be pronounced, neither durst they assume it into 
 their mouths. And howsoever the word be articulate 
 enough, and every syllable and letter therein easy 
 to be sounded, yet the nature which it containeth is 
 beyond all comprehension. What is God ? saith Ber- 
 nard, in his books of consideration to Eugenius. 
 » De bapt. con. Donat. xviii. t Ireii- ^^^- i''- <^^P- ^^- 
 
76 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 Concerning his election, lie is saving health ; but 
 concerning himself, ho best knoweth.* The Kabbins 
 observe, that all the letters in the name are liiercv. 
 quiescentes, letters of rest ; and they gather thereout a 
 mystery, that the rest, repose, and tranquillity of all 
 the creatures in the world is in God alone. The 
 prophet signilioth as much, Ps. xi., ' In the Lord put 
 I my trust ; how say yo then unto my soul, that she 
 should fly as a bird ?' &c., having built her nest and 
 habitation in the bosom of rest itself. I will not 
 much contend for this invention of theirs, but sure 
 there is some secret in this name, which many have 
 eagerly spent their labour upon, as is plain in Exod. 
 vi., whore God himself saith, that ho ' appeared unto 
 Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, by the name of a strong 
 God, omnipotent, but by his name Jehovah he was 
 not known unto them.' It importeth, first, the eter- 
 nity of God's essenee_in himself, that he is ' yesterdaj', 
 to-day, and the same for evermore ;' ' which was, 
 which is, and which is to come ;' and next, the exist- 
 ence and perfection of aU things in him, as from 
 whom all other creatures in the world have their life, 
 motion, and being. I may say, that God is the being 
 of all other creatures ; not that they are the same that 
 he is, but because of him, and by him, and in him are 
 all things.! Undoubtedly it was the purpose of 
 Jonah to weigh his words, and to powder the whole 
 speech delivered with as much honour towards the 
 Lord as his heart could devise. I fear (1.) Jehovah, 
 a God in essence and being ; j-ours in supposition. 
 (2.) The God of heaven ; yours not the gods of the 
 poorest hamlets in the earth. (3.) Which hath made 
 the sea and the dry land, as a little monument of 
 his sui-passing art and strength ; yours not the gar- 
 ments of their own backs. The prophet keepeth 
 the order of nature, placing first the heaven, then the 
 sea, afterwards the dry land, as the principal parts 
 whereof the whole consisteth ; for heaven is in nature 
 and position above the sea, the sea above the dry 
 land, heaven as the roof of that beautiful house 
 wherein man was placed, the sea and the dry land 
 as the two floors or foundations unto it. But did 
 not God make the heavens as well as the sea, and 
 the dry land ? Doubtless, yes. It is plainly ex- 
 pressed Gen. i., ' In the beginning God made heaven 
 and earth.' The beginning of the world is from the 
 beginning of all things, J whereto the name of the 
 author is first set as the seal, God ; § and un- 
 der the names of the two extremities and borders, 
 heaven and earth, all the rest is comprised, qtiic- 
 quiii iiirdinm, cum ipsis/mibus exurlum est, whatsoever 
 lielh middle betwixt the ends, with the ends them- 
 
 * Quod ad elcclionom spcctat, salua ; quod ad so, ipse 
 novit, lib. v. 
 
 t Sane esse omnium dixerim Deum ; non quful ilia sunt 
 quod 03t ille, seil qui;i ex ipso, Sic.^Berti. in Cant, ser. 4. 
 
 t I'rincipium a principio roruni omnium. — Baiil. 
 
 i Nomon authoris c>t aigillum imponitur. 
 
 selves. Neither did the Lord only cause and ordain 
 these creatures to be formed, but as the potter 
 shapeth his vessels, so he fashioned and wrought them 
 with his own hands, totuiii culnm totainqiie lellureiii, 
 Ipsaiii [iuijuaiii)cssciitiam,)iinieyiiiinsiinul cum forma, non 
 euiin firiurarum inventor est Deus, sed ipsius iiatura crea- 
 tor. The whole heaven and the whole earth, I say, 
 the matter with the form ; for God is not the deviser 
 of shapes and features alone, but the maker of nature 
 itself. And that God that hath made the heaven, can 
 fold it up like a book again, and roll it together hke a 
 skin of parchment ; he that hath made the sea, and 
 at this time set the waves thereof in a rage, and 
 caused it to boil like a pot of ointment, can sa}" to the 
 floods. Be ye dried up ; he that made the dry land, 
 can cover it with waters as with a breastplate, or 
 rock it to and fro upon her foundations, as a drunken 
 man reeleth from place to place. He can clothe the 
 sun and the moon in sackcloth, and command the 
 stars to fall down to the earth, and the mountains of 
 the land to i-emove into the sea, and it shall be ful- 
 filled. ' They all shafl perish, but the Lord their 
 maker shall endure; they all shall wax old as doth a 
 garment; as a vesture shall he change them, and they 
 shall be changed : but he is the same God for ever 
 and ever, and his years shall not fail,' Ps. cii. 
 
 The scope of the whole confession is briefly this, 
 the more to dilate his fall, by how much the less he 
 was able to plead ignorance ; as having the help of 
 religion, the knowledge of the true subsistent God, 
 and able to give a reckoning of every parcel of his 
 creation. All excuse is taken away where the com- 
 mandment is not unknown, excusatio om/iif: toUitnr 
 ubi manddtum non iijnoratur, Peter lent the buckler 
 of ignorance to the Jews, Acts iii. 17, therewith in 
 part to defend themselves against the weapons of God's 
 wrath, even in the bloodiest fact that ever the sun saw 
 attempted. ' I know that through ignorance you did 
 it' (that is, killed the Lord of life), ' as did also your 
 governors ;' but lest they should lean upon the staft" of 
 ignorance too much, he biddeth them ' repent and 
 revert, tliat their sins might be done away.' This 
 was the cloak tliat Paul cast over bis blasphemies, his 
 tyrannies, his unmerciful persecutions of the church : 
 1 Tim. i., ' I was received to mercy, because I did it igno- 
 rantly through unbelief ;' so as ignorance in that place, 
 you see, hath need of mercy to forgive it. And if igno- 
 rance have a tongue to plead her own innocency, why 
 did the blood of Christ cry to the Father upon the 
 cross : Luke xxiii., ' Father, forgive them, they know 
 not what they do.' Is ignorance of the will of God 
 sure to be beaten with rods '? And shall not contempt 
 of his will, a careless unprofitable knowledge of his 
 hosts and ordinances, bo scourged with scorpions ? 
 Shall Tyre and Sidon burn like stubble in hell fire, 
 and the smoke of their torment ascend for evermore, 
 wherein there was never virtue done that might have 
 reclaimed them ? And shall Chora^in and Bcthsaida 
 
Ver. 10.] 
 
 LECTURE XII. 
 
 77 
 
 go quit, and not drink down the dregs of destruction 
 itself, whose streets have been sown with the miracles 
 of Christ, and fatted with his doctrine '? Barbaiy shall 
 wring her hands that she hath known so little, and 
 Christendom rend her heart that she hath known so 
 much to no better purpose. It is no marvel to see 
 the wilderness lie waste and desert ; but if a ground 
 well husbanded and manured yield not profit, it de- 
 serveth cursing. Lactautius* saith, that all the learn- 
 ing of philosophers was without an head, because they 
 knew not God ; therefore when they see they are 
 blind, and when they hear they are deaf, and when 
 they speak they are speechless ; the senses are in the 
 head, the eyes, ears, and tongue. We want not an 
 head for senses, because, when we see, we perceive ; 
 and when we hear w^e understand, and when we speak 
 we can give a reason ; we want a heart only for obe- 
 dience : and, as our Saviour spake of the Scribes and 
 Pharisees, clicunt et nonfadunl, they say and do not ; 
 so it is true in us : we see, and hear, and say, and know, 
 but do not ; as idle and idol Christians, as those idol 
 gods in the psalm, to our greater both shame and con- 
 demnation. 
 
 So the apostle enforceth it against the Galalians : 
 chap, iv., ' Now seeing you know God, or rather are 
 known of God, how turn you again to impotent and 
 beggarly rudiments ?' To the like effect he schooloth 
 the Ephesians : chap iv., ' Ye have not so learned 
 Christ.' The nurture and discipline of this school is 
 not like the institution of gentility, with whom it is 
 usual ' to walk in the vanity of their minds, and in 
 dark cogitations ; to be strangers from the life of God 
 through the ignorance that is in them, and being past 
 feeling, to give over themselves unto wantonness, to 
 work all uncleanness, even with greediness. But if 
 ye have heard Christ, and if ye have been taught by 
 him, as the truth is in Jesus ;' not corrupting the test 
 ■with cursed glosses, nor perverting the Scriptures to 
 
 * De vera cultu. Omnis ductriua [iliilosophorum siue 
 capite, &c. 
 
 your own overthrow ; then with your new learning you 
 must leave your old conversation, as the eagle casteth 
 her bill ; and know that ' the kingdom of God cometh 
 not by observation,' but by practice ; nor that practice 
 is available with ease, but ' with violence,' and that 
 the hottest and most laborious spLi'it is fittest to catch 
 it away : 2 Pet. ii. 21, 'It had been better for us 
 never to have known the way of righteousness, than 
 after we have known it, to turn from the holy com- 
 mandment given unto us.' For whereas the end is 
 the perfection of every thing, ' the end of the relapsed 
 Christians is worse than their beginning.' There is 
 scinitiii coutristdiis, a sorrowful and woeful knowledge, 
 as Bernard gathered out of the first of Ecclosiastes,* 
 ' He that iucreaseth knowledge, increaseth sorrow.' 
 It is truest in this sense, when we are able and willing 
 to say with the Pharisee, ' Are we also blind ?' and 
 yet with our eyes open we run into destruction. 
 The time shall come, ' when many shall say' (that you 
 may know it is the case of a multitude to be swallowed 
 into this gulf), ' Lord, we have heard thee in our 
 streets,' &c., and yet their knowledge of Christ shall 
 not gain his knowledge of them, but as strangers and 
 reprobates they shall be sent from him. Our know- 
 ledge shall then be weighed to the smallest grain ; but 
 if our holiness of life, put in the other plate of the 
 balance, be found too light and unanswerable unto it, 
 our sorrows shall make it up. Therefore, unless we be 
 still sick of Adam's disease, that we had rather eat of 
 the tree of knowledge than the tree of life, let us be 
 careful of knowledge, not only to sobriety, but with 
 profit also, that the fruit of a good life, bringing eternity 
 of days to come, may wait upon it. Blessed are those 
 souls wherein the tree of sincere knowledge is rooted, 
 and the worm of security or contempt hath not eaten 
 up the fruit ; the Lord shall water them with the dew 
 of heaven in this life, and translate them hereafter, 
 as glorious and renowned plants into his heavenly 
 garden. 
 
 * Bern. Serm. xxxvi. in Cantic. 
 
 LECTURE XII. 
 
 Tlun uri-c the men exccedinghj afraid, and said unto him. Why hast thou done this ? (Jor the men knew that he had 
 jied from the presence of the Lord, because lie had told them.) — JoN.iH I. 10. 
 
 BECAUSE the confession in the ninth verse is not 
 so absolute as to answer all the questions which 
 were propounded, therefore the supply and perfection 
 thereof must be brought from this tenth ; wherein we 
 understand that the whole order and sum of his dis- 
 obedience was related, albeit not described at large ; 
 that being a prophet, and sent with a message to 
 Nineveh, he fled from the presence of the Lord, that 
 is, cast his commandments behind his back. 
 
 The connection, then, betwixt these two verses is 
 this, ' I am an Hebrew,' of the happiest people and 
 
 country under heaven ; I am not ignorant of true 
 religion, for ' I fear the Lord,' &c. — all which is by 
 way of preface, for amplification's sake, the more to 
 extend the fault mentioned, in the words following — 
 yet am I ' fled from the presence of the Lord ;' I 
 have taken a froward and unadvised course to frus- 
 trate his business. With this addition you may shape 
 an answer directly to every question. 1. What is thino 
 office : Shunning the face of God, running from his 
 presence, contempt of his voice. 2. What is thine 
 occupation ? Not manuary and illiberal, not fraudu- 
 
KIKG ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 lent and deceitful, but a calling immediate from God ; 
 I staud iu bis sigbt as the angels of heaven do, to 
 hear my charge ; and when he giveth me an errand, 
 my office is to perform it. 3. Wliencc earnest tliou 1 
 From the presence of the Lord, from whose lips I re- 
 ceived my late commission. 4. What is thy country? 
 I am an Hebrew. 5. Of what people- The most 
 scient and skilful in the service of God. Thus have 
 you his whole confession. Now, he beginneth to be 
 wise, and with a prudent simplicity more worth than 
 a thou.sand tergiversations, inf/eiiiosa iimplicitas millc 
 tciyiversdtioiiibus cautioy, to return unto him, by con- 
 fessing his fault, from whom he was fled by dis- 
 obedience ; to recover his lost justice, by accusing 
 himself; to cast forth the impostumated matter of a 
 dissembling conscience, which being concealed had 
 been present death ; to honour the righteous Lord, 
 whom he had grossly dishonoured ; and by opening 
 his lips into an humble confession, to shut the mouth 
 of hell, which began to open upon him. ' My son,' 
 saith Joshua to Achaii, chap. vii. 19, 'I beseech 
 thee, give glory to the Lord God of Israel, and make 
 confession unto him; and shew me now what thou 
 hast done ; hide it not from me.' It is a part of the 
 glory of God (o shame ourselves ; I mean, to confess 
 our sins (which in modesty and shamefaceduess we 
 strive to keep close), not only unto God, 'against 
 whom only we have sinned,' and to whom only it 
 appertaineth to say, I have pardoned, I will not 
 destroy, but unto men also, either to the magistrate, 
 who hath authority to examine; either to the minister, 
 who hath power to bind and lose; either to our bre- 
 thren generally, that the common rule of charity, one 
 in supporting the other's infirmities, may be kept in 
 practice. And it is, on the other side, an injury to 
 God not to justify his judgments, nor to acknowledge 
 the conquest of his truth, when it hath prevailed, but 
 in a sullen and melancholy passion to strangle it 
 within our bones, and never to yield the victory 
 thereunto, till, as the sun from out the clouds, so 
 truth hath made her a way by main force from out 
 our dissimulations. The first degree of felicity is, 
 not to ofl'end ; the second, to know and acknowledge 
 offences.* And as men dream in their sleep, but tell 
 their dreams waking, so howsoever we may sin by 
 carelessness, yet it is an argument of health and 
 recovery to confess our sins.f For what shall wo 
 gain by dissembling them ? Wounds, the closer they 
 are kept, the greater torture they bring;:]: and sins 
 not confessed will bring condemnation upon us with- 
 out confession. § 
 
 AYhat followcth ? When Jonas had confessed his 
 fault, 
 
 * Cyprian. 
 
 t Somniuin narrare, vigilantis est ; et vitia coufiteri, snni- 
 tatis incticium. — Scnec. 
 
 X Vulncra claiisa \Aus cniciant. — Gregor. 
 
 \ Si non coiifeasus fates, inconfessus damnaberis. — A ugmt. 
 
 1. They knew it, for his own mouth hath con- 
 demned him. They had a presumptuous knowledge 
 before, by the eviction of the lots, but now they are 
 out of doubt by his own declaration. So the test 
 speaketh, ' The men knew that he had fled from the 
 presence of the Lord, because he had told them.' 
 
 2. Their knowledge wrought a fear in them : ' Then 
 were the men exceedingly afraid.' 
 
 3. Their fear brake forth either into an increpation, 
 or a wonder at the least : ' They said. Why hast thou 
 done this ? ' 
 
 Their knowledge was consequent (of force) to his 
 confession ; they could not but be privy thereunto, 
 because he poured not his speech into the air, but 
 into their ears, that thty might apprehend it. But 
 this knowledge of theirs was not a curious and idle 
 knowledge, such as those men have who know only to 
 know,* but a pragmatical knowledge, full of labour 
 and business ; it went from their cars to their hearts, 
 and made as gi'eat a tempest in their consciences as 
 the wind in the seas ; it mingled and confounded all 
 their cogitations ; it kindled a fear within them that 
 sundered their souls and spirits. Aud though their 
 fear before was vehement enough in the 5th verse, 
 when neither their tongues were at rest for crying, nor 
 their wares had peace from being cast out, yet this was 
 a fear beyond that, as may appear by the epithet, 
 tiiniientnt thnore nuirpio, ' they were exceedingly 
 afraid.' 
 
 Now why they feared I cannot so well explicate ; it 
 may be in regard they bare to the person of Jonah, 
 knowing what he was, not knowing how to release 
 him. They understand him to be an holy man, and 
 of an holy nation, therefore were they brought into 
 straits ; they have not heart to deliver him, they have 
 not means to conceal him ; he is great that flieth, he 
 is greater that seekcth after him.f That is Jerome's 
 conjecture upon their fear. It may be in regard of 
 their sins. For if a prophet of God, and a righteous 
 soul (to theirs), were so persecuted, they would not for 
 their own parts but fear a much sorer judgment. ' For 
 if judgment begin at the house of God, what shall be 
 the end of them which obey not the gospel of God ? 
 and if the righteous shall scarce be saved, where shall 
 the ungodly aud sinner appear ? ' 1 Peter iv. The 
 apostle makcth the comparison, but it is as sensible 
 and easy to the eye of nature to sec so uuich, as the 
 highway is ready to the passenger. God speaketh to 
 the heathen nations with a zealous and disdainful con- 
 tention betwixt them and his people : Jcr. xxv. 29, 
 ' Lo, I begin to plague the city wherein my name was 
 called upon, and shall j'ou go free ?' It may be the 
 majesty of God's name did astonish them, and bruise 
 thorn as a maul of iron, having been used but to puppets 
 
 * Qniilain sciro Vdlunt ut sciant. — Bern. 
 
 t Iiiti'ltif;niit sanctum et sanctaj mentis virum. Non 
 audont trailero, ciclare non possunt. Magnus est qui fugit, 
 sed major qui qua;rit. 
 
.Vek. lO.J 
 
 LECTUHE XII. 
 
 and scarcrows, grandes jnrptc, before, in comparison. 
 They were not acquainted with gods of that nature 
 and power till this time ; they never had dreamed 
 that there was" a Lord whose name was Jehovah, 
 whose throne was the heaven of heavens, and the sea 
 his floor to walk in, and the earth his footstool to 
 tread upon, who hath a chair in the conscience, and 
 sittoth in the heart of man, possessing his secret reins, 
 dividing betwixt his skin and his flesh, and shaking 
 his inmost powers, as the thunder shaketh the wilder- 
 ness of Kadesh. It is a testimony to that which I 
 say, that when the ark was brought into the camp of 
 Israel, 1 Sam. iv., and the people gave a shout, the 
 Philistines were afraid of it, and said, ' God is come 
 into the host. Therefore they cried, Woe, woo unto us ! 
 for it hath not been so heretofore. Woe be unto us ! 
 who shall deliver us out of the hands of these mighty 
 Gods ■? these are the Gods which smote the Eg^-ptians 
 with all the plagues in the wilderness.' Wherein it is a 
 wonderfiil thing to consider, that the sight of the 
 tempest drinking up their substance before their eyes, 
 and opening as it were a throat to swallow their lives 
 up, did not so much astonish them as to hear but the 
 majesty of God delivered by relation. Alas ! what 
 did they hoar to that which he is indeed '? It was 
 the least part of his ways to hear of his creation of 
 heaven, and the sea, and the dry land ; he is infinite, 
 and incomprehensible besides ; all that thou seest not, 
 that, in some sort, God is.* 
 
 And it is not a thing to be omitted, that the speech 
 of the prophet made a deeper penetration and entrance 
 into them, than if a number besides, not having the 
 tongue of the learned, had spent their words. For 
 consider the ease. The winds were murmuring about 
 their ears, the waters roaring, the soul of their ship 
 sobbing, their commodities floating, the hope of their 
 lives hanging upon a small twine ; yet though their 
 fear were great, it was not so great as when a prophet 
 preached and declared unto them the almightiness of 
 the sacred Godhead. They have not only words, but 
 swords, even two-edged swords, in their mouths, whom 
 God hath armed to his service ; they are able to cut 
 an heart as hard as adamant ; they rest not in the 
 joints of the body, nor in the marrow of the bones, 
 but pierce the verj- soul and the spirit, and part the 
 very thoughts and intentions of the heart, that are 
 most secret. ' The weapons of their warfare wherewith 
 they fight are not carnal, but mighty through God to 
 cast down holds and munitions, and destroying ima- 
 ginations, disceptations, reasonings, and every sub- 
 limity that is exalted against the knowledge of God, 
 and captivating every thought to the obedience of 
 Christ,' 2 Cor. x. So there is neither munition for 
 strength, nor disputation for subtilty, nor height for 
 superiority, nor thought in the mind for secrecy, that 
 can hold their estate against the armour of God's 
 
 * Qiiiil est Deus ? totum hoc ipod viilcs, et totum lioc 
 quod non vicles. — Senec. 
 
 prophets. Have they not chains in their tongues for 
 the kings of the earth ? and fetters of iron for their 
 nobles ? Did not Pharaoh often entreat Moses and 
 Aaron to pray to the Lord fur him ? Did not the 
 charm of Elias so sink into the ears of Aliab, that 
 ' he rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his tlesh, 
 fasted, and laj' in sackcloth, and went softly ? ' Did 
 not John Baptist so hew the ears of the Jews with 
 the axe of God's judgments, that they asked him, as 
 the physician of their diseased souls, by several com- 
 panies, and in their several callings, Luke iii., tho 
 people, though as brutish for the most part as the 
 beasts of the field, 'What shall we do then '?' the 
 publicans, though the hatred of the world, and public 
 notorious sinners, puhliccun puhlici pcccaloictt, ' And 
 what shall we do '? ' the soldiers, though they had the 
 law in their swords' points, ' And what shall we do ?' 
 Hath not Peter preached at Jerusalem to an audience 
 of every nation under heaven (of what number j'ou 
 may guess in part, when those that were gained to the 
 church were not fewer than three thousand souls), and 
 was not the point of his sword so deeply impressed 
 into them, that they were ' pricked in their hearts,' 
 Acts ii., and asked (as John Baptist's auditors before), 
 Viiifratrcs, quid faciemus ? ' Men and brethren, wdiat 
 shall we do ? ' It is not a word alone, the vehemency 
 and sound whereof cometh from the loins and sides, 
 that is able to do this ; but a puissant and powerful 
 word, strengthened with the arm of God ; a word with 
 authority, as they witnessed of Christ ; a word with 
 evidence and demonstration of the Spirit, smiting upon 
 the conscience more than the hammers of tho smith 
 upon his stithy ; a word that drave a fear into Herod's 
 heart (for he feared John Baptist both alive and dead), 
 that beat the breath of Ananias and Sapphira from out 
 their bodies, struck Elymas the sorcerer into a blind- 
 ness, and sent an extraordinary terror into the hearts 
 of these mariners. So, then, the reason of their fear, 
 as I suppose, was a narration of the majesty of God, 
 so much the more increased because it was handled 
 bj' the tongue of a prophet, who hath a special grace 
 to quicken and enliven his speech, whose soul was a 
 ' well of understanding,' and every sentence that 
 sprung from thence as a quick stream to beat them 
 down. 
 
 And that this was the reason of their fear, I rather 
 persuade myself, because it is said for the further 
 confirmation of this judgment, that ' the iiuii feared, 
 and the men knew that he fled from the presence of 
 the Lord,' who in the whole course of the Scripture 
 unto this place were not termed by the name of men, 
 but luiiriiicrs. For when is a better time for man to 
 be laid forth in the colours of his infirmity and frailty, 
 than when God hath been declared in the brightness 
 of his glory ? Whether it be riii or Immines, the sex or 
 the generation, men as they are distinguished from 
 women, or men as they are distinguished from other 
 oreatures, we need not curiously inquire. The ori- 
 
80 
 
 KING ON JO^TAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 ginal word lictli to both. The former of these two 
 names, whereby the male kind is notified, Lactantius 
 thus deduceth : Mr itaqne nomiiialus est, Quad major 
 in eo vis est, quciin in ficmiiin ; ct Iriitc rirtiis nviiieii 
 accepit. The man is called rir in the Latin, because 
 there is greater strength in him than in the woman ; 
 and here hence virtue or viiiUtij took the name. 
 AYhereas the woman, on the other side, by Varro's 
 interpretation, is called inidicr, ijuasi iiioUior, d moUliie, 
 of niceness and tenderness, one letter being changed, 
 another taken away. But what is the stoutest courage 
 of man, mascnla i-irtus, the manliest prowess upon the 
 earth, when it hath girded up her loins with strength, 
 and decked itself with greatest glory, where the forti- 
 tude of God is set against it ? How is it possible that 
 pitchers should not break and fall asunder, being 
 fashioned of clay, if ever they come to encounter the 
 brass of his unspeakable majesty ? ' The hon hath 
 roared,' saith the prophet, Amos iii., 'shall not the 
 beasts of the forest be afraid '? ' The Lord hath 
 thundered in the height, the fame of his wonderful 
 works hath sounded abroad, shall not man hide him- 
 self ? If the latter name be meant b\' the word, the 
 whole kind and generation, including male and female 
 both, then is the glory oF man much more stained, 
 and his aspiring att'ections brought down to the dust 
 of the earth. For as the same Laetautius deriveth 
 it, homo ininciqKitus est, quod sit /actus ex humo ; he 
 is therefore called man with the Latins, because the 
 ground under his feet was his foundation. According 
 to the sentence of the psalm, ' He knoweth whereof 
 we be made, he remembereth that we are but dust.' 
 The Scriptures, acquainted with the pride and haughti- 
 ness of mankind, hang even talents of lead at the heels 
 thereof, to hold it down, lest it should climb into the 
 sides of the north, and set a throne by the most high 
 God. lu the eighth Psalm (which is a circular psalm, 
 ending as it did begin, ' Lord our God, how excel- 
 lent is thy name in all the world ! ' that whitherso- 
 ever we turn our eyes, upwards or downwards, we 
 may see ourselves beset with his glory round about), 
 how doth the prophet abase and discountenance the 
 nature and whole race of man ; as may appear by his 
 disdainful and derogatory interrogation, ' What is man, 
 that thou art mindful of him ; and the son of man, 
 that thou regardcst him ? ' In the ninth Psalm, ' Rise, 
 Lord ; let not man have the upper hand ; let the 
 nations be judged in thy sight. Put them in fear, 
 Lord ; that the heathen may know themselves to bo 
 hut men.' Further, in the tenth P.salm, ' Thou 
 judgest the fatherless and the poor, that the mau of 
 the earth do no more violence.' 
 
 The Psalms, as they go in order, so, mcthiuks, they 
 grow in strength, and each hath a weightier force to 
 throw down our presumption: 1, we are 'men,' and 
 ' the sons of men,' to shew our descent and propaga- 
 tion ; 2-, ' men in our own knowledge,' to shew that 
 conscience and experience of infirmity doth convict 
 
 us ; 3, 'men of the earth,' to shew our original matter 
 whereof we arc framci3. In the 22d Psalm, he addeth 
 more disgrace ; for either in his own name, regarding 
 the misery and contempt wherein he was held, or in 
 the person of Christ, whose figure he was, as if it 
 were a robbery for him to take upon him the nature of 
 man, he falleth to a lower style. At e//o sum vermis, 
 et noil rir, 'But I am a worm, and no man.' For as 
 corruption is the father of all flesh, so are the worms 
 his brethren and sisters ; according to the old verse, j 
 
 First man, next worms,* then stench and loathsomeness, 
 
 Thus man to no man alters by changes. 
 
 Abraham, the father of the faithful. Gen. xviii., sifteth 
 himself into the coarsest bran that can be, and re- 
 solveth his nature into the elements whereof it first 
 rose : ' Behold, I have begun to speak to my Lord, 
 being dust and ashes.' And if any of the children of 
 Abraham, who succeed him in the faith, or anj- of 
 the children of Adam, who succeed him in the flesh, 
 thinketh otherwise, let him kuow that there is a three- 
 fold cord twisted by the finger of God, that shall tie 
 him to his first original, though he contend till his 
 heart break. ' earth, earth, earth, hear the word of 
 the Lord,' Jer. xxii. ; that is, earth by creation, earth by 
 continuance, earth by resolution. Thou camest earth, 
 thou remainest earth, and to earlh thou must return. 
 Thus they are rightly matched (I mean not for equality, 
 but for opposition) ; the eternity of God, and the 
 mutability of man ; the terror of God, and the tearful- 
 ness of man ; the name of God, and the name of man ; 
 having at no other time so just an occasion to remem- 
 ber himself to be but man, as when the honour of the 
 Most High is laid before him. The warning serveth 
 for us all to consider what we are both by name and 
 nature ; unable to resist God. For ' who will set the 
 briers and the thorns in contention against him ? ' 
 Who ever hardened himself against the Lord, and hath 
 prospered? Bernard, in his books of consideration to 
 Eugenius, adviseth him to consider no less. Away 
 with thy mantles and coverings, pull otl' thy apron of 
 fig-leaves, wipe out the parget of thy flitting honours, 
 and take a naked view of thy naked self ;t how naked 
 thou camest from thy mother's womb. Which was iu 
 efl'ect that which Simonides sang to Pausanias, and a 
 page every morning to Philip of Macedou, Mi.akjjTw 
 allvgoiTo; uv, remember that thou art a man ; for in 
 remembering this, thou rememberest all wretchedness. 
 And theij said unto liiin, ]\'lii/ Imst thou done this? 
 Jerome thinketh it no increpation, but a simple inter- 
 rogation, lujn inerrjiaut sed internu/ani, &c., of men 
 desirous to know why a servant would attempt to run 
 from his Lord, a man from God. What i.s the mys- 
 tery of this dealing ? what sense hast thou to forsake 
 thine own country and seek foreign nations? Others 
 take it to be rather an admiration than an interrogation, 
 
 * Post liominom vermis, &c. — Pelr. de solo. 
 t ToUo [Jerizomata, &c ; ct nudum nudd cousideres, &c, 
 lib. 2. 
 
Ver. 10.] 
 
 LECTURE XII. 
 
 81 
 
 adiiiirantis oratio inar/is qiiinii inti'nvf/aiiti>:, that such 
 a man as Jonah, knowing that God is omnipotent, 
 all eye to behoki him, all foot to follow him, all 
 Land to smite him in all places, should oflcr notwith- 
 standing to fly from his presence. Others are out of 
 doubt that it is a reproof and reprehension. Why 
 hast thou transgressed, and not obeyed the voice of 
 the Lord whom thou acknowledgest ? A recompense 
 worthy of his disobedience, that as he ploughed con- 
 tumacy, and sowed rebellion, so he might reap shame. 
 As if God had set the mark of Cain upon him, the 
 mark of a fugitive and a vagabond, and written his 
 fault in his brows, that the basest persons of the 
 earth might control him, why hast thou done this ? 
 Thus justice proclaimeth from above. Art thou not 
 subject to God ? Thou shalt be subject to men. Dost 
 thou contemn the Lord? Servants shall contemn thee, 
 their eyes shall observe thy ways, and their tongues 
 shall walk though thy actions ; children in the street 
 shall cry after thee. There, there ; passengers shall 
 wag their head, and say, Fy upon thee, fy upon thee, 
 e/ clecl II ma till fit's ; and thou shalt be made the by- word 
 of as many as meet thee. 
 
 Reprehension of men for their offences committed 
 is of two sorts. The former hath no other end but to 
 reprehend, to fasten a tooth upon oveiy occasion that 
 is ofl'ered; born of the cursed seed of Ham, delighting 
 in nothing so much as to uncover the nakedness of 
 fathers, brethren, all soi'ts, or rather born of the devil 
 himself, whose name is diiihohis, an accuser, because 
 ' he accuseth the brethren day and night.' He that 
 reproveth in this sort, and he that approvcth and fos- 
 tereth such reproofs, the one hath the devil in his 
 tongue, the other in his ears. Augustine and Bernard 
 fit them with their proper names, that such are not 
 correctors, but traitors, willing to lay open the ofiences 
 of other men ; not reprovers, but gnawers, because 
 they had rather bite than amend aught amiss.* There 
 is no mercy nor compassion in this kind of repre- 
 henders. If the flax smoke, they will quench it ; if 
 the reed be bruised, they will break it quite ; if a soul 
 be falling, they will thrust at it, and if it be fallen, 
 they will tread upon it. The mercy and kindness of 
 their lips, is as if asps should vomit, That which 
 perisheth, let it perish. Istic tliesaurus stullis est in 
 Ii)if/iia sitiis,\ this is all the treasure and goodness that 
 they bear in their tongues ; contumelies, slanders, 
 defamations, opprobrious detractions, uucourtcous 
 upbraidings, supercilious, insolent, uncharitable accu- 
 sations, rather to vent their malice, which would burst 
 their hearts within them, than to reform the defects 
 of their brethren. Such an one was Philocles, who 
 had to name, choler and brine, bilis ct salsiii/o ; and 
 Diogenes, called the dog and the trumpet of reproaches, 
 canis el tuba convitiorum ; Carpilius Pictor, who put 
 
 •"- Non corrector aed traditor. — Aui;. de ver. Dom. in Mat. 
 viii. Nun correptorcs sed corropores. — Bcr. rpist. 78. 
 t Plautus. 
 
 forth a libel termed the scourge of Virgil's works, 
 Fliu/dlum .Thieidos; Herennius, who collected together 
 his faults, Faustinus his thefts. The epigram doth 
 well beseem them, which Cornelius Agrippa wrote of 
 himself (I think not seriously purposing to undertake 
 it), ' Momus, amongst the gods, carpeth all things ;* 
 amongst the worthies, Hercules plagueth all monsters ; 
 amongst the devils of hell, Pluto is angry with all the 
 ghosts ; amongst philosophers, Democritus laugheth at 
 all ; Heraclitus contrariwise weepeth for all ; Pyrrhus 
 is ignorant of all ; Aristotle thinketh he knoweth all, 
 and Diogenes contemneth all. Agrippa in this book 
 spareth not any; he contemneth, knoweth, knoweth 
 not, bewaileth, laugheth at, is oft'ended with, pursueth, 
 carpeth all things, himself a philosopher, a devil, a 
 worthy, a god, and all things.' The best is, we may 
 answer all such uncharitable reprehenders as St 
 Augustine answered Petilian, who had accused him to 
 be a Manichee, speaking from the conscience and infor- 
 mation of other men : I say (saith Augustinef), I am 
 no Manichee, speaking of mine own knowledge, elii/itu 
 cui crcdiitis, choose whether of the two ye will believe. 
 He addeth afterwards, I am a man appertaining to the 
 floor of Christ; if evil, then am I chaff; if good, good 
 corn ; Petilian's tongue is not the fan of this floor ; J 
 the more he accuseth my fault (do it with what mind 
 he will), the more I commend my physician that hath 
 healed it. 
 
 There is another kind of reprehension, thathandleth 
 the sores of other men as if they were their own, 
 with Christian and apostolic compassion (such as we 
 read of, ' Who is weak and I burn not?'), bringing 
 pity in their eyes and hearts when they chance to 
 behold their infirmities. It is a duty that we owe in 
 community, one to have feeling and care of another's 
 ofi'ences. Ilabanus noteth upon the 18th of Matthew, 
 that it is as gi'eat an offence not to reprove our broLher 
 falling into trespass, as not to forgive him, when he 
 asketh forgiveness ; for he that said unto thee. If thy 
 brother trespass against thee, forgive him, said before, 
 If he trespass against thee, reprove him. We know, 
 saith Bernard, that the same punishment abideth both 
 the committers of sin, and consenters unto it ;§ there- 
 fore let no man smoothe sins, let no man dissemble 
 oll'ences, let no man say of his brother. What ! am I 
 his keeper ? The words of the wise are called ' goads 
 and nails.' Gregory, in his homilies upon the Gospels, 
 giveth this reason, for that they neglect not the faults 
 of transgressors, but prick them, Quia culjuu ddia- 
 quentium nesciniit calcaie sed pungere. All which 
 agreeth with that wise and wary distinction, which 
 Bernard maketh in the handling of offences. There 
 
 * Inter divos miUos non carpit Momus, &o. 
 
 t Lib. iii. de bapt. cont. Donat. cap. x. 
 
 X Non est liiijus arese veutilabrum lingua Petiliani, 
 cap. 12. 
 
 § Scimus quia similis psena facioiites manet et consen- 
 tientes. — Ser. in natatal. Jo. Baiil. 
 
82 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 must be the oil of admonition, and the wine of com- 
 punction ; the oil of meekness, and the wine of zeal 
 and earnestness : olcuiii monitorum, vinum compiiiic- 
 tionis ; oleum mansuetiuUnis, vinum zeli.^ And with 
 the apostle's rule, ' Brethren, if a man be preoc- 
 cupate with a fault' (that is, first taken and snared, 
 when yourselves are not), ' j-on that are spiritual, 
 instruct him in the spirit of gentleness, considering 
 thyself, lest thou also be tempted,' Gal. vi. 1 ; the 
 very insinuation he doth use were enough to persuade 
 them, 1, because we are all brethren ; 2, there is no 
 difference between them and us, but in time ; they 
 may prevent us ofiending, but we shall follow them ; 
 3, iaecause iiesh and blood is haughty and insolent, 
 therefore the apostle maketh choice of the persons 
 exhorted : ' you that are spiritual,' that have been 
 softened with the unction of the Spirit of God ; 4, the 
 medicine is set down, which we must apply: ' instruct 
 him,' shew him the nature and measure of his fault, 
 and how to amend it ; 5, the ingredients of the 
 receipt are prescribed : instruct him with ' the spirit 
 of meekness ; ' G, we are bound thereunto by equality 
 of condition, ' considering thyself ; ' 7, it is worth the 
 noting, that where he spake before to a multilude, 
 v/^£h, now, by a kind of solecism, he maketh it the 
 case of each man apart; considering tJnjscIf, lest titou 
 also be tempted. Such a construction made a holy 
 father of the fall of his brother, for he wept bitterly, 
 using these words, illc hodie, et er/o cras,\ he hath 
 fallen this day, and I not unlikely to fall to-morrow. 
 Thus much of the kind of reprehension occasioned by 
 the person of the mariners their speech to Jonah. 
 
 Now touching the person of Jonahhimsolf, what a dis- 
 credit was it unto him, that barbarous men should re- 
 prove an Hebrew ; idolaters, one that feared God ; 
 those that worshipped the host of heaven, and crea- 
 tures both in the sea and in the land, a man that 
 ascribed the creation of all these to the true, sub- 
 stantial God ; infidels, a child of Abraham ; bond- 
 men and strangers, one that was born in the free 
 woman's house ! But this is a part of the judgments 
 of God, the mean time, to clothe us with our shame 
 as with a garment, when we commit such follies, as 
 the barbarous themselves are ashamed of. For what 
 greater confusion before men, than that an infidel 
 should say to an Israelite, a Turk or a Moor to a 
 Christian, a babe to an aged man, an idiotj to a pro- 
 phet, the ignorant to him that should instruct him, 
 ' Why hast thou done this ?' That which our Saviour 
 spake of the centurion in the Gospel, is much to the 
 praise of the captain, and no less to the shame of Is- 
 rael, 'I have not found so great faith, no not in Israel, 
 OJ5j h r^fi Iff^aj^A. And what meant he in the lOth 
 of Luke, by the parable of the man wounded betwixt 
 Jericho and Jerusalem, but, under the person of a Sama- 
 
 * Ser. 44 in Cantio. 
 
 t Bern, de rcRurroct. Dom. serm. 2. 
 
 j Tlisit i.-<, IV private person, or layman. — Ed. 
 
 ritan, to condemn a priest and a Levite, men of more 
 knowledge than the other had ? Yet, though they 
 served and lived at the altar, they had not an ofl'er- 
 ing of mercy to bestow upon the poor man, when 
 there was nothing but mercy found in the Samari- 
 tan. Why are the dogs mentioned at the gates of the 
 rich man, Luke svi., but that, for licking the sores of 
 Lazarus, and giving an alms in then- kind, they are 
 made to condemn the unmerciful bowels of their 
 master, who extended no compassion ? Om- Saviour 
 wondereth in the 17th of the same Evangelist, that, 
 when ten lepers were cleansed, one only returned to 
 give him thanks, and he was a stranger ; so he had 
 but the tithe, and that from a person of whom he 
 least expected it. Balaam was reproved by his ass, 
 Numb, xxii., as the rich man before by his dogs ; and 
 as he proceeded in fi'owardness, so the ass proceeded 
 in reprehensions : (1) she went aside ; (2) dashed 
 his foot ; (3) lay down with him ; (4) opened her 
 mouth, and asked him, why he had smitten her ? 
 Israel, in the first of Isaiah, a reasonable and royal 
 people, is more ignorant of their Lord, than the ox of 
 his owner, the ass of his master's crib. The com- 
 plaint is afterwards renewed again, Jer. viii., though 
 the terms somewhat varied, ' Even the stork in the 
 air knoweth her appointed time ; and the tm'tle, and 
 the crane, and the swallow observe the season of their 
 coming ; but my people know not the judgment of 
 the Lord.' The confession of St Augustine, uuless 
 we be shameless and senseless, cannot be denied of 
 our unpi'oficient da3's. The unlearned arise and catch 
 heaven,* and we with om' learning, behold, we wallow 
 in flesh and blood. We are made to judge the 
 angels, but angels and men, infidels, barbarians, pub- 
 licans, harlots, nay, beasts and stones, shall be our 
 judges, because when we ask in our daily prayers that 
 the will of God may be done in earth as it is in hea- 
 ven,' we are so far off' from matching that proportion, 
 that there is not the poorest creature in the air, in 
 the earth, in the deep, but in their kinds and genera- 
 tions go beyond us. Of beasts and unreasonable 
 creatures, Bernard giveth a sage admonition. Let the 
 reasonable soul know, that though it hath the beasts 
 her companions in enjoying the fruits of the earth, 
 they shall not accompany her in sufi'ering the tor- 
 ments of hell, therefore her end shall be worse than 
 her first beginning, because wherein she matched them 
 before, she now conieth behind thcni.f To this pur- 
 pose, with some little inversion of the words, he bringcth 
 the sentence which Christ pronounced of Judas, ' It 
 had been good for that man if he had never been 
 born.' Not if he had not been born at all, but 
 if he had not been born a man, but either a beast or 
 some meaner creature, wliich, because they have not 
 judgment, come not to judgment, and therefore not to 
 
 * Snrgimt indocti et rapiunt cceluni, &c , Confess, viii. 
 t Ser. XXXV. in Canlic. — Quando quae prills bestiis ccqua- 
 batur, nunc et postponitur. 
 
Vek. 11. 1 
 
 LECTURE XIII. 
 
 83 
 
 punishment. Noit utiqnesinatus nonfuissct oi)ininu,sed 
 si natus non ftiisset Iwmo, sed aut j>ecus, &c. But 
 amongst reasonable souls there must be a difference 
 kept. As the ground is more or less manured, so it 
 must yield in fruit accordingly, ' some an hundred, 
 some thirty, some sixty fold.' Fiyc talents must gain 
 other fiye, two must return two, and one shall satisfy 
 ■^N-ith a less proportion. A child may think, and do, 
 and speak as befittethachild ; a man must think, and do, 
 and speak as beeometh a man ; an Hebrew must liye as 
 an Hebrew, not as an Eg}-ptian ; a prophet as a pro- 
 phet, not as an husbandman ; a believer as a believer, 
 not as an infidel ; a professor of the gospel of Christ, as a 
 professor, not as an atheist, epicure, libertine, anabap- 
 tist, papist, or any the like, either hell-hound or 
 
 heretic, lest we fall and be bruised to pieces at that 
 fearful sentence, ' The first shall be last,' that whom 
 we went before in knowledge and other gi-acos, those 
 we are brought behind in the hope of our recompense. 
 It shall little avail us at the retribution of just men 
 to plead with our judge, as it is exemplified unto us 
 in the 7th of Matthew, ' Lord, Lord, have we not pro- 
 phesied by thy name '?' unless we have prophesied to 
 ourselves, and hved like prophets ; or that, ' by thy 
 name we have cast out devils ' out of others, if we 
 have kept and retained devils within our own breasts ; 
 or that ' we have eaten and drunken in thy presence, 
 and thou hast taught in our streets,' when neither 
 the example of his life, nor the doctrine of his hps, 
 hath any way amended us. 
 
 LECTURE XIII. 
 
 Then said thcij unto him, What shall we do unlo thee, that the sea matj he calm unto us (for the sea wrowjht, 
 
 and was troublous) / — Jonah I. 11. 
 
 YOU have before heard, first the conviction of 
 Jonah by lot, which was in effect by the oracle 
 and answer of God himself. Therewith they are not 
 content, but they will, secondly, know his fault, ' What 
 ' hast thou done ?' and his trade, ' What is thine occu- 
 pation ?' &c. Wherein I observed their justice and 
 uprightness in judicial proceeding against him, claris 
 sapientict, frequens interrocjatio. They have, thirdly, 
 con/ilentem ream, the confession of his own lips 
 against himself, so as there needed no more to do ; as 
 David spake to the young man that brought news of 
 the death of Saul, Os tuum contra te lotjinitum. est, 
 ' thine own mouth hath sjioken against thee ;' and the 
 rulers of the Son of God, ' AVhat need we any more 'wit- 
 nesses, for we have heard it of his own mouth.' They 
 arc not yet satisfied, but, fourthly, insteadj of resolu- 
 tion, they are exceedingly afraid, they punish . and 
 afflict themselves more than they punish Jonah, and 
 instead of execution they begin to expostulate with 
 him, ' Why hast thou done this ?' and though they 
 have not time to breathe almost, yet they find a time 
 to hear a long narration and tale of all his disobedience. 
 Is there yet an end ? No ; but, fifthly, in a matter 
 already judged, they go to deliberate, nay, against the 
 order and course of all justice, he that is judged must 
 judge, and tlie transgressor determine what shall be 
 done unto him. Put it to a murderer, a thief, or any 
 the like malefactor, when the fact is notorious, con- 
 victed, and confessed, to make choice for himself, 
 Wliat shall we do unto thee ? what were he likely to 
 answer, but to this effect, Let me live ? 
 
 I have a further conjecture of their meaning at this 
 time. For Jonah presented unto them a double per- 
 son : a sinner, a fugitive servant, a rebel against the 
 Lord, but withal a prophet, one that is seen and 
 skilled in the counsels of the Almighty. They 
 
 know themselves ignorant and barbarous men ; for 
 howsoever they might be otherwise learned in the 
 wisdom of Egypt and other Gentile knowledge, yet 
 they wanted that knowledge whereof the prophet 
 speaketh, • they shall all be taught of God,' and they 
 plainly perceived by that unaccustomed narration that 
 Jonah delivered, of a most sovereign and dreadful 
 Lord, that there was some more excellent way which 
 they were not acquainted with. Upon the persuasion 
 hereof, they refer themselves to the wisdom and in- 
 tegrity of Jonah, much like as the captains of the 
 host dealt with Jeremiah, chap, xlii., ' The Lord be 
 a witness of truth and faithfulness betwixt us, if we 
 do not accordingly to all things, for which the Lord thy 
 God shall send thee unto us ; whether it be good or 
 evil, we will obey thy voice.' 
 
 What shall we do unto thee ? Exposuisti causam 
 morhi, indica sanitatis,'* thou hast shewed the cause 
 of the malady, shew the means to cure it. What 
 shall we do unto thee ? Shall we kill thee ? Thou 
 fearest God. Shall we save thee ? Thou fliest from 
 God. Interfieiemus? C'nltor Dei es. Servalimus ' Deum 
 fuc/is.f Shall we set thee to land again ? Shall we 
 make supplications ? Shall wo offer sacrifice ? We 
 appoint thee our leader and guide in the whole dis- 
 position of this business. And surely it is an ad- 
 mirable moderation of mind in a people so immode- 
 rate, whom neither their country could soften, because 
 they were barbarous, and the seas could not choose but 
 harden, because they were mariners, and the immi- 
 nent danger had reason to indurate and congeal more 
 than both these ; yet notwithstanding in an action so 
 perplex, and howsoever it fall out likely to prove 
 perillous, they like to do nothing with tumult, with 
 popular confusion, with raging and heady affections, 
 * Hieron. t I<i- 
 
84 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [ClIAP. I. 
 
 swelling in choler and boiling in rancour against the 
 author of their miseries, but they will know from the 
 mouth of the prophet, what the mind and pleasure of 
 the Lord is. In ancient times God gave his answer 
 for decision of doubts and difficulties after diverse 
 manners. He answered JIoscs face to face, others by 
 angels, some by lots, some by Urim and Thummim, 
 others by visions and dreams, and the event of their 
 matters "hath been happy and prosperous, where the 
 mouth of the Lord was hearkened unto. What was the 
 reason that they erred so much in receiving the 
 Gibeonites to mercy. Josh, ix., pretending a ' far 
 country, old bottles, old bread, old garments, old 
 shoes,' but because they accepted their talc concern- 
 ing their victuals, and counselled not with the mouth 
 of the Lord ? In the prophecy of Isaiah, chap, xxx., 
 God pronounceth a peremptory woo against his rebel- 
 lious, stubborn children, ' that take counsel, but not 
 at him ; and seek the protection and defence, but not 
 of his Spirit ; and make haste to go into Egypt to 
 strengthen themselves with the strength of Pharaoh, 
 but have not asked at his mouth." It is noted of the 
 religion of the Turks, that it is a false but a well 
 ordered religion, /n?.vrt sed ordinatd Tiircarum rcUfiin, 
 &e. A professor of then- law proclaimeth, before they 
 attempt any thing, that nothing be done against reli- 
 gion. All the lawgivers of the nations, famous in 
 their lives and generations, bare their people in hand, 
 that they received their instructions from some 
 godhead. Numa in Kome alleged conference with 
 Egeria, Solon in Athens with Minerva, Lycurgus in 
 Lacediemon with Apollo, Minos in Crete with Jupiter, 
 Charondas in Carthage with Saturn, Osiris in Egypt 
 with Mercury, Zamolxis in Scythia with Vesta. Their 
 wisdom and policy therein was this, that they knew 
 their people would sooner yield to the voice of God 
 than man. Moses in truth and verity received tables 
 of ordinances upon the mount, written with the finger 
 of God, and he presumed thereupon that all the 
 people about them would think, ' Surely this is a gi'cat 
 nation,' &c. We are taught here hence, that in our 
 weightiest affairs, either of war or peace, religion or 
 poUcy, whether we take to mercy, as Joshua did, or 
 enter league with foreigners, as the Jews with the 
 Egj'ptians, either of hfe or death, as is specified in 
 that question touching Jonah, we decree nothing 
 without the mouth of the Lord, or at the least with- 
 out the mouths that speak from that mouth, such as 
 Moses had, ' I will be with thy mouth,' and the dis- 
 ciples of Christ, ' It is not you that speak, but the 
 Spirit of my Father within you ;' these must inform 
 us, by the lantern and light of his holy word, what 
 way is best to be followed. It is a testimony without 
 any exception to be made unto it, and a confident assur- 
 ance to our souls, when we are able to say. Ad liyem ct 
 tCHliintminm ivinnis, Wo went to the law and testimony 
 of almighty God, and these we chose to conduct us. 
 There is yet a further matter to be considered, 
 
 which both the order of things precedent, and the cir- 
 cumstances of the text now in hand, move me to ob- 
 serve ; for there are distinct persons here named. 
 Fu'st, the person of Jonah, ' What shall we do unto 
 thee ?' Secondly, of the mariners, ' That the sea 
 maybe calm unto us.' Thu'dly, of the sea, ' For the 
 sea went, and was troublous.' 1, Jonah is guilty; 
 2, the mariners are in jeopardy ; 3, the sea is angry : 
 and both the anger of the sea, and their o^^ti instant 
 dangers, are mighty and impulsive arguments to in- 
 cense them against Jonah. A proverb thej- have in 
 friendship, that the thigh is nearer to a man than his 
 knee ; no man dearer to any man than himself, or, 
 at the most, piXia lao^rii, friendship is no more than 
 an equahty, and if a friend be alter idem, a second 
 self, it is as much as in reason he can look for. We 
 are not bound, either by the law of nature written in the 
 heart, or by the law of God written in tables, to love 
 another more than om-selves. Bernard maketh a note 
 upon the order of om- Saviour's words to the women 
 of Jerusalem, ' Weep not for me, but for yourselves and 
 for your children.' 1, For yourselves ; 2, for 3"our 
 children. And though in friendship they set a law of 
 community, cran-a fiKuv y.oiva, all things must be 
 parted amongst friends, yet to depart fi-om the life is 
 no common thing : Rom. v., ' A man will scarcely die 
 for the righteous, but for a good man,' and one that 
 is profitable, ^dya. Tii -/.a! ro\iJ,S. a.'ZoOaviTv. See how 
 warily the apostle treadeth in this sentence, ' perad- 
 venture some man dareth die.' So it may be, when it 
 is not ; and he dareth, though he will not do it ; and but 
 some one perhaps amongst a thousand. Life to a 
 natural man, who thinketh he liveth but whilst he 
 liveth, is sweet upon any conditions, as may appear 
 in the example of the Gibeonites before produced, who 
 did that they did for fear of their lives. And though 
 they were cursed for their wily dealing, and none of 
 them ever afterwards freed fi-om being a bondman, 
 but made hewers of wood and drawers of water, for 
 the congi-egation of the Lord for ever, yet they were 
 content to escape with their hvcs, and to endure 
 anything, so the people might not slay them : ' Be- 
 hold, we arc now in thine hands, do as it seemeth 
 good in thine eycis to do unto us.' So true it is, 
 which Lactantius* TOtcth of this transitory life, that 
 although it be full of vexations, yet is it desired and 
 wished for, of all men, old and young, kings and 
 mean persons, wise and foolish desire it alike. Ho 
 addeth the sentence of Anaxagoras, Tanti cat contcm- 
 platio cteli ac hieis ipsius, iil ijiiciscuiujiie )>nserias Ubcat 
 smtincrc ; the very beholding of heaveu, and the 
 light itself, is so much worth, that wo are content to 
 endure any wretchedness for it. Now these mari- 
 ners, having an eve to their private estates, to pacify 
 the anger of God, and quiet the sea for their own 
 delivery, standing u])on the loss and miscamage, not 
 now of their substance, which was already gone, and 
 * De falsii sapiL'u. 12. 
 
Ver. n.] 
 
 LECTURE XIII. 
 
 might in time be supplied, but of tboir lives, wbich 
 never could be ransomed, I maiTel that they make 
 delays, and take not tbe speediest way for tbe ridding 
 of Jonab, and safeguarding of their endangered lives. 
 There is no more required of man but this, to do 
 good to men, if it may be, to many ; if not, to few ; 
 if not, to those that are nearest him ; if not, to him- 
 self ; * and therefore, the saving of Jonah being 
 plainly despaired of, methinketh the care of their own 
 welfare should presently and eagerly have been intended. 
 The other argument to spur them forwards, was 
 the impatience of the sea : ' the sea wi-ougbt,' nay, 
 ' the sea went, and was tempestuous,' an excellent 
 phrase of speech. The sea urnt, it had a charge for 
 Jonah, as Jonah had for Nineveh ; for as God said to 
 the one, . ' Ai'iso, go to Nineveh,' so to the other, 
 ' Ai'ise, go after Jonah.' Doth the sea sit still (as 
 Ehas sat under the juniper tree, and cried, It is 
 enough !), or settle her waters upon her slime and 
 gravel, and not fulfil the commandment of him that 
 made it ? No ; but as a giant refreshed with wine, 
 so it reneweth and redoubleth her wonted force, feeleth 
 not the labour imposed, but doth the work of the 
 Lord with all possible diligence. The Lord saith, 
 ' Go, and it goeth,' and it goeth with a witness ; as 
 Jehu marched, of whom the watchman gave warning, 
 he marcheth like a madman, so doth the sea go 
 furiously, with an unquiet, hasty, turbulent spirit, full 
 of impatience and zeal, till God have avenged himself 
 against his disobedient servant. Thus all the crea- 
 tures in the world have ai'ms and legs, as it were, and 
 all the members of living things, and a spirit of life 
 in some sort to quicken them, and activity to use 
 them, and courage with wisdom to direct them aright 
 and convert them to the overthi-ow of those, that with 
 contemptuous security depart from God's ways. Do 
 we then think that the "will of God can ever be frus- 
 trated ? ' The Lord of hosts hath sworn, Sm'ely as I 
 have purposed, so shall it come to pass ; and as I 
 have consulted, so shall it stand,' Isa. xiv. 24. ' Who 
 can make straight that which he hath made crooked?' 
 Eccles. vii. 13. ' There is no wisdom, no under- 
 standing, no counsel against the Lord,' Prov. sxi. 30. 
 He hath determined ; who shall disannul it ? His 
 hand is stretched out, and who shall turn it away ? 
 See an experiment hereof. AVhilst the mariners were 
 knitting and devising a chain of delaj's, adding protrac- 
 tion to protraction, wherewith to spend the time, desirous 
 either to save or to reprieve the guiUy person, and 
 with a number of shifts labouring to evade that counsel 
 which God had enacted, how vain and unprofitable are 
 all their consultations ! If all the senates and sessions 
 in the world had joined their wisdom together, to ac- 
 quit the ofl'ender, it had been as bootless as to have 
 run their heads against a wall of brass to cast it 
 
 * Hoc nempe ab liomine exigitur. ut pmsit liomibus, si 
 fieri potest, multis ; si minus, panels ; si minus, proximis ; 
 si uiiuus, sibi.' — Senec. de vita leata. 
 
 down. Unless they can see and corrupt the heavens 
 with all that therein is, the earth with all that 
 therein is, the sea with all that therein is, to keep 
 silence, to wink at the faults of men and to favour 
 theii' devices, it cannot be. For whilst these men 
 are in counsel and conference, the sea is in action ; 
 they are backward to punish, the sea goeth forward 
 with his service, they lose time, and the sea will ad- 
 mit no dilation ; and to teach them more wit and 
 obedience, the sea is in arms against the mariners 
 themselves, and persecuteth them, as consenters and 
 abetters to the sin, because the Lord had elected them 
 ministers of his judgments, and they neglect their 
 office. The will of God must either be done by us, 
 or upon us, md a nobis aiit dc nobis ; as it befell Jeru- 
 salem, ' How often would I, &c., thou wouldst not !' 
 Because it was not done by Jerusalem, it was done 
 upon Jerusalem. Thej' would have said afterwards 
 in Jerusalem, when the blessings wore all gone, and 
 whole rivers of tears could not have regained them, 
 ' Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.' 
 And therefore I conclude with Bernard : * Woe to all 
 crossing and thwarting wills, gaining nothing but 
 punishment for their gainsaying. What is so miser- 
 able as ever to intend that which never shall be, and 
 ever to be against that which shall never but be ? 
 They shall never attain what they would, and ever- 
 more sustain what they would not. 
 
 And take this for a further warning out of this 
 phrase, ' the sea went, and was troublous,' whereby 
 is declared the travel and pains it took to take ven- 
 geance ; that when the anger of the Lord is once 
 thoroughly fired, all the waters in the south cannot 
 quench it. It lieth haply in a smother and smoke a 
 long time before it breaketh out. But when it is once 
 ascended, and hath gotten height, incandescit eundo, 
 it increaseth by going, and gathereth more strength. 
 ' It burneth to the bottom of hell, before it giveth 
 over, consuming the earth with her increase, and set- 
 ting on fire the foundations of the mountains.' It 
 followeth in the same scripture, ' I lift up miue hind 
 to heaven, and saj', I live for ever' (a solemn and 
 venerable protestation) ; ' If I whet my glittering 
 sword, and my hand take hold on vengeance, I wiU 
 execute my judgment upon mine enemies, and reward 
 them that hate me. Mine arrows shall be drunk with 
 their blood, and my sword shall eat tboir flesh,' 
 Dent, xsxii. There is a time, I perceive, when his 
 sword is dull, and rusteth in the scabbard of his long- 
 suficrance, and his hands are so fraught with mercy, 
 that judgment is laid aside, and hath not room to be 
 spanned in them. But if ho once whet his glittering 
 sword, and his hand take hold of judgment, then will 
 he do it. The justice of God goeth slowly and orderly, 
 
 * Va3 oppositis vohnitatibus, &c. Quid tarn pcenalo quam 
 semper vollo quoil nunquam erit, ot semper nolle quod nun- 
 quam non erit ? In seternura nou obtiuebit quod vult, et quod 
 non vult in a;teruum sustiuebit. 
 
KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. L 
 
 'S^oX^ xai To^ii, but for the most part it recompeuseth 
 the slackness of judgment with the heaviness thereof, 
 tarditatem mipplicii r/ravitale cornpcnxat. It is long 
 before he cometh ; but when he cometh, he cometh in- 
 deed, he cometh in the clouds, he cometh in a chariot 
 of whirlwind, swifter than the flight of an eagle ; he 
 cometh to begin and to make an end ; he cometh not 
 to give a second wound, for he will fasten the first so 
 sure, that there shall be no need of a latter punish- 
 ment. There never lived um-ighteous man upon the 
 f\ice of the whole earth that had a sin in his breast, 
 but he had vengeance attending at his back, waiting 
 perhaps by leisure, and following with woollen feet, 
 but smiting with an arm of iron, when the sin was 
 lipe. It was not enough for God to bring Jonah into 
 neproach with strangers, and to make him subject to 
 the check of uncircumcised lips, wondering and hoot- 
 ing at him, as at a bii'd of diverse colours, but his 
 justice yet crieth. Give, give, and will not be satisfied 
 with the morsel before thrown, but Jonah himself must 
 also be cast out. The Lord would never have said in 
 the book of Lcvilicus, that the land should spew out 
 her inhabitants, but that the wicked are as it were the 
 oppression of nature, the surchai-ge and sm-feit of the 
 stomach, without the avoidance of whom she shall never 
 be eased. I come now to the purpose of my speech. 
 
 I'he danger was imminent, and called upon the 
 mariners. Yield Jonah, or yield yourselves ; the sea 
 importunate, and would not be answered. Two irre- 
 fragable arguments : the one fighting against the 
 nature and being of man, with whom it is no easy 
 thing to forego his interest of life, before he needs 
 must ; the other expressing the justice above to be 
 inexorable, unless it be satisfied. They have these 
 arguments before their eyes, they ponder and pemse 
 them in their hearts ; yet, behold their compassion, 
 their tender regard to the Ufe of man ; they arc not 
 so hasty as the sea, but put it to his conscience, 
 ' What shall we do with thee ?' It standeth not with 
 nature and humanity to make thee away. Their 
 commendation briefly is, that the life of a stranger 
 to them all, a stranger of that land which was most 
 hateful unto them, the life of an open and convicted 
 malefactor, the only matter of their woe, is so precious 
 unto them. Surely man was made unto man, as Moses 
 was to Aaron, in some sense, a god (for succour and 
 comfort), according to the ancient exiled proverb. 
 Homo honiini Bern, man mito man is, or should be, a 
 god. It is now varied, Homo howiiii h/pun, man unto 
 man is a wolf. The first that was created after Adam 
 (which was the woman), was given him for his helper, 
 because the life and welfare of man cannot consist with- 
 out association ; but the next that ever was boi-n by natural 
 and kindly generation, botli of father and mother, be- 
 came a destroyer. St Augustine* rcportetli of that sen- 
 tence in the comedy, Homo sxm, humaiii vihil d wc 
 alienum pulo, I am a man, I think no part of humanity 
 * Epist. 62. 
 
 impertinent imto me, that the whole theatre being full of 
 idiots, and vulgar persons, gave applause unto it, it 
 did so naturally touch the affections of them all.* 
 When Vedius Pollio, a Eoman, at a supper provided 
 for Augustus the emperor, would have thrown his 
 servant into his fish-pond, where he kept his lampreys, 
 because he had broken a cup of crystal, the emperor 
 withheld, and controlled him with the words, a man 
 of what condition soever he be, Homo ciijuscniique con- 
 ditionis, if for no other cause, yet because he is a man, 
 is more to be valued than all the cups and fish-pools 
 in the world. How is mankind become so degenerate 
 and wild, in that which natm-e shaped it unto ! How 
 is our gold become so dim, our blood so stained ! For 
 now we may rightly complain, with that noble and 
 virtuous Frenchman,! whom double honom- waiteth 
 upon. What is more rare amongst men, than to find 
 a man ! that is, as he interpretcth it, amongst men, 
 how many beasts are there for want of using reason, 
 and for not using it well, how many devils ! Lions 
 fight not against hons, serpents bite not serpents, j but 
 soothly the most mischief that man sustaineth, 
 cometh from man. Thou are deceived, saith Seneca, 
 if thou givest credit to the looks ol those that meet thee ; 
 they have the faces of men, the minds of wild beasts. 
 Surely we have justified the madness of the most 
 savage and untractable beasts, and steeled our allec- 
 tions with more cruelt}' and barbarity, than ever lions 
 and serpents could learn in the wilderness. And 
 therefore I blame not David, who, having his choice of 
 plagues presented unto him, made a present exception 
 to his own nature and land, ' Let me not fall into the 
 hands of man,' 1 Chron. xxi. 13. Barbarous and un- 
 civil Christendom, if we maj* say, in comparison of 
 these barbarous men (many whole regions and tracts 
 thereof, but singular persons in her best composed 
 parts without number), whoso hearts ai-e so bound and 
 confirmed with sinews of ii'on, that they are no more 
 moved with the life of a man, than if a dog had fallen 
 before them. Why should they think that the life of 
 another, as fearful made as ever their own was, as 
 dearly redeemed, as tenderly cherished by the provi- 
 dence of God, as scrviceably framed for church or 
 commonwealth, as carefully nursed in the mother's 
 womb, and by father and mother as painfully brought 
 up and maint;uncd manj- years together, now to be 
 spilt and ruinated in a minute of time ; why should 
 they think that it beareth not as high a price, both 
 with God and man, as their own lives ? Yet, such is 
 the nature of some, so fallen from their kind, as if 
 rocks had fathered them, and they had sucked the 
 dragons in the desert, rather than the daughters of 
 men ; their delight is in nothing so much as in the 
 slaughter of their brethren, and the style of that ancient 
 murderer, whose chiklren the}* shew themselves to be, 
 is ever in their mouths, Uic, scca, occidc, burn, cut, 
 
 * Ita omnium .iffecUim naturnliter attigit. 
 
 t riiil. Morn. de. ver. clir. relig. ncip. xvi. % Pliny. 
 
Ver. 11.] 
 
 LECTXJEE XIII. 
 
 87 
 
 kill, poison, crucify, take uo pity ; strangers, known 
 persons, old, young, men, women, bretlu-en, sisters, 
 whosoever doth but cross them with a mistalcen word, 
 or wry countenance, non in compendium, seil occidcndi 
 causa occidunt,'^ they will murder upon every occasion, 
 and though they gain not by their death, yet they will 
 kiU, because they take pleasure in killing ; whereas 
 the care and charge, I say not of Christian, but of 
 civil and well uatured people should be, parce civiu)n 
 saiiffuini, spare the blood of citizens, or rather spare 
 the blood of men, because they are all kinsmen and 
 brethren in the flesh. I am amazed to think how 
 ■wanton and luxm-ious we are in destroying the life one 
 of another, not content alone to wish the death of an 
 enemy, as they cried in the psalm, ' When shall he 
 die, and his name perish ?' But we will be actors 
 with our own hands, and approvers with our own ej'es 
 and hearts, deserving thereby a more blood-red com- 
 mendation, than he in the history, f his parricida, con- 
 silio priiii, itcrum spectaculo, twice a murderer, first in 
 counselling, afterwards in beholding the fact ; for we 
 are thrice murderers, first for invention and device, 
 afterwards for act, lastly for taking pleasure either 
 to view or to record the same. ]\Iurder with the 
 favourablest terms (unless . it be ijlentifuUy washed 
 away ■« ith a flood of tears, from a bleeding and broken 
 heart, and dyed into another colour, by the blood of 
 Christ) is likely to have ruth; enough. There is not 
 a drop of blood spilt upon the earth, from the days of 
 righteous Abel to this present hour, but swelling as 
 big as the ocean sea in the eyes of God ; and neither 
 heat of the sun, nor drought of the ground, shall ever 
 drink it up, till it be revenged. But murder with 
 pride, delight, triumph, with afleetation of glory there- 
 by, as if it were manhood and credit to have been in 
 the field and slain a man, to make it an occupation as 
 some do, when they have once committed it, to be so 
 far from remorse, that they are the readier to commit 
 it again, till bloodtoucheth blood. Woe worth it ; it 
 is the unnaturalest nature under the heavens ; I would 
 term it by a name, if there were any to express it. 
 Caligula, the Roman emperor, whom, for his filthy and 
 sanguinarj- conditions, I may term as they termed his 
 predecessor, lutum sanr/uinc maccnitum, dirt socken 
 with blood, wished that the people of Rome had all 
 but one neck, that at one blow he might cut them off. 
 Who would ever imagine, that a man of one heart 
 should so much multiply his cruelties by conceit 
 against a multitude ? Seneca writeth, that Messala, pro- 
 consul of Asia, beheaded three hundred in one day, and 
 when he had made an end of his tyranny, as if he had 
 done some noble exploit, walked with his arms behind 
 him, and cried. Oh ro3'al act! Lucius Sylla, at one 
 proscription having slain four thousand seven hundred 
 men, caused it be entered of record, ne memovia tain 
 praclara. rei dilueretur, lest the memory of so honour- 
 
 * Senec. ii de clem. f Valer. Max. lib. ix. cap. xi. 
 
 X Qu. ' wrath' ?— Ed. 
 
 able a thing should bo worn away. Valerius, setting 
 down the rest of his truculent murders, confesseth 
 against himself, I am scarcely persuaded that I write 
 probably. He killed a gentlemen of Rome without 
 stiiTing of his foot, for not enduring the sight of one 
 murdered before his face, novus punitor misericordicc ; 
 never was it seen before, that pity itself should be pun- 
 ished, and that it should be held as capital an ofi'ence to 
 behold a murder with grief, as if himself had done it. 
 Notwithstanding, saith he, the envy of Marius did 
 mitigate the cruelties of Sylla, whose name shall be 
 sti-iked with the blackest coal of infamy in all the 
 ages of the world, when they shaU but hear that an 
 innocent citizen di'ank a draught of burning coals, 
 to escape his tyrannous tortures. Sabellicus thinketh 
 that the factious cities of Italy, in his and his fore- 
 fathers' days, were stored with more pregnant examples 
 of cruelty than all these. When the princes of the 
 factions idling into the hands of their enemies, some 
 were bm'nt alive, their children killed in their cradles, 
 the mothers with child their bellies ripped up, them- 
 selves and their fruit both destroyed, some thrown 
 down headlong, some had their garbish pulled out, 
 their hearts, to their further disgrace, hung up and 
 beaten with stripes. You may easily guess (saith he) 
 what butchery there was, when hanging and beheading 
 were accounted clemency. Endless are the histories 
 which report the crvielties that have been committed 
 by man upon man. But of all that ever I read or 
 heard, the most incredible to mine ears, are those 
 that were practised by the Spanish nation upon the 
 West Indians ; of whom it is thought, thej' have slain 
 at times more millions of men than all the countries 
 of the east are able to furnish again. You may judge 
 of the lion by his claws. In one of their islands, called 
 Hispaniolii, of twenty huncbed thousands, when the 
 people stood untouched, the author* did not think, at the 
 penning of his history, that there were an hundred and 
 fifty souls left. He had reason to exclaim as he did, 
 quot. Nerones, quot Domitiani, qnot Commodi, quot 
 Bassiani, quot immites Di/onisii eas terras peragravere ? 
 Oh how many Neroes, how many Domitians, with other 
 the like egregious, infamous t^Tants, have haiTOwed 
 those countries ! Justus Lipsiusf- jnstifieth the com- 
 plaint, that no age in the world could match some 
 examples by him alleged, but only our ovm, howbeit 
 in another world. A few Spanish (saith he), about 
 four score years since, sailing into those west and new 
 found lands, good God ! what murders and slaughters 
 committed they I I reason not of the causes or right 
 of their war, but only of the events. I see that huge 
 space of ground, which to have seen (I say not to 
 have vanquished) had been a gi'eat matter, overrun by 
 twenty or thirty soldiers, and those naked flocks every 
 where laid along, as corn by a sickle. AVhat is be- 
 
 * Benzo in his India story. 
 
 t Lib. ii. de constant, ca. xxii. The marginal note is, 
 Indonim strarjes, imo excidiiim. 
 
88 
 
 KING ON JONAF. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 come of thee, Cuba, the greatest of islands ? of thee, 
 Hajti ? of you, the Yucatans ? which sometimes stored 
 and environed with five or six hundred thousands of 
 men, have scarcely retained fifteen in some places, 
 to raise up issue again ? Stand forth, thou region of 
 Peru, a little show thyself, and thou of Mexico. Oh 
 wonderful and lamentable face of things ! That nn- 
 measurablc tract, and in truth another world, is wasted 
 and worn awaj', as if it had perished \>y fire from 
 heaven. One of their kings in the province of Yucatan 
 spake to Montegius the lieutenant-governor, after this 
 manner :* I remember, when I was young, we had a 
 plague or mortality amongst us, so sore and unac- 
 customed, that infinite numbers of worms issued out 
 of our bodies. Moreover, we had two battles with 
 the inhabitants of Mexico, wherein were slain an hun- 
 dred and fifty thousand men. But these things are 
 tiifles, in comparison of those intolerable examples of 
 cruelty and oppression which thou and thy company 
 have used amongst us. They had named themselves 
 for credit and authority the sons of God ; but when 
 the people saw their ^ile behaviour, they gave this 
 judgment upon them : Qiitilis, iiialiiiii, Deux iste est, 
 qui tarn iiiipiiro.i ex se Jilios et sccleralos //eniiit .' Si 
 pater jilioiinii siiiiilis, iiiiiiiiiie profecio bonum esse 
 oportet. What kind of God, with a mischief, is this, 
 that hath begotten such impure and wicked sons ? If 
 the father be like the children, there can be no goodness 
 in him. Extremities of tp'anny practised in such 
 measure, that nothing could be added thereunto by the 
 wit of man, wTung out great liberty and audacitj' of 
 speech fi-om them. For when Didacus the deputy 
 told the cacique of Veragua, that, if he brought not 
 in gold enough, he would cast his flesh to the dogs, 
 the infidel made him this answer, I marvel how the 
 eaiih can foster and sustain such savage beasts. In- 
 deed, their impotent outrages were such, as the 
 WTetched souls would sooner die than endure them. 
 Therefore they choso rather to starve, and drown, 
 and hang themselves, if they wanted halters, by the 
 hairs of the head, and one to swing the other ujjon a 
 tree, till their breath were expelled ; they cut and 
 mangled theu' own flesh, for want of knives, with sharp 
 flint stones ; the women with child destroyed their babes 
 in theii- wombs, because they would not bear slaves 
 to the Spaniards ; many times they would fire their 
 houses, and kill their children, using this persuasion 
 uuto themselves, tliat it wore better to die once, than 
 miserably to spend their days under tyrants. The 
 carrying of their .silly vassals by companies, huked 
 and fettered together, like herds of beasts, from the 
 continent land wherein thcj- dwelt, to the mines in 
 the islands, together with branding a letter of slavery 
 in theii- arms and faces, are not cruelties but mercies 
 in them, for thus long they lived, though they dearly 
 bought their lives. They had not their fill of blood, 
 unless they slew them iu sport, to exorcise their arms, 
 * Buiizo. 
 
 and to tiy wagers, and threw their carcases to their 
 dogs ; unless they put them to th-aw their carriages 
 from place to place ; and if they failed by the way 
 (which, how could they hinder, except their strength 
 had been as the strength of stones), pulled out their 
 eyes, cut off their noses, strake of their heads ; unless 
 they lodged them like brute beasts under the plauks 
 of their ships, where all the filth and ordure was be- 
 stowed, till their flesh rotted from their backs. The 
 poor Nigi-ite their slave, after his toil the whole day 
 undergone, instead of his meal at night, if he came 
 short in any parcel of his task enjoined, they stripped 
 of all his clothing, bound him hand and foot, tied him 
 cross to a post, beat him with wke and whip cord, till 
 his body distilled with gore blood ; they pom-ed either 
 molten pitch or scalding oil into his sores to supple 
 them, washed him with pepper and salt, and so left 
 him upon a board till he might recover himself again ; 
 this, they said, was their law of Layonne. If tigers 
 should make laws, could they exceed these men in 
 savageucss ? I now wonder the less of the people of 
 Caribaua, and others thereabout, being accustomed ta 
 eat the flesh of man, would notwithstanding refrain 
 the flesh of a Spaniard, when they had caught one, 
 fearing lest such pestilent nutriment would breed some 
 contagion within them. If I do them injury by re- 
 petition of their furiousness against the life of man, 
 let them blame the history, not me. I was very weU 
 content to note thus much unto you, under the war- 
 rant and protection of mine author, both the matter of 
 mj- text leading me to a commendation of humanity, 
 even towards a stranger (the praise whereof these are 
 as far from, as a she-bear robbed of her whelps), and 
 because they are the men, whom some of our nation 
 have desired to be lords and rulers over them. But 
 if ever they make trial of their temperate government, 
 they will find the least finger of their hands heavier 
 unto them than another's loins, whom they would cast 
 ofl'; and how r.uch happier it had been for them still 
 to have felt the sweetness of the olive or fig-tree, under 
 which they have sitten and shadowed themselves, 
 than that the prickles of a brier should have torn them. 
 For, lest they should err in their ground of such a 
 change, the cause of religi(ui pretended is the least 
 thing regarded by them ; and that, these barbarous 
 people right well perceived, having bought their know- 
 ledge with a long and lasting experience, of many their 
 houses, cities, countries, sacked, ransacked, turned 
 upside down, and the dust of all their ground most 
 narrowly sifted and searched ; that a wedge of gold 
 was Deus Chiislianuniw, the God of the Christians; 
 and this they would hold aloft, and make proclamation 
 amongst themselves, 7','« Deus Christiaiioruin, behold 
 the God of the Christians ; propter hoc c Ccistella in 
 terri(s nostras reiu're, for this they came from Castile 
 into our land (not to convert infidels), for this thcj' spoil 
 us, and are at war within thomelves ; this is the cause 
 of their dicing, cursing, blaspheming, ravishing one the 
 
Ver. 12.] 
 
 LECTURE XIV. 
 
 89 
 
 other's wives, and committing all kind of abominations. 
 Insomuch, that a king of Nicaragua asked lienzo him- 
 himself, the penner of this story, Chrktiiine, quid ciiim 
 sunt ChristidiH / Christian, what are Christians ? 
 And thus he^answered himself bj' defining them : They 
 desii-e spice, honej-, silk, a Spanish cape, an Indian 
 ■woman to lie with, gold and silver they seek for ; 
 Christians will not work, they are scotlbrs, dicers, 
 blasphemers, slanderers, fighters, and finally to con- 
 clude, oi/nies iiiali sunt, they are all naught. Thus 
 was the honour of God, the name of Christianity, by 
 then- lewd behaviour, derided, defamed, reproached, by 
 those that were without, infidels and paj-nims. I say 
 no more for determining this unsavoury discourse 
 touching that uncivil, imgentle nation ; but happy are 
 we, if other men's harms can make us beware, if, 
 when we have seen the firing of their houses, bj- these 
 incendiaries and robbers, we look carefully to our own, 
 and make our fortunate examples of their unfortunate 
 and unrecoverable subversions. 
 
 When some smart (saith Cyprian),* all are ad- 
 monished, and God in his providence hath taken an 
 easy course, by the terror of a few, to deliver a multi- 
 tude from the like mischief. 
 
 What shall we do unto thee ■ The time is near at 
 hand when inquisition must be made for blood. You 
 that are magistrates, and sit in the seat of God, let 
 not your eyes or hearts pity that man that hath spilt 
 blood. Quanta nan nasci melius fuit, ijuam numerari 
 inter jiuhlico walv nalus .'f How much better were it 
 not to be born, than to be born to do hurt ! We can- 
 not jirevent the birth of such, but it is not amiss to 
 hinder and shorten their life, that they work not more 
 mischief ; if j-ou bear once, you must bear perhaps a 
 second time. God hath pronounced against mount 
 Seir long since, Ezek. sxsv., ' I wiU prepare thee lo 
 blood, and blood shall pursue thee;' unless thou do 
 hate blood, blood shall pursue thee ; and although 
 mount Seir be long since desolated, yet the judgment 
 
 * Magna providentiae compendia. — De simj. cleric. 
 t Seneca. 
 
 of that righteous judge shall stand like mount Sion, 
 and never be altered. They that commit and they 
 that conceal mm-der, * they that love to shed blood 
 and they that hate it not, principals, accessaries, 
 abettors, favourers, patrons of bloodshed, they are all 
 in fearful case. I'ou will say, I am cruel myself, and 
 forget to apply my text, whilst I speak against 
 cruelty. Nothing less. I would not that justice should 
 thrust mercy out of place ; but mercy and pity f 
 ditier as much as religion and superstition : the one 
 honoureth, the other dishonoureth God ; the one is 
 an ornament to man, the other reproacheth him. Be 
 compassionate to the life of man, and spare it as dis- 
 cretion shall require, but rather be compassionate to 
 the life of the commonwealth ; for be ye assured that 
 the punishment of bloodshed is, not to shed but to save 
 more blood. Melius est ut peicat unus quam uuitas 
 it is better that one should die by law, than numbers 
 without law. The dog that hveth in the shambles hath 
 commonly a bloody mouth, and he that hath been 
 fleshed upon the blood of man will not easily leave it. 
 I leave the answer of Jonah to the nest place. Let 
 us beseech our merciful God, the preserver of man, 
 as Job calleth him, that he would vouchsafe to pre- 
 serve unto us this vu-tue of humanity, without which 
 we are not men, putting softness and tenderness in 
 them that are cruel, justice into those that must 
 bridle the rage of cruelty, kindness and compassion 
 into us all, that whatsoever we are to deal in with 
 any sort of men, we may carefully cast beforehand, 
 as these mariners did, what we should do unto them, 
 setting Iheir rule of friendship and brotherhood before om- 
 eycs, not to do wronger violence in oppressing the slate 
 or life, either of brethren or strangers, but to measure 
 unto them all such duties of nature and charity as we 
 wish should be measured again to our own souls. 
 
 * Qui uon vetat pcccatuin, &c. Tot occiJimiis quot ad 
 mortem ire quotidie tcpidi ct tacentes Yidemus.— Gret;. siqjer 
 Ezcch. 
 
 t Clementia et misciicordia.— &n. Misericoidia ct 
 miseiatio. — Lij^s, 
 
 LECTUEE XIV. 
 
 And he said unto them, Take nte, and east nie into the sea ; so shill ihe si'a be calm unto ijou: for I Iniuir that Jor 
 
 nitj sake, &c. — Jonah I. 1"2. 
 
 THE order I kept in the verse going before was 
 this : three persons were proposed unto you, 1, 
 the person of Jonah, standing upon his delivery ; 2, 
 the person of the mariners, being in jeopardy : 8, the 
 person of the sea, continuing troublesome and unquiet 
 unto them ; the two latter whereof, the furiousness of 
 the waters, and their own peril, were mighty argu- 
 ments to incense them against Jonah. In this verse 
 he auswcreth their whole demand : 1, touching my- 
 self, you ask, what you shall do unto me '? ' Take me. 
 
 cast me into the sea ;' by this means, 2, ' the sea shall 
 be quieted ;' 3, ' towards you,' against whom it is now 
 enraged. This for the order and coherence. Now 
 for the matter itself, it is divided into three branches : 
 1, the resolution, decree, and sentence of Jonah upon 
 himself, ' Take me, cast me into the sea ; ' 2, the 
 end, and it may be the motive, to hearten them, ' so 
 shall the sea be calm unto you ; 3, the reason, warrant 
 or justification of their fact, ' for I know that for my 
 sake,' &c. ; the verso riseth by degrees. You ask 
 
50 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 ■what you shall do with me ? ' Cast me into the sea,' 
 What is that for our safety ? Yes, ' the sea shall be 
 quiet unto you.' But how may we purchase our 
 peace with so unjustifiable au action ? Eight well, ' for 
 I know that for my sake the tempest is upon you.' 
 
 Rabbi Ezra, and some of our later expositors 
 following his opinion, think that he maketh this offer 
 unto them, upon an obstinate obfirmed mind against 
 the commandment of God, that rather than he would 
 bo held in life to go to Nineveh, to gain a foreign un- 
 circumcised nation, he would die the death. And 
 they guess, moreover, that he would never have given 
 that liberty unto them against his life, but that he 
 heard them say, unless he went to Nineveh, they 
 would cast him forth. There is not a syllable in the 
 text to justify this judgment ; for Jonah had made a 
 reverent confession of God, a singular testimony of a 
 mind recalling itself. And as for the mariners, what 
 kindness they shewed him, both before and after, the 
 letter of the Scripture plainly demonstrateth. I 
 rather take it to be a doom of most prophetical and 
 resolute magnanimity, wrestling with the terrors of 
 death, as Israel with God, and prevailing against 
 them ; as if he had said. You shall not lose an hair of 
 your heads for mine offence ; I will not add mu.rder to 
 rebellion, and the wreck of so many souls to my 
 former disobedience; ' Take mo,' not as if you feared 
 to touch me ; tulliie tnr, take me on high, take me 
 with force and validity of arms, take me with violence, 
 lift and hoise me up; when you have so done, use no 
 gentleness towards me, let me not down with ropes, 
 neither suffer me to take my choice, how or where I 
 may pitch, 'cast me' at adventures, as you threw 
 forth your wares ; and though the sea hath no 
 mercy at all, threatening both heaven and hell with 
 the billows thereof at this time, and bearing a counte- 
 nance of nothing but destruction, and it had been a 
 blessing unto me to have died on the laud in some 
 better sort, or to have gained the favour of a more 
 merciful death, yet ' cast me into the sea,' and let the 
 barbarous creature glut itself. Jonah might have 
 stood longer upon terms : I have committed a fault, 
 I am descried by the lots, I confess my misdeed, the 
 sea is in wrath, your lives in hazard, what then ? 
 will it work your peace to destroy me ? say I were 
 gone and perished, is your deliverance nearer than 
 before it was ? But without cunctation and stay, 
 possessing his soul in patience, and as quiet in the 
 midst of the sea as if he beheld it on firm ground, 
 making no difference between life and death, animated 
 with a valiant and invincible sjjirit, triumphing over 
 dread and danger, charitable towards his companions, 
 faithful and bold as a li(m within himself, and yield- 
 ing to nothing in the wcn-ld, save God alone, he 
 giveth not only leave and permission unto them. Do 
 what you will, I cannot resist a multitude, you may 
 try a conclusion by the loss of a man, but with a 
 confident intention, as willing to leave his life as ever 
 
 he was to keep it, and as ready to go from the pre- 
 sence of men as before he went from the presence of 
 God; first, heputteth them in right and possession 
 of his person, ' Take mo ; ' secomlly, he prescribeth 
 them the manner and form of handling him, ' cast me 
 into the sea ; ' thirdly, drivcth them by agreements * 
 thereunto, not of conjecture and probability, it may 
 be thus and thus ; but of certain event, ' the sea shall 
 be calm unto you ;' and of undoubted persuasion, ' I 
 know that for my sake,' &c. 
 
 It is a question not unmeet to be considered in this 
 place (which many have handled from the first age of 
 the world, not only with their tongues, but with their 
 hands, and instead of sharpness of wit, have used the 
 sharpness of knives and other bloody instruments to 
 decide it), whether a man may use violence in any 
 case against himself? I find it noted upon these 
 words, God would not let Jonah cast forth himself, 
 but would have it done by the ministry of the mari- 
 ners ; f but the odds is not gi-eat in effect, if you 
 observe what is mentioned. For Jonah setteth on 
 the mariners, and not only counselleth, but in a sort 
 compelleth them to cast him forth. Saul was not dead 
 by the wounds which he gave himself, till an Amaleliite 
 came and despatched him, 2 Sam. 1., yet was Saul 
 an homicide against his own person, and the other 
 that made an end of him /iliiis mortis, ' the child of 
 death.' Surely God hath given a commandment in 
 express terms against this horrible practice : noii 
 occides, ' thou shalt not kill ; ' jmnrrtim, quia nnn 
 addlilit, pro.rimitm tiiitm,'l especially, because he 
 added not, thy neighbour, thou mayest the rather 
 understand thyself, as in the other commandment, 
 when he forbade false witness, he said, ' Thou shalt 
 not bear false witness against thy neighbom- ; ' 
 although, if the law had spoken more fully. Thou shalt 
 not kill thy neighbour, thou hadst not been iree<l 
 therebj", '/i(o»(V)/« iciiiihim dilii/endi j)ro.riii!um a srmiU- 
 ipso dilcclor accipit, J because he that loveth taketli 
 the rule of loving his neighbour, fii-st, from himself. 
 And the conclusion holdeth good, iKin (x-cidcs, non 
 allenim, cir/o nee te ; nee eniiii qui se occidil, tdium 
 quam Iwminem occidit, thou shalt not kill no other 
 man, therefore not thyself, for he that killeth himself 
 killeth no other but a man. ' I will require your 
 blood,' saith the Lord, Gen. is., ' at the hands of 
 beasts, at the hands of man himself ; at the hands of 
 every brother will I require it.' Will he require 
 blood at the hands of beasts in whom there is no 
 understanding, and at the hands of every brother 
 (which conjunction of brotherhood is the effectual 
 cause why we should spare one the other's life) ; and 
 will he be slack to require it at thine own hands, who 
 art nearer to thyself than thy brother is? Tho. 
 
 * Qu. ' arguments ?'— Ed. 
 
 ■f Noluit Dcus ut soso projiccret, seJ id iiautarum niini- 
 sterio fieri vohiit. — IHct. 
 
 X August, i. de civ.^Dei, 20. § Ibid. 
 
Vek. 12.j 
 
 LECTURE XIV. 
 
 91 
 
 Aquinas givetb three reasons to condeaui the unlaw- 
 fulness of these bloody designmeuts : 1 , they are 
 evil in nature, because repugnant to that charity 
 ■wherewith a man should love himself; and death, we 
 all know, is an enemy iu nature, and life is a blessing 
 of God in the fifth commandment ; 2, each man is a 
 part of the communion and fellowship of mankind, 
 and therefore he doth injury to the commonwealth, 
 that taketh away a subject and member thereof; 3, 
 life is the gift of God, and to his only power subdued, 
 who hath said, 'I kill and I give life.' Therefore 
 Jerome, ■writing to Marcel of Blesillae's death, in the 
 person of God abandoneth such souls, noii nrijiio 
 tales animus, qua, me noleule, c.ricnint c corporc, I re- 
 ceive not such souls, which, against my will, have 
 gone out of their bodies ; and he calleth the philo- 
 sophers that so died, martyrcs diilta philos(ijilii<c, 
 martjTs of foolish philosophy. 
 
 There were two vile kinds of deaths, wherewith of 
 old (it seemeth) they were wont to finish their unhappy 
 days, laqaeus et prctcipitiiDii, either thej' hung them- 
 selves, or brake their necks from some steep pbice. 
 Petihan, '= an enemy to the Cathohc church, had thus 
 reproachfully spoken against the sound believers. The 
 traitor Judas died by an halter, and the halter he 
 bequeathed to such as himself was (meaning the 
 orthodox Christians). No, saith Augustine ; this be- 
 longeth not to us, for we do not honoui- those by the 
 name of martyrs who Lalter their o^wn necks. How 
 much more do we say against you, that the devil, the 
 master of that traitor, would have persuaded Christ to 
 have fallen down from the pinnacle of the temple, and 
 took repulse ! Then ■n-hat are thej' to be termed whom 
 he hath both counselled so to do, and prevailed with ? 
 Truly, what else but the enemies of Christ, the friends 
 of the devil, the disciples of the seducer, fellow-dis- 
 ciples with the traitor ? for both from one master 
 have learned voluntary deaths, the one by strangling 
 himself, the other by falling down headlong. | The 
 same father bringeth these murderers into straits, and 
 holdeth them in so closety on both sides, that there is 
 no escaping from them. AVhen thou killest thyself, 
 cither thou killest an innocent, whei"eby thou beoomest 
 guilty of innocent blood, or an ofi'ender, which is as 
 unlawful to do, because thou art neither thine own 
 judge, and thou cuttest off space of repentance. Judas, 
 w'hen he slew himself, he slew a ^^■icked man ; notwith- 
 standing, he is culpable, both for the blood of Christ 
 -and for his own blood, because, though for his wicked- 
 ness, yet ■u'as he slain by another wickedness. Licet 
 propter scelus suiim, alio scclere suo occisus est. 
 
 Some have ofl'ercd themselves unto these voluntary 
 deaths, to leave a testimony of courage and undaunted 
 
 * August, contlitcr. — Pcliliani, 1. ii c. 4'J. 
 
 t Quid enim nisi inimici Cliristi, amici diaboli, discipuli 
 seductoris, condiscipuli traditoris? spontaneas enim niortes 
 ah uno magistro utriquo didicerunt,"_ille laqueum, isti pi'a3ci- 
 jiitium. — Lib. i. de civ. Dei, cap. xvii. 
 
 resolution behind them ; of whom St Augustine speak- 
 eth, Perhaps they are to be admired for stoutness of 
 mind, but not to be commended for soundness of wis- 
 dom. ■'■ Albeit, if reason may be judge, we cannot 
 rightly call it magnanimity, for it is a far greater mind 
 which can rather endure than eschew a miserable life. 
 t^ui vltam (irumnosam ma (j is potest ferre qudm fiigere. 
 I am sure the patriarchs, the prophets, the apostles 
 never did thus ; and though they Xfere pinched in 
 their reins, and their souls heavy unto the death, as 
 Christ's was, insomuch that they cried out, ' Take my 
 life from me, my soirl chooseth to be strangled : Oh, 
 that my spirit were stifled within mj' bones,' and 
 ' Wretch that I am, w'ho shall deliver me "?' yet they 
 never jiaid their debt of nature, till their creditor called 
 upon them ; which time they would never have stayed, 
 if, in a moment of an hour, the service of their own 
 hands might justly have released them. Cleombrotus 
 Ambraciote, having read Plato his books of the immor- 
 tality of the soul, threw himself headlong from a wall, 
 and brake his neck, that he might the sooner attain 
 to immortality. He had another reason than the for- 
 mer ; it was rather_ a great than a good act, maijne 
 poll US fact wii qndiii bene. Plato would have done so 
 himself, or at least have advised it, but that in that 
 learning, w-herewith he saw the immortality of the soul, 
 he also saw such means to attain it utterly unlawful. 
 Some, to avoid a mischief to come, have fallen into 
 the greatest mischief, as virgins and honest matrons 
 in a time of war, to avoid the rapes and constuprations 
 of enemies. In two words, do they consent to that 
 filthiness, or do they not consent ? if they consent not, 
 let them live, because they are innocent. Kon iiiqtii- 
 iiatiir corpus, nisi de conseiisji mentis.f The body is 
 not defiled but when the mind agreeth. If they con- 
 sent, yet let them hve too, that they may repent it. 
 Whether is better, adultery to come, yet not certain, 
 or a certain mmxler presently wrought ? { Is it not 
 better to commit an ofl'ence, which may be healed by 
 repentance, than such a sin, wherein no place is left 
 for contrition ? Oh rather let them live, who sin, that 
 they may recover themselves ' before they go hence, 
 and be no more seen.' It is a reason euflicient to raze 
 the history of the Maccabees out of the canon of the 
 Scriptures, that the author thereof commendeth the 
 fact of Kazis, who, being beset by Nicanor round 
 about, and having no means to escape, 2 Mac. xiv., 
 ' fell on his own sword, and missing his stroke, ran to 
 a wall to break his neck ; and yet, his life being whole 
 within him, ran through the people, and gat to the top 
 of a rock, and when his blood was spent (gushing out 
 from him like a fountain), he took out his bowels with 
 both his hands and threw them upon the people, call- 
 
 * Aniiiii magiiitudino fartasse miraudi, iion .sapieutiEe 
 sanitate laudaudi sunt. — Lib. i. cap. 22. 
 
 t Aquinas 2, qua). C4, ar. 5. 
 
 t Nonne satius est incovtuin de future adullcrium, quam 
 ccrtum de prasseuti liomicidium? — L. i. de cit: Dei, cap. xxv. 
 
92 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 ing upon tlie Lord of life and spirit, that be would 
 restore them again unto Lim, and so he died.' This 
 the story commendeth for a manful and vahant act. 
 Aquinas thinketh otherwise. There are some, saith 
 he, that have killed themselves to avoid troubles and 
 vexations, iiuda ptnudia (of which number was Razis), 
 thinking they do manfully, astimantcs se forlilur arjere ; 
 which, notv.-ithstanding, is not true fortitude, but 
 rather a certain efl'eminateuess of mind, qu cdam mol- 
 Utics anhni, not able to endure their crosses. I will 
 pronounce nothing rashly. The mercy of God may 
 come inter jioiilciii ct foiilcm, as the proverb is, be- 
 tween the bridge and the brook, inter i/hidium et 
 jiii/idtiiii, between the sword and a man's throat; and 
 the last words of Razis testify his petition to the 
 Father of life and spirit, that his bovi-els might be 
 restored him. But, excepting that conclusion, what 
 difference, I jjray you, between him and Cato ? of 
 whom Seneca"' writcth at large, that the last night he 
 lived, he read Plato his books (as Cleombrotus did), 
 and taking his sword in his hand, said, ' Fortune, thou 
 hast done nothing in withstanding all my endeavours ; 
 I have not hitherto sought for mine own liberty, but 
 for the liberty of my country, neither have I dealt so 
 unmoveablj-, to live fi'ce myself, but that I might live 
 amongst free men, noii ut liher sed inter liberos ; 
 now, because the affairs of mankind are irrecoverable, 
 let Cato be borne to rest ; so he stabbed his body, and 
 when his wound was bound up by the physicians, 
 having less blood, less strength than before, yet the 
 same courage, minus sanyuinis, idem animi, and now 
 not angry against Csesar alone, but against his own 
 person, he tumbleth his hands in his wound, and 
 sendeth not forth by leisure so properly, as by violence 
 ejecteth his generous spirit, scorning and disdaining 
 that any higher power should command him. Both 
 these, you hear, betake themselves to a desperate 
 refuge, the point of the sword : Razis to avoid Nicanor, 
 Cato, Caisar ; both allege the good of their country, 
 not their private estates ; both are impatient of the 
 misery to come, the reproach and disgrace that capti- 
 vity might bring upon them ; both miss their fatal 
 strokes ; both are implacably bent to proceed in their- 
 voluntary homicides ; both toss and imbrue their 
 hands in their own bowels ; and as the one reposeth 
 himself upon God's goodness, so the other was not 
 without hope of rest, when he cried, Cato deducalur in 
 tutum, let Cato go to a quiet place; both are com- 
 mended for their valiant death. But it is certain that 
 Cato died through impatience of mind. Occidit enim 
 se, ne dicereliir, t'lfseir me semiril, for he killed himself 
 that it might not be said, Cicsar hath saved me ; and 
 Seneca ailirmeth as much, that it might not be happy 
 to any other man, either to kill or to preserve Cato. 
 Valerius Maxinius reporteth the words of Ca;sar when 
 he found him dead : Cato, I envy thy glory, for thou 
 enviedst mine. It was a caudle before the dead, and 
 * Lib. iii. ci). 24. 
 
 as messes of meat set upon a grave, but a truth, which 
 another told him, thou shouldst have read and under- 
 stood Plato otherwise. 
 
 Scripta Platonis 
 Non ita erant auimo pcrcipienda tiio. 
 
 If thou hadst well considered what Plato wrote, thou 
 mightst have found reasons sufficient to have stayed, 
 so unnatural a fact: 1, that God is angi-y with such, 
 as a lord with his bondmen that slay themselves ; 
 2, that the relinquisher of his own life is more to be 
 punished than a reneger of his service in war.* And 
 therefore there is no doubt, but the fact of Razis also- 
 must have very favourable interpretation, if it be anj- 
 way excused. Albeit Seneca, in the place before- 
 alleged, commended the dying of Cato m some sort, 
 3'et it is not amiss to consider with what golden sen- 
 tences he cudeth that epistle : It is a ridiculous thing, 
 through wearisomeness of life, to run to death, when 
 by the kind of hfe thou hast so handled the matter, 
 that thou art di-iven to run unto it. Again, so great 
 is the folly, or rather the madness of men, that some, 
 for the fear of death, are enforced to death, timore 
 mortis coguntur ad mortem. He addeth singular pre- 
 cepts : A wise and a vahant man must not fly, but go 
 from life, nun fngere delict e vita sed exire ; and above 
 all things that atiection must be shunned which hath 
 taken hold upon manj-, a longing and lustfuluess of 
 dying, libido vioricndi. lie would have us pre- 
 pared both ways, neither to love nor to hate this life 
 too much, and sometimes to finish it, when reason 
 calleth us forth, but not with a feasef and impotent 
 forwardness, )ion cum procursit cajtiendns eat iinjietns. 
 His counsel certainly agreeth with divinity. For our 
 Savioiu- exhorted his disciples, ' If they persecute you 
 in one city, fly into another.' Notwithstanding he 
 had warned them, ' whosoever will find his life,' and 
 not forsake it when the time and cause requu'e him to 
 lay it down, ' that man should lose it.' 
 
 Which law aud precept of Christ, by the judgment 
 of Gregory Nazianzen,| compoUeth no man to ofl'er 
 himself wilfully to death, or to yield his tlu-oat to him 
 that seeketh it, lest through a desire we have to- 
 please God, in pouring forth our blood, we either com- 
 pel our neighbour- to break that commandment, ' 'Thou 
 shalt not kill,' or seek to purchase and procure om- 
 own deaths ; but when the time calleth us to the com- 
 bats, then we must cheerfully stand forth. So sayeth 
 Jerome upon these words of Jonah : Non est }tostrinit 
 mortem unipcrc, sed illatam ah ediis lihcnter c.rcipere. 
 It is not for us to catch after death, but, when it is- 
 oilered by others, then willingly to receive it. 
 
 Seneca, in his eighth book of Controversies, settctll 
 dow'n a law against felons of themselves, and debatetb- 
 it both ways. The law is, whosoever mm-derelh him- 
 
 * Majori supplicio aflicieudus desertor vittc quain deaer- 
 tor m\\\\.\x.—Ludov. Viv. in lib i. de civ. Dei, cap. xxii, 
 
 t Qu. ' ik-rco"?— Kd. 
 X 111 Moiiod. 
 
Ver. 12.] 
 
 LECTURE XIV. 
 
 93 
 
 self, let him be cast forth without burial.* The de- 
 claration on the one side, in defence of the felon, is 
 made to say something for fashion's sake. Bo angry with 
 the murderer, but pity him that is murdered, imscere 
 iiiteifcctori, miserere interjecti. I ask not that it may 
 be honour for him thus to die, but that no danger, 
 non ut (jloriosum, sed ut tutwn sit mori. They are 
 as cruel that hinder those that are willing to die as 
 others that kill them when they are willing to live. 
 But on the other part, what vehcmency and eagerness 
 doth he use ? It is a shameful part that any hands 
 should be found to bury him whom his own hands 
 have slain. He would have attempted anything, that 
 could find in his heart to kill himself. No doubt he 
 had great crimes in his conscience, that drave him so 
 speedily to his end, and this, amongst the rest, is one, 
 that we cannot proceed against bim (as against other 
 malefactors) by course of judgment. But order is 
 taken against such offenders, that, because they fear 
 not death, they should fear something after death. 
 So said the poet, who saw no further into these things 
 than the glass of nature gave him light, 
 
 ■ They tliat have wrought themselves a causeless death, f 
 And hating light above, thrown out their breath, 
 How wouUi tliey joy to be alive again, 
 Though put to penury and bitterest pain.' 
 
 And methinketh the reason of that law, to debar 
 them from honest bm'ial, can never be disproved. 
 Que sibi ipsi non jinrcit, quomodo parcel aliis ? He 
 that spareth not his own person, bow will be spare 
 other men ? There is but one example in the whole 
 book of God wherein there is any colour of patronag6 
 for this prodigious and treacherous sin against their 
 own bodies, the example of Samson burying him- 
 self and the Philistines ■nith the fall of an house, 
 which is not otherwise excused by Augustine, but that 
 a secret spirit willed him so to do, spiritns hitenter 
 hoc jiisserat. For it appeareth in the Book of Judges, 
 where the history is written, that his strength was 
 renewed, and he called upon the Lord at the instant 
 of his death. And in the 11th to the Hebrews, he is 
 well reported of, in that cloud of righteous men, by 
 the Spirit of God. 
 
 I have held you long in disputing this question, 
 v.hich many a one hath disputed himself without reply, 
 when the malignant spirit hath once but whispered it 
 into his ears, easily di-awn to make a conclusion against 
 body and soul, without longer deliberation. Such have 
 Ijoen the du-eful tragedies which oft have been presented 
 upon the face of the earth, carrying always a note of 
 a most distrustful mind, either suspecting itself, that 
 it is unable to bear the burdens of calamity imminent, 
 or hating and abhorring itself for some iniquity com- 
 mitted. Now what shall we think the afl'ection of 
 
 * Honiicida in se, inscpulius abjiciatur. The like was at 
 Athens, forbidding burial in agro Aitico. 
 t ' Qui sibi lethum 
 
 insonles pcpcrere manu,' &c. 
 
 Jonah was in this case, giving, and not less than thrust- 
 ing upon them, full power of his person '? ' Take me, 
 and cast me into the sea.' Judas, we know, upon 
 the sting of his guilty conscience, hung himself upon 
 an alder tree, and burst in the midst. Ahithophel 
 did the like, because his counsels were defeated. 
 Saul fell upon bis sword, that he might not come into 
 the hands of the Philistines. Domitlus Nero, fearing 
 the approach of Galba, and hearing that a sentence of 
 the senate was passed against him, to stand in the 
 pillor}', and to be beaten with rods to death, for his 
 outrageous both tyrannies and impurities of life, find- 
 ing no man to stiike him, and exclaiming against 
 them all, What ! have I neither friend nor foe ? I 
 have lived dishonourably, let me die shamefully, strake 
 himself through with his own sword, his trembling 
 hand directed thereunto by a beastly eunuch. Others 
 through other impatience, angrj' with heaven and 
 earth, God and man, have desperately departed, with 
 Ajax in the tragedy. It doeth me good to have van- 
 quished heaven, the gods, the lightning, the sea, all 
 opposition, jurat ricisse caiam, &c. Thus, in eflfect, 
 did Cato triumph. Nihil egisti, fortiina, fortune, thou 
 hast not sped. Thus might Jonah cast vdih. himself : 
 Is there a God in heaven, winds in the air, and waves 
 in the sea, that cross my intent ? I will have my 
 will, though I die for it. 
 
 Sic, sic juvat ire sub umbras. 
 
 So, even so, it easeth my stomach to take my leave of 
 this life. But never shall it enter into my heart thus 
 to conceive of a righteous and repentant prophet, who 
 rather humbleth his soul under the hands of God, 
 framing these or the like persuasions to himself. I see 
 the purpose of the Most High cannot be changed. I 
 kick against the pricks, heaven hath proclaimed me a 
 traitor, the winds and the seas have heard it, and 
 whiles there is breath in the one, and water in the 
 other, I shall not go unpunished. The word of the 
 Lord is good that he hath spoken, the wisdom of the 
 Lord is wiser than the foolishness of men, and the 
 strength of the Lord stronger than the weakness of 
 man ; the Lord do that that is good in his sight. 
 Cast me therefore into the sea, throw me into the 
 mouth of justice, let the hunger and thu-st of it be 
 satisfied, for I have deserved no less. Surely there 
 is not a word in this whole speech but full of vuiuous, 
 charitable, and mystical obedience. 
 
 We are now come to the end of his resolution. 
 Wherein we have two things to bear away : fii-st, bis 
 charity to his companions, wherein he tendered the 
 safeguard of their lives ; secondly, the figure he bare. 
 For bo was a type of that uudetiled Lamb by whom 
 the nations of the world should be redeemed. His 
 charity appeareth in plain tenns, ' that the sea may 
 be cahn unto you.' It is no pleasure uuto him to 
 have the lives of others brought in question for bis 
 sake ; he is not of the nature of some men, neither 
 
94 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 profitable in their lifetime, and, at their deaths, of 
 most ungracious, desolatory, hateful affections, who 
 make it their ease and comfort in some sort to have 
 their miseries accompanied ; and, so they be not alone 
 in destruction, they are less grieved. The poets ex- 
 press the uncompassionate style of these Catilinaiy 
 dispositions. When I am dead, saith one of them, 
 let the earth be mixed with fire. E,aoD fcno'i/roj, ya'ia 
 IJ^ty^riroi -rrxj^t. Medea crioth in the tragedy. It were 
 the only felicity to see all things ruinated when I go 
 myself. Domitius Nero, of whom I spake before, 
 caused Eome to be fired in twelve places together, 
 that he might see a pattern how Troy burnt, ut speci- 
 men Trojm ardentis rideret, himself the mean while 
 singing verses out of Homer. 
 
 What were their prizes and combats in the theatre 
 of Rome, but the slaughterings of men, to move plea- 
 sm-e and delight ? When the people desired Theo- 
 dosius the emperor to grant them those sports, he 
 answered them, A mild prince must temper himself 
 both from cruel governments and from cruel spectacles, 
 pium principcm opovtct noit tantwn rerinare sed etiam 
 spectare clementer. The same matter falling into de- 
 bate at Athens, Demonax gave judgment, that if they 
 will publicly receive so great atrocity and cruelty 
 amongst them, they should first overthrow the altar 
 of mercy. His meaning was, that mercy hath no 
 place where there is admission of such heathenish 
 cruelties. Cyprian, in his second book of Epistles,* 
 making mention of this custom, sheweth their man- 
 ner thereof, that their bodies were fed beforehand, 
 and dieted with strong meats, to fill them with juice 
 and blood, that being fatted to punishment, they might 
 die with more cost, carim (it may be glory, elarim), 
 but with less'contentation, cluoim. He much inveigh- 
 eth against it, that man should be killed to delight 
 man, and that an art, science, or skill thereof, peritia 
 est, tims est, ars est, should be practised, and not only 
 wickedness wrought, but taught by precept, sceliis non 
 taiitiim (jeritur, sed docetur. They had a custom be- 
 sides to enter combat with wild beasts ; men of a 
 sound age, lusty, able, well-favoured persons, well- 
 apparelled, went to a voluntary death, and fought with 
 the beasts, not for any offence committed, but in a 
 mad mood, non cn'mine, sed furore. And as the 
 actors themselves gloried ia their miseries, so their 
 parents were well pleased to behold their sons ; the 
 brother was within the rails or bars, the sister near 
 at hand, the mother present at her sorrows ; and 
 though beholding such ungodly sports, they never 
 thought that, at the least, for looking on, they were 
 parricides, ocidis pnrricidrr. You see the humours and 
 affections that some men have, how lightly they are 
 conceited of the life of their brethren, whereas brother- 
 hood, indeed, requireth at their hands that they should 
 rather wish, with Marcus Antonius, to raise up many 
 from the dead, than to destroy more, utinam possem 
 * Epist. 2. 
 
 vndtos ah iii/eris excitare, or with jMoses, in the sacred 
 volume, rather himself to be razed from the book of 
 life, than that his people should perish. 
 
 This former reason is expressed in my test, the lat- 
 ter is implied and conceived, that he made this proffer 
 unto them, as being the figure and type of the most 
 loving Son of God. The explication whereof, though 
 it stand chiefly in the article of his resm-rection, where- 
 of himself spcaketh in the Gospel, ' They seek a sign, 
 but there shall no sign be given them, but the sign of 
 the prophet Jonah,' yet there are many compari- 
 sons besides wherein they are resembled. Jonah 
 was a prophet, and Christ that person of whom Moses 
 spake, proplielam excitabit Deus, ' God shall raise up 
 a prophet unto you.' Jonah was sent upon a mes- 
 sage unto Nineveh, and Christ was anrjehis ma(jni 
 consilii, ' the angel of the great council of God,' le- 
 gatus f(cderis,' ' the ambassador of the covenant.' 
 Much inquiry was made of Jonah : whence art thou ? 
 what is thy calling, country, people ? why hast thou 
 done thus ? Much questioning with and about Christ : 
 ' Art thou the king of the Jews ? ' ' Art thou the Son 
 of the living God ? ' ' Who is this that the winds and 
 the seas they obey him ? ' 'Is not this the carpen- 
 ter's son ? ' ' Whence hath he this wisdom '? ' Jonah 
 was taunted and checked by the master of the ship, 
 ' What meanest thou, sleeper ? ' Christ by the mas- 
 ters of Israel, the rulers of the people and synagogues, 
 as ' a Samaritan,' as ' one that had a devil, and by 
 the finger of Beelzebub cast out devils,' ' a glutton,' ' a 
 wine-bibber,' ' a blasphemer of the law of Moses.' 
 Both came under the trial of lots, the one for his life, 
 the other for his vesture. Both had a favourable 
 dehberation passed upon them, Jonah that he might 
 be saved, Christ that he might be delivered, and Ba- 
 rabbas executed. Both had a care of their brethren 
 more than of themselves. Jonah erieth, ' The sea 
 shall be quiet unto you.' Christ answereth him, ' If 
 ye seek me, let these depart ; ' and ' of those that thou 
 gavest unto me have I not lost one.' The one saith, 
 i'uUite me, ' Take me and cast me into the sea;' the 
 other saith, 'When the Son of man is lift up, he shall 
 draw all things to himself.' Finally, both are sacri- 
 ficed, the one in the water, and the other in the air ; 
 both are buried, the one in the bowels of the whale, 
 the other of the earth ; both allay a tempest, the one 
 of the anger of God present and particular, the other 
 of that wrath which, from the beginning to the end of 
 the world, all flesh had incurred. The ditt'erence 
 betwixt them ia this : that Jonah died for his own 
 ofl'cnce, Christ for the sins of others. Jonah might 
 have said unto them. Though I sec the goodness of 
 your natures, yet who amongst you is able to acquit 
 me from my sin ? Christ made a challenge to malice 
 itself; he might have justified it at the tribunal of 
 highest justice, ' Who is able to reprove me of any 
 sin ? ' Jonah made no doubt, but for that his latest 
 misdeed of flying from the presence of the Lord, he 
 
Ver. 12.] 
 
 LECTURE XIV. 
 
 95 
 
 was cast out. Christ had done many good works 
 amongst them, and none but good, and therefore asked 
 upon confidence of his innocency, ' For which of these 
 works do you stone me '? ' Our innocent Abel perse- 
 cuted by cruel Cain (I am deceived, for as ' his blood 
 speaketh better things than the blood of Abel,' so it 
 is blood of better and purer substance) ; our innocent 
 Jacob hunted by unmerciful Laban, although he might 
 truly say. Gen. xxsi., ' What have I trespassed ; how 
 have I offended that thou hast pursued after me ? ' I 
 might add, our innocent Joseph, sold and betrayed 
 by his despiteful brethren, and little less than mur- 
 dered, though he went from his father, and wandered 
 the fields gladly to seek and see how they did ; our 
 innocent David chased by unrighteous Saul, though 
 by Jonathan's just apology, ' Wherefore should ho 
 die ; what hath he done ; or who so faithful amongst 
 all the servants of Saul as David was ? ' or if from the 
 state of innocency to this present hour, I should reckon 
 all the innocents of the earth, and put in angels of 
 heaven, yet all not innocent and holy enough to be 
 weighed with him ; and therefore to call him by his own 
 names, 'our Sun of righteousness,' ' Branch of right- 
 eousness,' • the Lord our righteousness,' ' he that was 
 born of a virgin,' ' that holy thing,' Luke i., ' the 
 undefiled Lamb,' our 'holy, harmless, blameless high 
 priest, separate from sinners,' our 'Jesus the just;' 
 he that had the shape of a serpent in the wilderness, 
 but not the poison, the similitude of sinful flesh in the 
 world, but not the corruption; he that ' knew no sin,' 
 and much loss was born sin, yet ' was made sin for 
 us, that we might be made the righteousness of God 
 in him;' he had the wages of sin, though he never 
 deserved it, and made his grave with the wicked, 
 though he had done no wickedness, neither was there 
 any deceit in his mouth ; he was wounded for our trans- 
 gressions, and broken for our ini(juitios, and the chas- 
 tisement of our peace was upon his shoulders ; all we 
 like sheep had gone astray, and the Lord his Father 
 had laid upon him the iniquities of us all,' Isa. liii. 
 But was he compelled thereunto ? That were to go from 
 the figure, and to shew less humanity to mankiiid than 
 Jonah to his companions. For what hand could cut this 
 stone from those heavenly mountains '? The apostle 
 telleth us otherwise, Philippians the second, iaurm 
 lyiivaai, ' ho emptied himself, and took the form of 
 a servant,' sTavii'tictiSiv laurJv, ' he humbled himself, 
 and became obedient unto death, even the death of 
 the cross,' Heb. ix., ' he offered himself, Eauriv t^o- 
 e^nyxiv, to purge our consciences from dead works ;' 
 Gal. ii., ' He gave himself.' The prophet telleth us 
 otherwise, Isa. liii., Ohlatiis est, quia ipse voluit. Ho 
 was ofl'ered, because he would himself ; and ' ho hath 
 poured out bis soul unto death,' which noteth a liberal 
 and voluntary dispensation. When sacrifice and obla- 
 tion God would not have, and somewhat must be had, 
 what saith the Scriptm'e of him ? ' Then said I ; ' 
 
 Divi facto, quod aiiDuticiareram pn- pniphctas.* I said 
 it indeed, for I had passed my word before in the pro- 
 phets, ' Behold I come : ' vciiio volnntarie, non coactus 
 adducor, I come of mine own accord, I am not brought 
 by coaction. ' It is written in the book that I should 
 do thy will ; I am content to do it, my God ;' it is 
 as deeply written in my will, and ' thy law is in the 
 midst,' not in a corner ' of my heart,' non in angulo, 
 sed in medio cordis. You see his willingness ; being 
 called, he answered; being sent, went, with as cheerful 
 a spirit as ever any servant the centurion kept : ' his ear 
 was opened' with attention, as it were with the awl of the 
 law, Exod. xxi. ; his desires accommodated no other 
 way ; and not an angle, but the heart of his heart, and 
 the inmost concavity, which the}' say is made to con- 
 tain vital breath, was filled up with subjection to his 
 father's pleasure. Incredulous soldiers, if ye believe 
 not this, open his side with a spear, and pierce his 
 heart to the centre of it, and tell me if he wrote not 
 with streams of blood, as sometimes ho wrote on the 
 dust, perfect obedience toward his Father, incredible 
 loving-kindness towards our ungrateful generation. 
 Look into the ark, ye curious Bethshemites, examine 
 the secrets of it, and tell me what ye find. Bring 
 hither your fingers, and thrust your nails into the 
 prints of his wounds, and sound the bottom, if you 
 can, of his willing and hearty disposition. Was he 
 not ' dumb before the shearer?' Or did he ever abuse, 
 nay, ' open his mouth before the slaughterer, though 
 they took both fleece and flesh from him, his cloak 
 and his coat too, did he ever repine ? Was his voice 
 ever heard in the streets, though the very stones iu 
 the streets could have found in their hearts to have 
 spoken and cried in his cause? Augustine applieth 
 to his passion the words of the psalm, ' I will lay me 
 down in peace, and take my rest,' Ps. iv. E(jo cum 
 jiondcre provunciandum est, we must pronounce I with 
 weight, to shew that he suffered death with his free 
 assent. And Bernard noteth upon the second of the 
 Canticles,! ' Behold, he cometh leaping by the moun- 
 tains, and skipping over the hills ; ' that being nimble 
 of spirit, fervent in love, zealous in piety, he overcame 
 all others in the alacrity of his ministration, as he 
 whom God had ' anointed ^rith the oil of gladness 
 above all his fellows ; ' he outleaped Gabriel the arch- 
 angel, sayeth he, and came to the virgin before him, 
 by the testimony of the angel himself. Hail Mary, ftill 
 of grace, TJominus tecum, ' The Lord is with thee.' 
 Behold thou leftcst him in heaven, and findest him in 
 the womb. How can this be ? Volarit et pmvolaeit 
 super penncis ventorum, He flew and overflew thee upon 
 the wings of the wind, and he that sent thee before is 
 come before thee. If you will know his other leaps, 
 Gregory setteth them down, that as he leapt from 
 heaven into the womb, so fi'om the womb into the 
 manger, from the manger to the cross, fi-om the cross 
 * Hugo Card f Sor. 54. 
 
96 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 to tlio grave, from the grave into heaven again, and 
 thence we look for his second coming. 
 
 / liitoH- tluti for my sake tJiis i/rcnt lempcul h upon you. 
 Jonah Imew tire canse of their danger, parti}' by pro- 
 phetical revelation, which manner of knowledge was 
 private to Jonah, but with few other men ; partly by 
 touch of conscience, which he liveth not upon the 
 earth that can escape. Tempests you have had in 
 your days without number; but first, grandis tempcstas 
 hac, this great and unwonted tempest, which is not 
 only come upon me, but, secondly, super vos, upon you 
 also ; thirdhj, I know, and am without doubt, that it is 
 ra.ised, fourthly, for my sake. Though it mingle the 
 recent and innocent, unrighteous and righteous, to- 
 gether, as the nets in the Gospel mingle the good and 
 bad fish, yet am I the spring of it, and thereof I 
 am as certain as that I know my right hand. I 
 know that for my sake. Jonah was very forward before 
 in confession ; he told them the whole progress of his 
 disobedience, but never proceeded thus far. For yet 
 he might have pleaded, I gi-ant I am a sinner, it may 
 be, you as deeply as myself; but when he seeth the 
 siege of the anger of God lie so hot and close to the 
 walls of his conscience that it will not be removed, 
 then, Novi quia propter ine, 'I know that it is for 
 my sake.' 
 
 ]\Iany are strangers to themselves for a space, and 
 will seem to be ignorant of their own doings ; charge 
 them with sin, they will say, and swear, and bind it 
 with cursing, I know it not, in the same terms that 
 Peter denied his master, Non novi honiinem, 'I know 
 not the man.' But when Christ looked back, I mean, 
 when they find themselves narrowly eyed, and remem- 
 bered, then I know that for my sake it is that he looketh 
 back. When our Saviour told his people, as he sat at 
 supper with them, Mat. xxvi., ' One of you shall betray 
 me,' do j'ou think the traitor would bewTay himself ? 
 No, though they ' were all sorrowful, and asked one 
 after one, Is it I ? ' yet is he as forward as the rest to 
 ask that question also, ' Is it I, master '? ' albeit he 
 knew it as perfectly as his own name. Being but one 
 amongst twelve, and eleven more in company to bear a 
 part of the burden, he thought he was safe enough. 
 Seneca, by his own confession and preface to his tale, 
 roporteth a strange but a true thing, rem inrredihilem 
 narro sed vcram, of Harpastes a fool, and, with age, a 
 blind beldame. She knoweth not that she is blind, and 
 often cntreateth her guide to go forth of doors, because 
 the house is dark. Neither is there any, saith he, 
 amongst us, that knoweth his faults. Every man 
 Jlattcreth himself, Nou eyo amhiliosus sum, I am not 
 ambitious, nor covetous, nor luxurious, uor given to 
 this or that vice. IXavid knew not the man that 
 Xathan spake of, 2 Sam. xii. ; he pronounced of a 
 person unknown unto hiiu, ' The man that hath done 
 this is the child of death.' This is but muffling of the 
 conscience for a time, as Tamiir muffled her face to 
 
 take a short pleasure ; but Tamar shall be discovered, 
 and all hearts shall be opened ; the cockatrice that 
 hath lieu in her hole will come to warm herself against 
 the heat of the sun ; Adam will be brought from his 
 bushes, and Sarah from behind the door, and a man 
 shall say to his conscience, as Ahab said to Elijah, 
 'Hast thou found me, mine enemy?' The Del- 
 phians made no scruple to murder iEsop amongst 
 them ; * but when they were plagued with death and 
 mortaUty thereupon, thej- walked up and down in all 
 the public assemblies of Greece, and caused it to be 
 proclaimed by noise of criers, that whosoever would, 
 should be avenged upon them for the death of ^Esop ; 
 they knew that for their sakes the plagues came. 
 The accusers of the adulteress in the Gospel, how 
 skilful and busy were they in detecting and following 
 her fact: (1.) they had taken her; (2.) in the act; 
 (3.) they set her in the midst ; (4.) they urged the 
 law, ' Moses commanded that she should be stoned,' 
 John viii. IIow ignorant were they and forgetful of 
 themselves, till Christ advertised them ! ' Then they 
 went out ' (saith the Gospel), ' one by one, from the 
 eldest to the last, being accused by their own con- 
 science ; ' then there was none left to give evidence 
 against her, but our Saviour asked, ' Woman, where 
 be thy accusers ? ' or rather their own accusers ? They 
 knew that for their sakes Christ spake, and they 
 found that writing which he drew in the dust cn- 
 gi-aven so deep in their own hearts with a pen of iron, 
 that it could not be dissembled. This is the case of 
 all those that cover their sins, quorum si mentes re- 
 cludnntur, possint adspici lauiatus et ictus, f whose 
 minds, if they could be opened, we should see their 
 rents and stripes within. Sins may be without danger 
 for a time, but never without fear, tula esse scelera, 
 secura non possunt. Happy are they that know as 
 they should know J (for this uori, whereof I speak, 
 belougeth to us all), whose knowledge is not ron- 
 trislans scientia, a sad, unpcaceable, sorrowing know- 
 ledge (the knowledge of devils, who know there is an 
 hell for them, and albeit they know much, yet they 
 know not the way to salvation), but fruitful, comfort- 
 able, joyful knowledge, who know to amendment of 
 life, who know to rim to the remedy of their sins, to 
 lay a plaster of the blood and wounds of Christ to 
 the wounds and hurts of their soul ; who ' know that 
 their Redeemer liveth,' as Job did, know Christ cruci- 
 fied not only for the world, but for themselves also, 
 and ' account all things but loss and dung in com- 
 parison of that excellent knowledge,' Philip, iii. This 
 is to bo ' rich in knowledge,' as the apostle spcaketh, 
 1 Cor. i.; and without this, ' if wc knew all sorts, and 
 all knowledge besides,' 1 Cor. xiii., we might be poor, 
 beggarly, miserable, ignorant, reprobate, as bad as 
 devils. 
 
 * riutar. do ser. num. viiulict. t Tacitus, 
 
 t Fractus et utilitas sciendi in motlo scioiuli. — Ber. 
 
Ver. 13.] 
 
 LECTURE XV. 
 
 97 
 
 LECTURE XV. 
 
 Ncveiihclcss the men rowed to hiiiti/ It to land, but could not, dc. — Jonah I. 13. 
 
 IN the former verse, there are preKuaut causes laid 
 down why the mariners should have eased them- 
 selves of Jonah : 1, the liberty' and leave he gave them 
 to cast him forth ; 2, the good that should ensue by 
 the pacification of the sea; 3, their warrant, (1) the 
 tempest was upon them ; (2) a tempest for his sake ; 
 (3) himself, upon knowledge, avowed it. 
 
 Nererlheless, though they see the danger, and the 
 causes of the danger, and the remedy thereof, plainly 
 and assuredly demonstrated, tlieij row to hrimj it to 
 land. It seemeth very strange unto me that they 
 take not the first occasion and oifer to unwind them- 
 selves from the peril thej' were in ; and that neither 
 the master of the ship in his wisdom, nor the multi- 
 tude of the mariners in their tumultuous and heady 
 violence, nor any one jierson amongst them, forward 
 for the common cause, taketh the benefit of all these 
 opportunities to save themselves. It giveth us a 
 memorable instruction, that in singular and extraordi- 
 nary facts, which either the law of God or the law of 
 nature repugneth and is plainly against, we be not too 
 eager and quick in expedition thereof, until it be out 
 of doubt by some special wan-ant from heaven, that 
 they may be attempted. Touching this present entcr- 
 pris(^ there is no question but, though they had not 
 learned the letter of the law of God, ' Thou shalt not 
 kill,' yet the law of nature tied them bj' secret bonds 
 to deal with Jonah as they wished to be dealt with 
 themselves. Then why should they drown him ? Be- 
 cause the lots had convinced him ? The lots might 
 err at a time ; or, if they spake a truth, must these 
 men be his judges ? or, if judges, of his hfe and 
 death ? There might some lesser punishment be de- 
 vised. Again, what though he ofl'ered himself to be 
 thrown into the sea for their safety ; must they take 
 him at his first word ? Cannot their hurts be cured 
 but by so desperate a medicine as nature cannot 
 brook ? When Constantine the emperor {if the his- 
 tory be true) heard that there was no means to cure 
 his leprosy but by bathing his body in the blood 
 of infants, his heart abhorred it. Malo semper 
 trr/rotare, quant tali remedio conralescere, I had rather 
 be sick whilst I have my being, than recover by such 
 a medicine. Again, the warrant he gave them, ' I 
 know that for my sake,' might perhaps bo without 
 warrant. A man might speak in the bitterness of his 
 soul what else he would not ; weary of his life, not 
 able to bear his crosses, and therefore, as the manner 
 of many distressed is, seeking for death more than for 
 treasures. Whatsoever they did or might conceive, 
 this I am sure of, they had great reason to be very 
 circumspect and scrupulous, to bear their hearts in 
 their hands, to walk with advice and chariness before 
 
 they did .anything in an action so unusual, and that 
 which nature itself forbade them. Augustine, in the 
 first book of the Citi/ of God, chap, xxvi., handling 
 Abraham's parricide intended upon his own son — a 
 fact both against nature, for ' no man ever hated 
 his own flesh,' and against the written precept, ' I 
 will require the blood of man,' — speaketh thus : It doth 
 not excuse another from impiety, that shall purpose to 
 ofler his son, because Abraham did so, even with com- 
 mendation, sed non idea sine scelere/acit, &c. For a 
 soldier, also, when, for obedience sake to that power 
 under which ho is lawfully ordained, he shall kill a 
 man, he is not chargeable with murder by any law of 
 the city ; nay, he shall be guilty of contempt to his 
 governor if he do it not, hnmo nisi fecerit, reus est 
 imperii deserti ; which, had he committed by his own 
 accord and authority, ho had fallen into question of 
 spilling man's blood. Itaque unde punitur si fecerit 
 i)ijussus, inde punitur nisi fecerit jussus, therefore, 
 by what reason he is punished if he shall do it with- 
 out commandment, by the same he is punished if, 
 being commanded, he do it not. Quod si ita est, 
 jubente iiupcratore, quanta niai/is juboite creators ? If it 
 be thus for the bidding of the emperor, much rather 
 for the bidding of the Creator. He adjoins the ex- 
 ample of certain virgins, Pelagia with her mother and 
 sisters, who throw themselves into a river rather than 
 they would be defiled by a villainous soldier. In ex- 
 cuse of whom he demandcth, AVhat if they did it, not 
 deceived by human persuasion, but commanded by 
 God ? Not of error, but through obedience, as in 
 Samson's departm-e from his life, it is not lawful for 
 us to think othei-wise. Only lot him beware, that 
 killoth himself or his child, and fully be satisfied that 
 the commandment of God hath no uncertainty in it. 
 'Tantummodo indent vtrum diviua jussio nullo nulet 
 incerto. It is the judgment of sound divinity, that 
 some facts which the Scripture recordeth are singular, 
 and died with the persons that did them, enforcing no 
 imitation at oiu- hands, without the like special direc- 
 tion and dispensation from almighty God that he gave 
 to them ; as namely, Abraham's obedience in offering 
 his son; Phinehas his zeal in kilhng the adulterers; 
 Samson's magnanimity in destroying himself and the 
 Pliihstines with the foil of the house ; the IsraeUtes' 
 pohey in spoiling the Egyptians of then- jewels and 
 ornaments, all which, and the like singularities, cum 
 Deus jubet, seque jubere sine talis ainbatjibus intimat, 
 quis obedientiam in crimen j-ocet.* When God com- 
 mandeth them, and makoth it a clear case, without 
 any perplexities, that so his pleasure is, who can accuse 
 thy obedience ? Cut before, be assured in thy con- 
 * Aug. ib. 
 
 G 
 
9S 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. T. 
 
 science tliat God hath commamlcd them ; tie and 
 untie a thousand knots, and hoth make and remove 
 as many olijcctitms as thy heart can devise. 
 
 The Anabaptists in Germany framed and feigned an 
 imagination to themselves, that, by the will of God, 
 the ancient magistracy must he quite rooted from the 
 earth ; * they said, and liaply believed, that tliey had 
 speech with God, and that he enjoined them to kill all 
 the wicked in the land, and to constitute a new world, 
 consisting only of the innocent. Who persuaded 
 them ? lie that spake with God concerning Ahab, 
 ' I will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his pro- 
 phets to deceive Ahab ; ' a spirit of error and false- 
 hood, a spirit born and bred within their own brain. 
 The conceit was extraordinary, that private men, by 
 violence and force of arms, should not only displace, 
 but destroy their rulers and magistrates. Wliat 
 shmghter and havoc it catised, what profusion of blood 
 between the nobles and the commons, Germany then 
 felt and smarted for ; history and monuments of time 
 will relate to all posterity, and the jireeedent thereof 
 may make the world take heed how they be drawn by 
 fanatical spirits into these or such like unaccustomed 
 and iniprol.iable courses. 
 
 What disputing and scanning was there of late 
 within this realm of ours, by conference in private, 
 by brokers and coursers up and down, by books and 
 ballads in print, whether there were not in these days 
 extraordinary callings ; upon the persuasion hereof, 
 what hasty, headlong, heathenish endeavours to reform 
 a church, to dissolve government, to unjoint order, to 
 comprl a prince, and not to tarry her leisure, if pre- 
 sently she agreed not ! Each man ha^■ing a forge in 
 his own hand, to niakt^ and mar, to turn square into 
 round, white into black, church into no church, minis- 
 try into no ministry, sacraments into no sacraments; 
 this man coining himself a ]irophet, that man a 
 Christ, others they knew not wdiat ; thus travailing 
 and toiling themselves in the fire of their own fancies, 
 till they lost themselves, their wits, their gi'ace, and 
 some their hves ! AVhat shall w-e say hereof, but that 
 it was a singular enterprise, proceeding from the singu- 
 lar spirits of singular persons ; ami if God had not 
 wrought for us in mercy, the sequel must needs have 
 been singular unhappiness. 
 
 My conclusion is, that by the example of these 
 manners, fearful and nice to deal in so dangerous a 
 matter, wo follow the c(mmion rule (as the king's 
 beaten way) which the law of nature engi'afTcd, and 
 the will of God revealed, hath prescribed unto us ; 
 and if ever we meet with actions which have not 
 agreement with these two, to examine all ambiguities 
 therein, and to be certain of the will of God before we 
 enterprise anything. 
 
 That this w-as the purpose of the measm-es, is plainly 
 to be gathered both by the wliole context and body of 
 the history hitherto continued (when, though they 
 * Joh. Sleiilaii. in Coiniiu'iil. 
 
 had many provocations to free themselves and their 
 ship, they withheld their hands), and by a phrase of 
 their further pains most efl'cctually significant, where- 
 in, as they contended with their oars to bring their 
 ship to land, so writers have contended with their 
 wits how to express their labours. Our English hath 
 simply and in a word, ' The men rowed;' truly but 
 not sufficiently. The Latm saith no more hut remi- 
 //ahiint, which is as much as our English. The 
 Seventy interpreters, cTags/S/a^ovro, thei/ offered violence 
 III the sea. And Jerome, witli an excellent circumlo- 
 cution, lienim iiatiiram viinrre cnpichant ; they de- 
 sired to exceed nature, and do more than they could 
 do. The original tongue saith, Fodenint reiiiis, they 
 digged, and delved, and furrowed the sea with their 
 oars, as a man the ground with cutters and shares. 
 Kt iiqiKi; fiimliim inrestir/aha)it, They searched and 
 sounded the bottom of the waters, as men that would 
 turn them upside down, rather than miss the success 
 of their charitable intention. Solon could do no more 
 for Athens than he did. When Pisistratus had taken 
 it, he afterwards hung up his spear and target at the 
 court gates, with this protestation, OJi paliia ! lihi et 
 dictis et fdctk opilidatus sum, O my country, I have 
 aided thee both with word and deed ; so betaking him- 
 self to his ow'u house to take his rest. Alexander's 
 soldiers told him, when, as they thought, he proposed 
 to go info another w^orld, and to seek an India un- 
 known to the Indians themselves, Qtiicquid »iort(ditas 
 capere poliiit, imjilei-imiis ; we have done as much as 
 men might undergo. These men here mentioned, to- 
 their uttermost power, stood and fought for Jonah 
 against the rage of the tempest. Qui aiiiat, atit iion 
 Inliornl, fiiil ipsiim aiiiat Uiborcm; ho that loveth, 
 either laboureth not, or at least he loveth and taketh 
 pleasure in his labours ; as the pains of hunters,. 
 ha\vkers, and fishers, seem not grievous unto them. 
 And it is the property of love to transform and alter 
 a man into that he loveth, amor tnuisanimnt in rem 
 amoldm. These men think of Jonah, I take it, as of 
 themselves, make it their owni cause, thus speaking in 
 themselves, Why should we cast away a man, if there 
 he any menus to deliver him ? See what a load they 
 plot of reciprocal kindness one to the other. Jonah 
 to the mariners, in the former verse, willing to forego 
 his lite for the preservation of others, ' Take mo, audi 
 cast me into the sea, that it may be quiet unto you;' 
 and these as earnestly labouring with hazard of them- 
 selves, if it be possible, to save Jonah. It is such an 
 image, methinketh, of that sociablt< and mutual amity, 
 that tunung and winding, and retailing of courtesy, 
 which ought to pass between man and man, as is 
 worthy to leave behind it an heedful observation. For 
 what were the life of man, without this harmony and con- 
 sent of friendship? When there is no dale et dnhilnr, 
 giving and taking, lending and borrowing, gratifying 
 and regi-atifying (as it were light for light), changing 
 of offices and good turns, what were it but the life o£ 
 
Ver. 13.] 
 
 LECTURE XV. 
 
 99 
 
 beasts, which, as they are sundry iu kinds, so there is 
 no communion betwixt them in fcllow-lilie duties? I 
 will not now declaim against the inhumanity of men ; 
 that one thing which all men know, I will not so much 
 utter to others as hold to myself; thtit by biting of a 
 serpent we lose our lives, but by the biting, barking, 
 breathing of a man, together with life, all that we 
 have perisheth.* The prophet once cried, ' ye 
 heavens, drop down righteousn(!Ss,' when righteous- 
 ness was taken up into the clouds, and the earth void 
 of it. We may cry, for lack of love among us, yo 
 heavens, drop down kindness and charity unto our 
 times, that the uncourteous and churlish Nabals of 
 this present generation, which are not willing to re- 
 deem the lives of their brethren — shall I say with the 
 hazard of their own lives ? no, nor with the loss of 
 their shoo-latchets ; with the hazard I mean of transi- 
 tory and fading commendations, which never are 
 touched with the afflictions of Joseph, and, though a 
 member be grieved and pinched, as if they belonged 
 to a foreign body, never vouchsafe to partake the 
 smart with them ; with whom it is a common speech, 
 'That that dieth, let it die,' Zech. xi., that they 
 may know at length they were not born to sing or 
 cry, laugh or joy to themselves, not to eat and drink, 
 thrive or live to their private families ; but that others 
 which stand in need, by many prerogatives of man- 
 kind, have also an interest in their communion and 
 service. I noted the humanity of the mariners, by 
 occasion of some circumstances before past, and I 
 would now have spared you iu the repetition of the 
 same argument, but that my test spareth you not. I 
 were worthy of much blame, if, when my guide shewed 
 me the way, I would purposely forsake it ; neither can 
 I justly make my excuse, if, when the Scripture taketh 
 me by the hand, and biddeth me commend humanity 
 once again, I then neglect it. 
 
 You may perceive how well they affected .Jonah, both 
 by the continuance and by the excess of their pains. 
 I make it a further proof, that it is said in the text, 
 ■' the men rowed,' as if he had said, they were mere 
 strangers unto me ; I cannot say they are Grecians, 
 or Silicians, I know not then' countries or dwelling 
 places, I know not their private generations and kin- 
 dreds, much less their proper names and conditions. 
 I know them no more than to be men, after the name 
 commonty belonging to all mankind. It is an usual 
 manner amongst us, when we know not men by their 
 other difl'erences and proprieties, to term them by that 
 general appellation which appertaineth equally to us 
 all. When Paul was disposed to conceal his person, 
 as touching the visions and revelations which were 
 sent unto him, 2 Cor. xii., ' I know,' saith he, ' a man 
 in Christ, whether in the body or out of the body,' 
 &c. I say not that he was an Hebrew, I name no 
 
 * Nolo nunc in hominis inhumanitatem dcclamaro. Id 
 unum quod omnea soiuut, non tam dicain quam milii habe- 
 am, &c. Jul. Scaliger. Exerc. 33. 
 
 apostle, I name not Paul ; ' I know a man, of such a 
 man I will rejoice, of myself I will not, except it bo 
 of mine infirmities.' They asked the young man 
 whose sight was restored, John ix., how his eyes were 
 opened? who, because he knew not Christ in'tho pro- 
 priety either of his nature or otHco, to bo the S(m of 
 God, or the Messias that should come, he answered 
 thus for himself, ' The man that is called Jesus made 
 clay, and anointed mine eyes.' Concerning whom he 
 afterwards bcwrayeth his ignorance ; ' whether a sin- 
 ner or no, I cannot tell ; but one thing I know, that I 
 was blind, and now I see.' 
 
 Is it not, think you, a wonderful blemish and maim 
 to Christianity, that those who were but men, oven 
 strangers unto Jonah, ahens in country, aliens in re- 
 ligion (but that they began a little to bo seasoned 
 with the knowledge of the true God), should thus be 
 minded unto him ; we that are joined and built to- 
 gether, not only in the frame of our common kind, but 
 in a new building that came from heaven ; we that 
 are men, and more than men, men of another birth 
 than we took from Adam, men of a better family than 
 our father's hou.se, regenerate, sanctified, sealed by the 
 Spuit of God against the day of redemption, men thaX 
 are concorporate under one head, Jesus Christ, knit 
 andunited by nature, grace, by flesh, faith, humanity, 
 Christianity, should be estranged in affection, Christians 
 towards Christians, protestants towards protestants, 
 more than ever were Jews and Samaritans, of whom 
 we read in the gospel, that they might not converse ? 
 
 Doubtless there arc many things that have an at- 
 tractive virtue to win and gain the opinions of men 
 unto them. The uncstimablo wisdom of Solomon 
 drew a woman, a queen, from a far country, that she 
 might but hear and question with him. The admir- 
 able learning of Origen caused ungracious and wicked 
 Porphyry to go from his native land to the city of 
 Alexandria to see him,* and Mammasa the empress to 
 send for him into her presence. It never wanteth 
 honour, that is excellent. The voice of friendship, 
 where it is firmly plight, is this, as Ambrosef observ- 
 eth in his Offices, tiiitu sum lotus, I am wholly thine. 
 What diflercnce was there betwixt Alexander and 
 Hephestion ? Marriage, by the ordinance of God, 
 knoweth no other method but composition : of two it 
 makcth one, as God of one before made two by resolu- 
 tion. The fu'st day of marriage solemnised amongst 
 the heathens, the bride challenged of the bridegroom, 
 Ubi tu Caius, ego Caia,X where you are master, I will 
 be mistress. But the only loadstone and attractive 
 upon the earth, to draw heaven and earth, men and 
 angels, east and west, Jews and barbarians, sea and 
 land, lands and islands together, and to make one of 
 two, of thousands, of all, is religion, by which they 
 are coupled and compacted under the government 
 of one Lord; tied and conglutinate bj' the sinews of 
 one faith, washed from their sins by the same laver of 
 * Viucen. Liriu. f Ollic. iii. % Flularo. 
 
100 
 
 KING ON JOXAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 new birth, nourished by the milk of the same word, 
 feasted at the supper of the same Lamb, and assumed 
 by the same Spirit of adoption, to the undoubted in- 
 heritance of one and the same kingdom. And I can- 
 not niislike their judf^mcnt, who thinli that the little 
 knowledge of God, and but elementary learning which 
 Jonah preached, when he made his grave confession 
 of the true God, laid the foundation of all this kind- 
 ness which proceeded from these mariners. 
 
 How hath religion been a band unto Christendom, 
 the discords and dissensions whereof (like a fire in 
 the midst of the house, consuming both timber and 
 stones) have laid more countries to the dition of the 
 Turk, than ever his bow and shield could have pur- 
 chased. We may truly say, as they in Athens some- 
 times, Av.rimits Philiiijium nns ipsi Atlienienses, we of 
 Athens ourselves have amplified and strengthened 
 Philip our enemy. It was prudently espied by Cor- 
 tugal, one of the Turkish princes, in his oration per- 
 suasive to his lord to besiege Rhodes, Christ ianiis 
 occ(i>:us discordiis intfstinis corrohoratur, the fall of 
 Christendom is sot forward by civil disagreement. In 
 the days of Mahomet the Second, they had gleaned 
 out of Christendom (I mean those polluted Saracens), 
 like scattered ears of corn neglected by the owners, 
 two hundred cities, twelve kingdoms, and two empires. 
 What an harvest they have reaped since that time, or 
 rather we reaped for them, who knoweth not ? And 
 yet the canker runneth on, fretting and eating into 
 Christendom, because the whole ncglecteth the parts, 
 and seeketh not to preserve them. Who is not 
 moved with that lamentable description which ^Eneas 
 Silvius maketh of Greece, in his oration against the 
 Turks, for the composing and atoning of christened 
 kingdoms ? noble Greece, behold now thine end, 
 thou art dead and buried ; if we seek for thy walls, 
 we find but rubble, nay, we find not the ground 
 wherein thy walls have stood; wo look for Greece in 
 Greece ; we search for her cities, and find nothing 
 save their carcases and ruinated fragments. It is a 
 paradox in common reason, hardly to be proved, but 
 that experience findeth it true, brethren, kinsmen, or 
 fi-iends, when they fall to enmity, their hatred is 
 greater than betwixt mortal foes ; according to the 
 prophecy of Christ, inintici riri domestici ejus, ' a 
 man's enemies ' indeed, and to purpose, to work him 
 most harm, ' shall bo they of his own house.' Of all 
 the vials of the wrath of God poured down upon 
 sinners, it is one of the sorest, when a man is ' fed 
 with his own llesh, and drunken with his own blood, 
 as with sweet wine,' Isa. .\lix. ; that is, taketh pleasure 
 in nothing more than in the overthrow and extirpation 
 of his own seed: — 
 
 Non nisi quocsitum cognala cmde cruorom, 
 lllicitumquo biliit, 
 careth not for any blood but that which is drawn 
 from the sides of his brethren and kinsmen. Tacitus* 
 * Aniial. i. 
 
 notcth no less than I speak of, between Segestes and 
 Ariminius, the one the father, the other the son-in- 
 law, both hatefully and hostilely bent. Qua apud cott- 
 cordes vlncula chiuitalia, iiici'awrnta irariim apud in- 
 fensns sunt ; that which bound them together in love, 
 whilst they were at concord, put them further at vari- 
 ance, being once enemies. What more eager and 
 bitter contention hath ever been between Christian 
 and Saracen, than between Christian and Christian ? 
 We are brethren, I confess, one to the other, fintres 
 utcrini, brethren from the womb, iif/.o'rdrpioi, oij-o/xjit^ioi, 
 having one Father in heaven, and one mother upon 
 earth ; but it is fallen out upon us, which Jacob pro- 
 nounced upon Simeon and Levi, wo are brethren in 
 evil ; 'they in their wrath slew a man, and in their 
 self-will digged down a wall,' and therefore their rage 
 was accursed. Can we escape a curse, that have slain 
 a man and a man, digged down a wall and a wall, 
 betrayed a kingdom and a kingdom, laid open the 
 vineyard for the v.i.\d boar, given the soul of the turtle 
 to the beast, resigned up many sanctified dominions 
 whercjin the sceptre of Christ was acknowledged, to 
 capital and deadly enemies, by our mutual intestine 
 seditions ? I can bettor shew you the malignity of 
 the disease, than prescribe the remedy ; but where 
 brethren, kinsmen, confederates, contend together, 
 what part gaineth '? I'icli rictorcmjue in lachri/wa.ifusi, 
 the vanquished and the victorers may both beshrew 
 themselves ; they may fight and imbrue their hands 
 in blood, and get the honour of the day, but they will 
 have little list to triumph at night. Jocasta told her 
 two sons (rather her firebrands, as Hecuba foresaw of 
 Paris), agreeing together like fire and water, that 
 whosoever conquered the other, he would neither 
 make show nor bear sign of the conquest ; Cadnifra 
 i-ictoiia, Frangcnda pahna est : — 
 
 Bella gcri placuit, millos hiibifura triuuiplios. 
 
 ' Oh pray for the peace of Jerusalem ; they shall pros- 
 per, and speed right hajipily, that wish her prosperity.' 
 Pray not for the peace of Kdom, whilst it is Edom ; 
 pray not for the peace of P)abylon, whilst it continueth 
 Babylon ; so long as they cry against Sion, ' Down 
 with it, down with it even to the ground,' tlie Lord 
 return it sevenfold into their bosom. But pray to 
 the prince of peace, whoso blessing and gilt peace 
 is, that if ever wo fight by moving either hand or pen, 
 we may fight against Edom and Babylon, Ammon 
 and Aram (as Joab and Abishai did), those that are 
 without, but evermore desire, procure, and ensure the 
 peace of Jerusalem. Thus far of the kindness shewed 
 by the mariners unto Jonah, who, though thoy were 
 but men, strange and unknown unto him, yet upon 
 that knowledge of God which he had instilled into 
 their minds by his preaching, they endeavoured what 
 they could to save his life, llow sped their labours '? 
 But they could not, for the sea wroui/ht, &c. I re- 
 mit you for instruction hcrcbcuce to the 11th verse, 
 
Vek. U.J 
 
 LECTURE XVI. 
 
 lUl 
 
 where you liavo most of these very words. It shall 
 stand more durable than the firmament of bcaveu, 
 which the king of Babylon testified of God : Dan. iv., 
 ' According to his will he workoth in the army of heaven 
 and in the inhabitants of the earth ; and no man can 
 stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou ? ' 
 He pronounceth as much of himself: Isa. xlvi., 'My 
 counsel shall stand, and I will do whatsoever I will ;' 
 the earnestness and improbity of man's labour, no- 
 thing availeth, if God bo against it ; it is but the labour 
 of Sisyphus, labouring in the fire, and ploughing upon 
 the rocks (as the mouth of God spoakelb), according 
 to his word in Malachi, ' They shall build, but I will 
 pull down.' The vigour of the words once again 
 giveth this counsel unto us, />(.?) 3£o//.a;>^s/V, not to con- 
 tend or wrestle with the power of God, which is as 
 if a fly should oppose her force against a bulwark. 
 They preach doctrine of suflerance and patience at 
 the will of God ; Qiiodferendum est, f cms, that which 
 thou must bear of necessity, bear with good content- 
 ment of mind, mains rat miles qui iiiiperalorciii 
 yemens sequitur* He is an unmeet eoldicr that 
 follovreth his general groaning ; thou canst not strive 
 with thy Maker, thou canst not add to the stature of 
 thy body, nor change one hair of thy head from the 
 colour which God gave it. It is not thy rising early 
 tliat can make thee rich, nor barring the gates of thy 
 city that can make thee safe ; much less canst thou 
 ransom thy hfe, nor the life of thy brother, from the 
 band of God, thou must perforce let that alone for 
 ever. A league with all the elements of the world, 
 with the beasts of the field, stones in the street, with 
 death and hell themselves, is unable to secure thee ; 
 therefore, whatsoever befall thee in thy body, goods, 
 children, or beasts, enter into thy chamber, be secret 
 and still, and let the right hand of the Lord of hosts 
 have the pre-eminence. 
 
 This was the reason, I conceive, that after those 
 last words, ' cast me into the sea,' though the men 
 strove with their oars, and cried to the Lord in the 
 * Senec. 
 
 next verse, yet there is no mention made either of 
 deed or word added by Jonah ; for what should he 
 do, when the countenance of the Lord was against 
 him, but ' run the race set before his eyes with 
 patience,' and fall to another meditation than before 
 he had, that, although he were thrown into the sea, 
 yet God was the Lord both of the land and the waters, 
 and whether he sunk or swam, lived or died, he was 
 that Lord's ? Inijuilicntie/: ivttales in ipso diabolo de- 
 prchcndi), I find that impatience was born of the devil, 
 saith Tertullian ; to him let us leave this plant, which 
 the hand of the Lord never planted, and to malcon- 
 tcuted imps, with whom there is nothing so rife as ban- 
 ning, blaspheming, bitter and swelling speech against 
 the highest power of heaven, if ever they be crossed 
 or wrung with the least tribulation. They never 
 learned how the links of that heavenly chain are 
 fastened one to the other ; that ' tribulation bringcth 
 patience, patience experience, experience hope, and 
 hope will never suffer them to be ashamed or dis- 
 mayed ;' they break the chain at the first link; 
 troubled they are against their wills, but that which 
 is voluntarj', as patience, experience, hope, they will 
 not add, that both in body and soul they may be 
 confounded. Wo on the other side hang upon the 
 chain, and trust to climb to heaven by it (through 
 the merits of Christ's death and passion), whereof 
 the last link consisteth ; and we suffer none of those 
 comfortable persuasions to fall to the ground without 
 use, that ' if we suffer with him, wo shall also reign 
 with him,' and ' through many tribulations we must 
 enter into the kingdom of heaven.' We regard not so 
 much what part we have in the whip, but what place 
 in the testament : non quam pwiiam in Jlar/cllo, sed 
 qttcin. locum in testamento .i- We know who hath se- 
 questered for us (to use the word of Tertullian), Ido- 
 ncus palieutiiJ' sequester Daus. God will truly account 
 for all our sufl'erings ; if we commit our wrongs unto 
 him, he will revenge them ; our losses, he will restore 
 them ; our lives, be will raise them up again. 
 * August. 
 
 LECTUEE XVI. 
 
 Tiiea llu'i/ cried unto the Lord, and snid, IFc beseech thee, O Lord, ice beseech thee. — Joxah I. 1-1. 
 
 THE sea is angi-y, you have heard, for the Lord of 
 hosts' sake, and will have a sacrifice ; they gave 
 it space and respite enough to see if time could make 
 it forget the injury that was ofl'ered ; they entered 
 consultation with Jonah himself of some milder hand- 
 ling him ; they spared not their painfullest contention 
 of arms and oars, to reduce him to land again. But 
 when delay wrought no better success, and neither 
 the prophet himself could by advice prescribe, nor 
 they efi'ect by labour and strength, the release of God's 
 vengeance, what should they do but make ready the 
 
 sacrifice, and bind it to the horns of the altar, bestow- 
 ing a few words of blessing and dedication (if I speak 
 rightly), before the ofl'ering thereof? Jonah is sacri- 
 ficed, in the next verse, ' So they took up Jonah ;' 
 but the consecration and hallowing of the sacrifice 
 goeth before in these words, ' wherefore they cried,' 
 &c. It is the catastrophe of the whole act, now it 
 draweth to an issue and accomplishment ; their fear, 
 prayer, projection of their wares, sortilege, examina- 
 tion of Jonah, consultation, and other machinations 
 and essays whatsoever, were but prefaces and intro- 
 
102 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 ductions U> this that I'olloweth. The sea hath made 
 a vow, aud will surely perform it : I will not give my 
 waters any rest, nor lie down upon my couch, till 
 Jonah be cast forth. 
 
 Wherefore, or then. It implieth an illation from the 
 former speeches ; when neither head nor hands, 
 counsel nor force could provide a remedy, they make 
 it their last refuge to commend both themselves and 
 Jonah to God by supplication : Jonah, by a touch, 
 and in secret, in that they call his blood innocent 
 blood, as who would say, he never did us hurt ; them- 
 selves of purpose, aud by profession, that having to 
 deal in a matter so ambiguous, the mercy and pardon 
 of God might be their sm-est fortress. The substance 
 and soul of the whole sentence is prayer, a late but 
 a safe experiment ; and if the worst should fall out, 
 that there were imperfection or blame in their action 
 now intended, prayer, the sovereignest restorative 
 under heaven to make it sound again. For thus in 
 effect they think. It may be we shall be guilty of the 
 life of a prophet, we address ourselves to the effusion 
 of harmless blood, we must adventure the fact ; and 
 whether we be right or wrong, we know not ; but 
 whatsoever betide, we bog remission at thine hands, 
 be gracious and merciful unto our ignorances, require 
 not soul for soul, blood for blood, neither lay our ini- 
 quities unto our charge. Prayer hath asked pardon, 
 and prayer (I doubt not) hath obtained pardon for 
 some of that bloody generation which slew the very 
 son and heir of the kingdom ; which ofl'ered an un- 
 righteous saci'ifice of a more righteous soul than ever 
 Jonah was ; else why did he open his mouth at his 
 death, and pour forth his groanings for those that 
 opened his side and poured forth his blood, ' Father, 
 forgive them ' ? 
 
 -Before, they had handled the oars of their trade 
 and occupation, but pre\'ailod not, ' for bodily exercise 
 profiteth nothing ;' now they betake them to the oars 
 of the Spirit, invocations, intercessions to the ever- 
 living God, that, if the banks of the land, which they 
 hoped to recover, should fail them, they might be 
 received to an harbour and road of the mercies of God. 
 These are the oars, my brethren, which shall row the 
 ship through all the storms and insurrections of the 
 waves of the seas, I mean the ark of God's church 
 universal, and these vessels of ours, our bodies and 
 souls in particular, through all the dangers of the 
 world, and laud them in the haven of eternal redemp- 
 tion. This world is a sea, as I find it compared, 
 swelling with pride, and vain glory the wind to heave 
 it up, blue and livid with envy, boiling with wrath, 
 deep with covetousncss, foaming with luxuriousness, 
 swallowing and drinking in all by oppression, danger- 
 ful for the rocks of presumption and desperation, ris- 
 ing with the waves of passions and perturbations, 
 ebbing and flowing with inconstancy, brinish and salt 
 with iniquity, and finally, mure amarum, a bitter and 
 unsavoury sea, with all kinds of misery. What should 
 
 we do, then, in such a sea of temptations, where the 
 arm of flesh is too weak to bear us out, and if our 
 strength were brass, it could not help us ; where we 
 have reason to carry a suspicion of all our ways, and 
 he that is most righteous in the cluster of mankind, 
 falleth in his happiest day seven times, and ' though 
 we were privy to nothing in ourselves, yet were we 
 not justified thereby,' but had need to crave, ' Cleanse 
 us, Lord, from our secret faults ;' where we are 
 taught to say, ' Father, forgive our debts ;' and if the 
 sum of our sins at our life's end be ten thousand talents, 
 then whether we speak or think, wake or sleep, or 
 whatsoever we do, we add a debt. When ' all ofi'end 
 in many things,' and many in all, and ' he that ofiendeth 
 in one jot of the law breaketh the whole,' what should 
 we do, I say, but as the apostle's exhortation is, 
 1 Thes. v., ' pray continually,' and think neither 
 place, nor time, nor business, unmeet to so holy aud 
 necessaiy an exercise ; that whether we begin the day, 
 we may say with Abraham's servant, Gen. xxiv., ' 
 Lord, send me good speed this day ;' or whether vv'e 
 be covered with the shadows of the night, we may 
 bog with that sweet singer of Israel, Ps. xiii., ' Lighten 
 mine eyes, that I sleep not in death ;' or whatsoever 
 we attempt in either of these two seasons, we may 
 prevent it with the blessing of that other psalm, Ps. 
 xc, ' Prosper the work of our hands upon us, oh 
 prosper thou our handiworks.' Eyrcdientes de hospit'to 
 armet oratio, ref/redientilins de jjlataa occurrat oralio ;* 
 when thou gocst out of thine house, let prayer arm 
 thee ; when thou comest home to thine house, let 
 prayer meet thee. Koceive not thy meat without 
 thanksgiving, take not thy cup without blessing, pray 
 for the sin of thine own soul, and ofl'er a sacrifice for 
 thy sons and daughters ; when thou liest down, couch 
 thyself in the mei'cies of God ; when thou risest up, 
 walk with the stalf of his providence. 
 
 In this prayer of the mariners, there are many notable 
 specialties : First, it is common ; the work of the whole 
 multitude. In the fifth verse there was mention of 
 prayers, I gi-ant, but there it is said, Inrocarwit (juisqiie 
 Deum «(«(»(, though all prayed, yet all apart, to theirpro- 
 pier Gods. Secondli/, fervent ; they cried in their prayer. 
 It is not a formal service ; the sound of their lips, and 
 the sighs of their souls, are sent with an earnest 
 message to the cars of God. Third!//, discreet ; they 
 pray not to their id<ils, as before, but to the Lord of 
 hosts. Foiirtldij, vocal and public ; there was a form 
 and tenor of supplication which their lips pronounced, 
 llicij said. Fij'tlihi, humble ; thc_y come with the term 
 and phrase of obsecration, xve beseech thee, O Lord. 
 Sia-tli/i/, importunate, as appeareth by their ingemi- 
 nation, we beseech thee, ice beseech thee. Serenth/i/, 
 seasonable and pertinent, applied to the thing then 
 in hand to be executed, brinf not npon us innocent blood. 
 Kiijldhlij, reasonable and just, standing upon a good 
 
 * Ilierou. 
 
Ver. 14.] 
 
 LECTURE XVI. 
 
 103 
 
 ground, fitted to the will and pleasure of the Almighty, 
 for thou. Lord, hast done as it pleased thee. 
 
 1. Tlu'ij. We are willed, Matthew the sixth, to 
 ' enter our chambers, and shut the doors, and pray to 
 our Father in secret ; and our Father that seeth in 
 secret shall openly reward it ;' because it was the 
 fashion of hypocrites to stand and pray in the syna- 
 gogues, and in the comers of the streets, to be seen of 
 men. Our Saviour never meant thereby to condemn 
 prayers in synagogues, either standing or kneeling, or 
 prayers in the corners of the streets, or in the height 
 of the market-places, or upon the house-tops, in the 
 sight both of men and angels, but only to exclude the 
 afl'ected ostentation of men-pleasing hypocrites, who 
 praj'ed to a wicked cud, not to obtain, but only to be 
 seen of men. Enter into thj' chamber and pray, go into 
 the temple and pray; commune with thine own heart, 
 commune with the multitude, both are good. And that 
 we may know that we are not stinted in our prayers, 
 only to ourselves and our private famihes (as the Athen- 
 ians would ofl'er sacrifice but only for their own city and 
 their neighbours of Chins), our Saviour hath taught us 
 the contrary, in that absolute form of his, willing us to 
 say, ' Our Father which art in heaven ;' as if we all came 
 from one womb, and whosoever spake, pleaded the 
 cause of the rest of his brethren. Not that we may 
 not say asunder and in private. My Father, as Thomas 
 said, ' My God and my Lord ;' but as there is a time 
 for the one, so we must not omit the other in due 
 season. It is a principle both of nature and policy, 
 vis inula fortior, strength united receiveth more 
 strength ; it holdeth likewise in divinity. If the prayer 
 of one righteous person availeth much, the j)rayer of 
 many righteous shall avail more. If the Syropba^ni- 
 cian obtained for her daughter the suit she made, much 
 more shall the church and congregation of Christ obtain 
 for her children. If, ' where two or three be gathered 
 together in his name, he is in the midst of them,' 
 much rather in the midst of a people, in the midst of 
 thousands, in whom there is animn una, cor unum, one 
 soul, one heart, one tongue, as if they were all but one 
 man. Lord, heal the sores of our land in this point ; 
 and as it is thy work alone that ' those who dwell 
 together in one house shall be of one mind, 'so magnify 
 this work amongst us, that the children of this realm, 
 which fly from our churches and oratories, as John 
 from the bath wherein Cerinthus was, rending and 
 tearing the soul of this country into two pieces, dividing 
 the voice and language thereof in their prayers to God, 
 Elias and his company praying in one place, and with 
 one style, ' Lord God of Abraham,' and they in 
 another, ' Baal, hear us' (for so they do in effect, 
 when they pray to such as hear them not) ; some call- 
 ing for fire to consume the sacrifice, and some for 
 water to consume the fire ; some praying for the life of 
 Deborah the queen of this land, and some for the life 
 of Jabin the king of Spain ; thus mingling and con- 
 founding the ears of the Lord with opposite petitions. 
 
 from crossing and contrary afiections, that at length 
 they may consider from whence they are fallen and 
 severed, both from the unity of this public body of 
 ours, wherein they have their maintenance, and, if they 
 take not heed, of that mystical body of their Lord and 
 Redeemer Christ Jesus. 
 
 2. They cried. It is a condition which James 
 requireth, ' the prayer of the just, ;/ it l/e fervent.' 
 Else even the prayers of the just, if they be perfunc- 
 tory and cold, rather of custom than of devotion and 
 piety, they profit not, but to condemnation. ' Cursed 
 be he that doeth the work of the Loi'd negligently ;' 
 prayer is a work of his. ' The Lord is near unto all 
 them that call upon him faithfully,' not formally. He 
 giveth both aqu/ini et sitiin,'" the benefit, and the grace 
 to desire and thirst after it. We hear not our own 
 prayers (I mean not for want of sound, and much bab- 
 bling, but for want of inward desire) ; the voice of our 
 spirit is soft and snbmiss, and dieth in the air before 
 it ascendcth into the presence of God ; and shall we 
 think that God will hear us?f Our bodies haply in 
 the church, our minds without ; our tongue uttereth 
 prayers, our heart thinketh on usuries ; we bow the 
 knees of our flesh, but not the knees of our hearts. 
 He that knew in his soul that prayer ' from feigned 
 lips ' and a false heart would return empty into his 
 bosom that sent it up, but ' a broken and contrite 
 spirit the Lord would not despise,' never pressed into 
 the courts of his God, but the inwardest and deepest 
 affections of his mind were given in sacrifice. ' Every 
 night w^ashed he his bed, and watered his couch with 
 tears ;' he in the night time, when others slept and 
 took their natural recreation ; yea, there was not a 
 night that escaped without task, and it washed not bis 
 plants alone, but the very pallet and couch which he 
 lodged upon. So richly was his soul watered with the 
 dew of heaven, that it ministered continually both 
 fountains to his eyes, and a fluent expedition to his 
 tongue to commend his prayers. We may learn to be 
 zealous in our prayers, even of those wooden priests, 
 1 Kings xviii., of whom it is written that ' they called 
 upon the name of Baal from morning till noon,' and 
 when they had no answer, ' they cried loud,' nay, 
 ' they cut themselves with knives and lances, till the 
 blood flowed out ;' so they prayed not only in tears, 
 but in blood, that they might be heard. I would the 
 children of the light were as zealous in their genera- 
 tions. But rather let them receive their Ught and 
 directions for the framing of this holy exercise from 
 the Sun of righteousness, of whom the apostle witness- 
 eth, Heb. v., that ' in the days of his flesh he ollered 
 up praj'crs and supplications, with strong crying and 
 tears, unto him that was able to help him.' And the 
 Gospel further declareth, not only that ' he kneeled' 
 (at the naming of whose name all knees have bowed, 
 both in heaven and earth, and under the earth), but 
 that ' he fell upon the ground,' the footstool of his 
 * Gregor. t Chrysost. 
 
104 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I 
 
 own majestj', and ' lay upon bis face,' -which never 
 angel beheld without reverence ; and when he bad 
 prayed before, be prayed 'more earnestly' (as the 
 Scripture recordetb), he once prayed, and departed ; 
 and a second time, and depai'ted ; and yet a third 
 time, and departed ; evermore using the same petition. 
 His prayer ascended by degi-ees, bke incense and per- 
 fume, and not onl}' his lips went, but bis agony and 
 contention within was so vehement, that ' an angel 
 ■was sent from heaveu to comfort bim ;' and whereas 
 the priests of Baal used art to make them bleed, cut- 
 ting theii' flesh with lances and knives to that purpose, 
 lie, with the trouble of his soul, sweat a natural, or 
 rather unnatural, sweat, ' like drops of blood trickling 
 down to the earth.' AYe, when we go to prayer, as if 
 our souls and tongues were strangers, the one not 
 witting what the other doth, the lips babbling without, 
 and the heart not pricked with any inward compunc- 
 tion, ' honouring God with our mouths, and our spirits 
 far from him,' deserve to be answered as he answered 
 the Jews, Isa. i., ' When you stretch forth your hands, 
 I will hide mine eyes from j-ou ; and though you make 
 manj- prayers, I will not hear you.' The reason is 
 there, ' your hands arc full of blood ;' the reason to us 
 may be, your hearts bleed not ; you call me Lord, 
 Lord, but mean it not : the altar is without fii'e, prayer 
 without heat, words without intention, gesture of the 
 body without the consent of the inward man. 
 
 S. TIicij ciicd unto the Lord. It is not less than a 
 mu'acle, that men so newly endued with the knowledge 
 of God, can so presently renounce their ancient idols 
 which they had ever served, and within but few 
 minutes of time most religiously adored ; they call 
 upon Jehovah, that hidden and fearful name, which 
 erst they had not known ; and neither the accustomed 
 manner of their countries, nor colour of antiquity", nor 
 want of exjjerience in another Lord, nor the simple 
 narration of one singular prophet, nor any the like 
 motions, can hold them in awe of their former imagi- 
 nary gods, and keep them from invocation of the Ijord 
 of hosts. Kg reason can be yielded but this, ' The 
 wind bloweth where it listeth,' and the Spirit breatheth 
 where it will, and the mercy of God softeneth where 
 Lis pleasure is. It is a gift from him alone, who 
 giveth the new heart and putteth the new spirit within 
 a man ; who taketh the stony heart from him, and 
 givethhim an heart of flesh instead thereof, Ezck. xsxvi. 
 20, who of the stones by the banks of Jordan (saith 
 John Baptist) ' is able to raise up children to Abra- 
 ham,' and daily doth raise up children to himself, to 
 do him worship and service, of those that were hardened 
 in idolatry before, like flints in the streets. Turn us, 
 Lord, and wo shall bo turned ; wash us with clean 
 water, and we shall be cleansed ; renew us (as the 
 eagle her days), and we shall be renewed ; gather thy 
 chosen flock from the mountains and deserts when they 
 stray, to fuUll thy fold, and we shall be gathered; say, 
 thou wilt sweep thy house, and find thy groat, and wc 
 
 shall be found. Nature cannot make a new birth ; 
 entering into oiu' mother's womb again, is unable to 
 work it ; the gold of Sheba and Seba cannot purchase 
 it. ' No man cometh to the Son, imless the Father 
 di'aw him ;' and if the Father have once given him into 
 bis hands, all the devils in bell cannot pull bim out 
 again. I make it the wisdom of him that prayeth, to 
 level bis heart and affections at the very right centre 
 and mark of prayer, which is God alone; he is the 
 sanctuary to whom we must fly, the period and scope 
 in whom our requests must end. Prayer and faith 
 (if the apostle deceive us not, liom. x.) must kiss each 
 other ; ' how shall they call on bim in whom they have 
 not believed?' Faith is the ground of prayer; iirst, 
 ' we believe,' and then ' speak;' so was the order of 
 David, Ps. cxvi. Do we (mj* brethrun) believe in 
 angels ? for that is the apostle's phrase, how shall they 
 call on bim, ei; h oix i'TTion'otiav, ' in whom,' or ' upon 
 whom, they have not believed '?' We believe aiu/clos, that 
 there are angels, which the Sadducees denied. And if 
 an angel should come from heaven unto us with a mes- 
 sage from God, as he came to Mary and others, we 
 would believe angels, (nujdia, that is, give credence 
 unto them, as they did. But if we believe in angels, 
 ill anridos, w c forget then- place of ministration which 
 they are appointed unto, and make them our gods. 
 Much less beheve we in the sons of men, which are 
 less than angels. Therefore the gleaning of these 
 mariners is more worth than the whole vintage of Home, 
 who, in a moment of time, have gathered more know- 
 ledge how to inform their praj'ers aright, than they in 
 the decourse of many continued generations. These 
 pray to Jehovah, the true subsisting God ; they not 
 only to God, but to angels, and men, and stocks, and 
 stones, and metals, and papers, and I know not wl;at. 
 It may be a challenge sufficient unto them all (to 
 say no more), that in so many prayers of both ancient 
 and righteous patriarchs, prophets, judges, kings, 
 registered in the book of God, and in an huudi-ed and 
 fifty psalms, an huudrtd whereof at least are prayers 
 and supplications, and in all the devout requests that 
 the apostles of Christ, and other his disciples sent into 
 heaveu (if the}' take the pen of a writer, and note from 
 the beginning of Genesis to the end of the llevclatiou), 
 they cannot find one directed to cherub or seraphim, 
 Gabriel or Eaphael, Abraham or Moses, or John Bap- 
 tist after his death, or any other creature iu heaven or 
 earth, save only to the Lord and his anointed. Have 
 these all erred '? Even so will wc ; and more s\\eet 
 shall our error be unto us, with these, of whom we 
 make no question, but that they are bound up in the 
 bundle of life with the congregation of first-born, than 
 a new and recent device of prayer, obtruded unto us 
 by those who falsely suppose themselves to be tho 
 pillars and stays of God's militant church. The 8()th 
 Psalm (to give you a litlle portion of food to ruminate 
 upon), as some conceive, was not a psalm composed 
 for any pai-ticular use, but left to the church of God, 
 
Vkr. U.J 
 
 LECTURE XVI. 
 
 105 
 
 as a general rule and prescription to fit the condition 
 of every man. "Wherein there are first some I'easons 
 in our own behalf, wherewith we insinuate oiu'selves 
 into the favour of God, that he may hear us : 1. ' Bow 
 down thine ear unto me, Lord.' Why ? ' I am 
 poor and needy ;' the exigence of my distressful aftairs 
 requu-eth thy help. 2. ' Presei-ve thoumy soul.' Why? 
 ' I am merciful ;' I ask not mercy at thy throne, but 
 as I shew mercy again to my bretln-en. 3. ' Save thou 
 thy servant, my God.' AVhy ? ' Because he putteth 
 his trust in thee ;' he hath no other rock to cleave unto. 
 
 4. ' Be merciful unto me, Lord.' A^^ly ? ' I cr,' 
 upon thee eonttnually ;' I have constantly decreed with 
 myself not to give over the hope of thy comfort. 
 
 5. ' Rejoice the soul of thy servant.' Why? ' For 
 to thee, Lord, do I lift up my soul ;' the best and 
 chosenest member I have shall do thee service. His 
 misery, mercy, faithfulness, constancy, sincerity, speak 
 for audience. Now, on behalf of God, there are other 
 inducements recited from the 5 th verse, why we resort 
 to the wings of his favom- when we are distressed : 
 1. From his mercy and kindness to all that call upon 
 him : ' furthou,^Lord, art good andgracious, and of great 
 compassion ;' therefore give ear to my prayer, and 
 hearken unto the voice of my supphcation, 2. From 
 experience and trial : ' Li the day of my trouble will 
 I call upon thee, for thou hearest me.' S. From com- 
 parison and greatness of his works : ' Amongst the 
 gods there is none like unto thee, and who can do like 
 thy works ?' 4. From consent of the world : ' All 
 nations whom thou hast made shall come and worship 
 before thee, Lord, and shall glorify thy name.' 
 5. From the soleness and singularity of his Godhead, 
 which is the chief : ' For thou art groat, and doest 
 wondrous things, and art God alone.' 1, His general 
 exhibition of mercy to all ; 2, particular and personal 
 application to some; 3, the rareness and majesty of 
 his works ; 4, the consent of nature and nations ; 
 5, the singularity of Godhead : these are motions and 
 persuasions to call forth our prayers ; and these, if 
 they can be verified, either of angels or men, I refuse 
 not to give them a part with God in this our sacred 
 oblation. 
 
 4. Tliei/ cried and sciid. Then' prayers were also 
 vocal and expressed. The groanmgs of the spirit un- 
 doubtedly, though Zachai'ias be dumb and cannot 
 speak a word, shall never be refused. He made the 
 heart and the tongue, that understandeth the language 
 of both alike ; he is as near to our reins as to our lips ; 
 and the voice of the one is not more audible to him 
 that heareth without ears, than the other's intention. 
 In Dei aurihus desiderium tehemeiis ddiiwr iiwt/nus est ; 
 remissa iiitciitio, vox submissa ;'■' in the ears of God a 
 vehement desire is a great crj', a remiss and careless 
 intention is a submiss and still voice. Hannah, a type 
 of the chm-ch, ' spake in her heart, her lips did only 
 move, and her voice was not heard,' 1 Sam. i. Yea, 
 ♦ Bernard. 
 
 the gestures of her body through the grief of her soul 
 were such, that EU reproved her of drunkenness. In- 
 deed, she was di-unk, not with the wine of grapes, but 
 with the wine of devotion, which ran from the wine- 
 press of a troubled spirit, and the Lord remembered 
 her petition, though she prayed with her heart alone, 
 and her tongue stirred not. AVhat then ? Hath the 
 tongue immunity thereby from doing that homage unto 
 the Lord which" he hath enjoined it ? Shall not ' the 
 calves of our lips' be required, because we have ten- 
 dered the calves of our hearts ? JMust not both the 
 heart believe, and the mouth make confession ? and 
 as the one is the cistern withm thyself to contain the 
 honour of God, so must not the other be the pipe to 
 convey it to thy brethren ? Surely yes. Ask both 
 body and soul, "and every part of them both, whose 
 image and inscription they bear ? They will tell thee, 
 God's ; then pay the tribute of both, and glorify God 
 with thy body and spirit, for both are his. And as 
 thou liftest up thy soul with David in the 86th Psalm, 
 so lift up thy h mds also with Moses, lift up thine 
 eyes with Stejahen, lift up thy voice with Deborah, and 
 with all the children of God, whose pleasure and joy 
 it is to hear God praised in the great congreg.dion. 
 If there be priests to pray for the people, which must 
 weep ' between the porch and the altar,' even in the 
 body and navel of the chm-ch, where the sound of his 
 voice may best be heard, and say, ' Spare thy people, 
 Lord,' &c., Joel ii. ; if there be temples and churches 
 which the prophet hath termed, and Chi-ist ratified to be, 
 the ' houses of prayer ;' if there be seldom and set times 
 appointed for these duties to be done in ; if there be 
 forms and patterns devised, even from the Son of God, 
 how om- prayers should bo conceived : then is there 
 no question but we must open our lips in the service 
 of God, and our mouth must be willing to shew forth 
 his praise. 
 
 5. ]Vc beseech thee, Lord. They use the pro- 
 perest terms of submission that may be. They come 
 not to brag, ' We are worthy, Lord, w^honi thou 
 shouldst do for,' as the princes of the people spake 
 for the centm-ion in the Gospel ; they come not to in- 
 dent and bargain, ' If thou wilt be om- God,' &c. ; they 
 know they stand upon grace, not desert, and that the 
 Lord must be entreated, or they cannot hve. Humi- 
 hty is both a grace itself, and a vessel to comprehend 
 other gi-aces ; and this is the nature of it, the more it 
 receivelh of the blessings of God, the more it may. 
 For it ever emptieth itself, by a modest estimation of 
 her own gifts, that God may always fill it ; it wrestleth 
 and striveth with God, according to the policy of Jacob, 
 that is, winneth by yielding ; and the lower it stoopeth 
 towards the ground, the more advantage it getteth to 
 obtain the blessing. qiuun excelsns es, Doinine, et 
 humiles corde sunt domus titer ;* Lord, how high 
 and sovereign art thou, and the humble of heart are 
 thine houses to dwell in. ' Where is that house that 
 * Aufrust. in confess. 
 
106 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 ye will build imto me, and where is thut place of my 
 rest ? To him will I look, even to him that is pure, 
 and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my words,' 
 Isa. Isvi. Plutarch writeth of some who sailed to 
 Athens for philosophy's sake, that first they were 
 called sopliistrr, wise men, afterwards philosophi, but 
 lovers of wisdom ; next, rhetores, only reasouers and 
 discoursers ; last of all, idiote, simple, unlettered men. 
 The more they profited in learning, the less they 
 aclmowledged it. Thus, in sj)iritual graces, we should 
 study to be great, but not know it ; as the stars in the 
 firmament, though they be bigger than the earth, yet 
 they seem much less. In alto iinn ahum sa'pere, not 
 to be high-minded in high deserts, is the way to pre- 
 ferment. David asketh, Qnis ego sum, Domine, ' 
 Lord, who am I ?' He was taken from that lowliness 
 of conceit to be the king of Israel. Jacob protcsteth. 
 Minor sum, ' I am less than the least of thy mercies ;' 
 he was preferred before his elder brother, and made 
 the father of the twelve tribes. Peter crieth, Exi d me, 
 Domine, homo peccntor sum, ' Go out from me, Lord, I 
 am a sinful man ;' he heard, ' Fear not, I will hence- 
 forth make thee a fisher of men.' John Baptist sound- 
 eth, Non sum dir/nns. ' I am not worthy to loose the 
 latchet of his shoe ;' he was found worthy to lay his 
 hands upon the head of Christ. The centurion treadeth 
 in the same footsteps, Non sum. dit/nux, ' I am not 
 worthy, under the roof of whoso house thou shouldst 
 come ;' his commendation was rave, ' I have not found 
 so gi'eat faith, no, not in Israel.' Paul departeth not 
 from the same words, Nonsumdii/iius', ' lamnotworthy 
 to be called an apostle ;' he ' obtained mercy to the 
 example of those that were afterwards to come.' The 
 blessed virgin, in her answer to the angel, sheweth 
 that the salutation no way lifted up her heart, Ecee 
 nucitla Doviiui, ' Behold the handmaid of the Lord;' 
 she obtaineth that for which ' all tlie generations of 
 the world should call her blessed.' This base and 
 inglorious style of the most glorious saints of God, nou 
 sum dii/uus, and the like, shall get us the honour of 
 saints, shall raise us from the dust, and set us upon 
 thrones, take us from amongst beasts, and place us 
 with angels. What was it in the blessed virgin, the 
 mother of God's first-born, the glory and flower of 
 womankind, that God regarded so much ? She telleth 
 you, in her song of thanksgiving, ' He hath regarded 
 
 the lowliness of his handmaid ;' yea, the blood and 
 juice of that whole song is in praise of humility. ' He 
 hath scattered the proud in the imaginations of their 
 heart, he hath put down the mighty from their seat, 
 and hath exalted the humble and meek.' Oh that the 
 women of our age could sing Ma(/ni/icat with that hum- 
 bleness of spirit that Mary did, ' My soul doth magnify 
 the Lord ;' that recompense would be theirs which 
 followeth : ' He that is mighty hath magnified me 
 again, and holy is his name.' But they magnify them- 
 selves too much with pedlars' ware (what shall I term 
 it?), unprofitable garments, which the moth shall fret, 
 and time itself rot upon their backs, but they never 
 think in their hearts how God may be magnified. It 
 is not without some mysterj' that the angels told the 
 shepherds, Luke ii., ' This shall be a sign unto you, 
 you shall find the infant wrapt in swaddhug clothes.' 
 In siffuum podti sunt panni tui, O bone Jcsu, sed in 
 sifjnuin avTiXtyo/Mivov, ' A sign that is spoken against;'* 
 a sign that is done against ; we cannot abide thy clouts, 
 thy rags (0 Lord Jesu), nor any part of thy humility. 
 His nativity was by his ordinance first preached to 
 shepherds ; he contended with his forerunner who 
 should be the lowlier of the two ; he took fishermen 
 to be his disciples, embraced young children, paid tri- 
 bute to his inferiors, fled away that he might not be 
 made a king, washed the feet of his apostles, charged 
 the leper not to tell any man, rode upon an ass, sought 
 his Father's glory, not his own, to whom he was ' obe- 
 dient to the death, even to the deatli of the cross.' In 
 all which he doth not less than proclaim unto us, 
 ' learn of me to be humble and meek, and j"ou shall 
 find rest for your souls.' I say but this. The Master 
 is worth}' your hearing, the lesson your learning, the 
 recompense your receiving. In this bed of humility 
 let me rest your souls for this time, and let us beseech 
 the God of majesty, who is higher than the highest in 
 the earth, who will resist the proud, and give his graces 
 to the humble and weak ; that whether we ask, we 
 may ask in humility ; or whether we have received, we 
 may use it without vainglory, that all our words and 
 works may be powdered with that salt in the psalm, 
 which eat out all ostentation, ' Not unto us, Lord, 
 not unto us, but unto thy name give the honour and 
 praise.' Amen. 
 
 * Bern. scr. de verb. Angel. 
 
 LECTURE XVII. 
 We beseech ihee, O Lonl, we beseech thee, let us not perish for tliis man's life. — Jonah I. 14. 
 
 THE prayer of the mariners boginneth not till you 
 come to these words. The other were the words 
 of the history, reporting what they did ; these now pro- 
 pounded are their own, or at least the sum and ell'ect 
 of them. We may reduce them to two heads : first, 
 a petition, and therein a preface, ' We beseech thee, 
 
 Lord, we beseech thee," comprising the manner and 
 form of praying, and the matter or substance of the 
 petition, ' Let us not perish for this man's life,' &c. ; 
 second, the reason, ' For thou. Lord, hast done as it 
 pleased thee.' So as in the words of the history, 
 signifying how they behaved themselves, together 
 
Ver. 14.] 
 
 LECTURE XVir. 
 
 107 
 
 witb the petition, and the reason of the same, we find 
 eight conditions requisite to the natui'e of prayer, 
 five whereof we have ah-eady dealt in ; the sixth we 
 are to proceed unto. 
 
 G. The iruportunity tljcy use, implied in tlie doulj- 
 ling and iterating of their suppliant tcnns, 11 '« hc-nrch 
 ihee, Lord, u-e beseech tliee. ' Woe be to him that 
 is alone,' who, when he hath spoken once, speakcth 
 no more, as if he were weaiy of well-doing, and rc- 
 jiented himself that he had begun. If his former 
 request be weak and infirm, tainting in the way to the 
 mercy of God, he hath not a friend to help it, nor a 
 brother to say unto it, ' Be strong.' This double 
 supphcation of theirs falleth as the showers of the 
 first and latter rain ; if the one taileth of watering the 
 earth sutiiciently, the other fulfiUeth the appetite and 
 thirst thereof. So should our prayers be bent, that as 
 the kine of the Philistines, which bare the ark, 1 Sam. 
 vi., though they were milch, and had calves at home, 
 ' yet they kept the straight way to Beth-shemesh, and 
 held one path, and lowed as they went, and turned 
 neither to the right hand nor the left, neither ever 
 stood still till tliej' came into the field of Joshua, 
 where he was reaping his harvest;' so the alfection of 
 cm- souls bearing the ark and cofler of our suits, 
 though it hath worldly allurements to draw it back, 
 as the kine had calves, 3'et keepeth on the way to the 
 house of God, as they to Beth-shemesh, holding one 
 path of perseverance, lowing with zeal, turning neither 
 to the right nor to the left hand with wandering cogi- 
 tations, till it Cometh into the field and garden of God, 
 where her harvest groweth. 
 
 TTV beseech thee, lie beseech tliee. This ingemination 
 of speech noteth an unmovcable and constant affec- 
 tion to the thing we affect, as if the tongue and heart 
 were willing to dwell thereupon. ' Absalom, my 
 son Absalom, Absalom, my son, my son,' was the 
 mourning of David, when he heard of the death of 
 Absalom, as if his soul had been tied to the name and 
 memory of his son, and his tongue had forgotten all 
 other speech, save only to pronounce Absalom. It 
 sheweth what love our Saviour bare to the holy city, 
 in that he repeated his sorrows over it, ' Jerusalem, 
 Jerusalem,' as if he had made a vow, with David, ' If 
 I forget Jerusalem, let my riglit hand forget her cun- 
 ning, or rather my tongue her moving.' I cannot 
 leave thee at the first naming, thou art deeper in my 
 heart, therefore I say, Jcnisahm, and u^MnJenisaleDi, 
 I ever regarded thy welfare with undoubted compas- 
 sion. The mariners import no less in repeating their 
 request, we beseech thee, U Lord, and once again, ire 
 beseech thee ; pardon our importunate outcries, ' om- 
 hearts are fixed, yea, our hearts are fixed,' our ' souls 
 are athirst for thy loving-kindness, we will give thee 
 no rest' till thou receivest our prayers. The longer 
 Abraham talked with God, Gen. xviii., the more he 
 gained. He brought him li-om the whole number to 
 fifty, and from fifty to ten, before he left him. ' Be- 
 
 hold, I have begun to speak unto my Lord, and am but 
 dust and ashes ; let not my Lord be angry, and I will 
 speak again,' and once more, ' I have begun to speak,' 
 and once more, ' let not my Lord be offended.' Once 
 more and aijain, j'ou see, are able to send away clouds 
 of fire and brimstone. And so far was it ofl' that 
 God was angry with his instant request, that he gave 
 him both a patient ear and a gracious answer, ' If ten 
 be found there, I will not destroy it. It jileaseth the 
 ears of his majesty right well to be long entreated, his 
 nature is never so truly aimed at as when we persuade 
 ourselves that our impatience in prayer can never 
 oifcnd his patience. He that hath twice and ten 
 times together ingeminated the riches of his mercy, 
 as Exod. xxxiv., ' The Lord, the Lord, is merciful, 
 gracious, slow to anger, abundant in goodness and 
 truth, reserving mercy for thousands, forgivmg ini- 
 quity, and sin, and transgression ;' what did he 
 mean thereby, but that twice and ten times together 
 we should cry for his mercy ? 
 
 We beseech thee, Lord, ire beseech thee. A woman 
 of Canaan, in the Gospel, Mat. xv., calleth upon our 
 Saviour, ' Have mercy upon me, O Lord, thou Son of 
 David, my daughter is miserably vexed with a devil ; 
 he answered her not one word.' It appeareth that 
 she called still, because his disciples said, ' Send her 
 away, for she crieth after us.' Then he was 'not 
 sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel ;' yet 
 she came and ' worshipped him, saying. Lord, help 
 me.' He answereth, ' It is not meet to take the chil- 
 dren's bread and cast it to the whelps.' She replied 
 upon him, ' Truth, Lord, but the whelps eat of the 
 crumbs that fall from their master's table.' Then 
 Jesus answered, and said unto her, ' woman, great 
 is thy faith.' She fastened upon Christ with her 
 prayers, as the woman of Shunam upon Elisha with 
 her hands, 2 Kings iv. She caught him by the feet, 
 and said unto him, ' As the Lord liveth, and as thy 
 soul hveth, I will not leave thee.' Consider what 
 discouragements her poor soul digested : 1, she was 
 ' not answered ' by Clu-ist ; 2, she had hack fiiends of 
 his disciples ; 3, she was none of the lost sheep ; 4, 
 she was a whelp. Yet in the end she obtained both a 
 cure for her daughter's infirmity, and a commendation 
 for her own faith. She wrought a miracle by the 
 force of her prayers, she made both the deaf to hear 
 and the dumb to speak, she cried to the ears and 
 tongue of her Eedeemer, Ephatha, ' Be ye opened,' 
 hear and answer my petition, fulfil my request. Nun 
 iiiiporliiniis nee impiidens cs,* &c. ; it is not a saucy nor 
 shameless part in thee to ask remission of thy sins 
 at God's hands without ceasing; thou givest him 
 occasion to do a memorable act, convenient to his 
 nature, glorious to his holy name. That which man 
 giveth, he loseth and dispossesseth himself of; it is 
 not so with God ; thou art not the better, God the 
 worse, thou the richer, God the poorer, for his gifts, 
 * August, de verb. Apost. 
 
108 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [CnAl>. I. 
 
 710H tu accipiendo proficis, et Dens in dando deficit. 
 ' Open thy moutli wide, and he will fill it ;' enlarge 
 thy belly, and he will satisfy thee. Fons rincit si- 
 tientcm, the fountain and source of his goodness is 
 above the desire and thirst of thy necessities. If 
 you observed it in the last history, the disciples of 
 Christ thought it an impudent part that the Syrophce- 
 nician cried after them, ' Send her away.' Did 
 Chi'ist so account it, or would he dismiss her ? 
 Doubtless it joyed his heart to suspend her desires in 
 expectation, and consequently to extend them, to hold 
 her long in his company ; he said to himself, I am 
 well pleased that she erieth after me. It delighted his 
 ears to hear her redoubled obsecrations, more than 
 the instruments of David could have done ; it gave him 
 matter to work upon, it tried a faith, it won a soul, it 
 occasioned a miracle. Bernaid to this purpose noteth 
 of the spouse in the Canticles,! beginning her suit, and 
 wooing of Christ so rudely as she doeth, ' Let him kiss 
 me with the kisses of his mouth,' though to entreat a 
 great favour- of a great Lord she useth no flattery unto 
 him, she seoketh no means, she goeth not about by 
 drifts and circumlocutions, she maketh no preamble, 
 she worketh no benevolence, but from the abundance 
 of her heart suddenly breaketh forth, iiiulc fiontesque 
 satis, barelj' and boldly enough, Let him kiss me 
 with a kiss of his lips. The pai-ables in St Luke, 
 chaps, xi. and sviii., the one of a friend called up at 
 midnight, the other of a wicked judge, instmct us thus 
 much, that unless we hold a meaner opinion of God 
 than of a common vnilgar friend, which were too base 
 to conceive, or a more unrighteous judgment of him 
 than of the most unrighteous judge (thau which what 
 can be thought more blasphemous ?), we should not 
 distrust the success of our praj-ers, but that improbity 
 and importunity at the least would draw him to audi- 
 ence. It was midnight with these mariners when 
 the}- caUed at the gates of God, the friend and lover 
 of the souls of men, the unseasouablost and deadest 
 time in the judgment of human reason. They called 
 for more than loaves, the rehef and succour of their 
 lives, more dear unto them than any sustenance. 
 Their fi-ieud ? Nay, their enemy was at hand, and the 
 last enemy of mankind. The gates seemed to be 
 shut, all hopes of deliverance well nigh past ; the 
 children were in bed asleep, vain was the help of man, 
 their arm was weak, and their oars unprofitable, angels 
 and saints could not help them ; yet thej- knocked at 
 the gates of their friend once, ' We beseech thee, 
 Lord,' and, because he denied them the first time, 
 they knocked again, ' We beseech thee, Lord ;' and 
 I doubt not but thiy- continued knocking, till in the 
 end he arose, and granted them their heart's requests. 
 7. The next condition of their prayer was, that it 
 was properly and pertinent I}- applied to their present 
 fear, ' Let us not perish for this man's life,' &c. It 
 was -written in their hearts, which others might have 
 t Scr. vii. iu Cautic. 
 
 read in the Psalms of David, ' Touch not mine anointed, 
 and do my prophets no harm.' They thought that 
 pi-ophets were jewels and pearls unto God, and that 
 the marring of one such would severely be rcqim-ed. 
 Hence come their tears, this is the thorn that pricketh 
 them, fear to ofl'cnd in hurting an harmless man, to- 
 gether with that stiug and venom which sin leaveth 
 behind it ; they know it will call for vengeance, and 
 though it pass the hand, and the eye, speeding itself 
 in the seeming of him that doeth it, into the land of 
 forgetfulness, as it should never be thought upon, yet 
 the Lord will fetch it back again, and set it before the 
 face of the sinner, and laj- it as freshlj- to his charge 
 as if he were then in the act and perpetration thereof. 
 These be the sores wherewith they smart, danger of 
 their own lives, if they assault the life of Jonah ; and 
 watchfulness of the justice of God in taking account 
 of forepassed sins. To these they apply the medicines. 
 We know the order of thy court and judgment-seat, to 
 exact life for life, therefore let us not perish for tliis 
 inan's life; we know that no sin can escape thy dreaJful 
 hand, therefore if we happen to ofi'end in spilling in- 
 nocent blood, lay not our iniqiiitij upon us, blot it out 
 of thy book, let it pass as a morning dew before the 
 sun, and not be imputed. In disposing our- praj-crs 
 to God, we must, as the scribe in the Gospel, ' bring 
 forth of our treasures things old and new.' For the 
 blessings of God in general, there may be general 
 thanksgivings; for sins in general, general confessions; 
 ancient and usual forms of prayer for ancient and Ubual 
 occurrences. We may ' take unto us words,' as the 
 prophet speaketh, Hosea xiv., 'and say unto the Lord' 
 at all times, ' Take away all iniquity, and receive us 
 graciously, so will we render the calves of our lips." 
 But as the matter of God's judgments and our dangers 
 is varied, so must we accordingly vary oiu- prayers. 
 In the time of a plague, we must make of our prayers 
 a particular Mithridate* against the plague, acknow- 
 ledging the hand of God that inflicted it, knowing that 
 the cause and original thereof is not so much infection 
 in the air, as rottenness and corruption within our own 
 bones, beseeching his majestj', as Phinehas did, that 
 the plague maj' cease, and that he will visit no longer 
 with that kind of judgment. If the land be smitten 
 with leanness and scarcity, so that the childi-en thereof 
 cry for bread, and swoon as they go in the streets for 
 want of food, we must pray in another style, that the 
 Lord will vouchsafe to ' hear the heavens ag;iin, the 
 heavens may hear the earth, the earlh the coi-n, the 
 vine, and the oil, and these Israel,' Hosea ii., or other 
 his distressed people, and that he will visit no longer 
 with this kind of judgment. If the encm}- shall say 
 against us, ' Come, we will devour, v.-e will devour, 
 the name of Sion shall be no more had in remem- 
 brance,' wc must turn unto the Lord with another form 
 of supphcation: Joel ii., ' Sparc thy people, Lord, 
 
 * A Milhndate was a culebratcii antidote against poison, said 
 to have been discovered by Milliridutes, king of Poutus. — Ed. 
 
Ver. ] 1.] 
 
 LECTURE XVII. 
 
 i09 
 
 and give not thine heritage into reproach, that the 
 heathen should rule over them ; wherefore should 
 they say among the people, Where is now their God ? ' 
 Oh cease to visit thy servants with this kind of judg- 
 ment. If the heavens be brass above us, and di-op 
 no moisture upon our fruits, or if the spouts which 
 God hath divided in the air pour down too much upon 
 our heads — sometime he roareth so fearfully with his 
 voice of thunders as who may abide it ? His light- 
 nings give shine to the earth, and our eyes are dazzled 
 thereat ; he raincth down tempests and storms upon 
 us, hailstones and coals of fire, this is our portion 
 sometimes to drink — still, as his plagues are now, so let 
 us come before him with new songs, new intercessions, 
 meekly kneeling before the Lord our maker, and falling 
 low at his footstool, that his hand may be turned back 
 in these kinds of judgments. Thus did Solomon 
 dedicate and bless the temple, 2 Chron. vi., beseech- 
 ing the Lord, that when the people should pray unto 
 him, according to their sundry needs, whether they 
 were troubled with the assault of their enemy, or with 
 want of rain, with fiimine, or mildew, or v>'ith captivity, 
 he would (hen hear them in heaven, and be merciful 
 unto them. The sickness which these mariners sus- 
 pect is an issue of blood, which being once opened, 
 will ever run and keep a course, if it be not staunched 
 with the mercy of God, and therefore thej' call upon 
 him, as that present occasion enforceth them, ' let 
 us not perish for this man's life, and bring not upon 
 us innocent blood.' Besides which purpose of theirs, 
 in laying the finger upon the sore, that is, in suiting 
 of their prayer with the present danger ; for the fuller 
 explication of the words themselves, it may please you 
 to take knowledge of two things : (1.) The proceeding 
 of God in the case of bloodshed, life for life, delivered 
 in the former clause, ' Let us not perish for the soul 
 of this man ;' (2.) how the blood of Jonah in the latter 
 may be called innocent blood. 
 
 (1.) The law is general touching the former: Exod. 
 xxi., 'life for life, eye for 63-6, tooth for tooth, hand 
 for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound 
 for wound, stripe for stripe.' It is added, Leviticus 
 xxiv., 'Breath for breath, blemish for blemish;' 
 Gen. ix., 'I will require your blood wherein your lives 
 are,' that is one reason ; in the next words, ' whoso 
 sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed, 
 for in the image of God hath he made man,' that is 
 another reason. Our Saviour reciteth the law in the 
 Gospel: Mat. xxvi., 'Whoso takcth the sword shall 
 perish with the sword.' And that we may know that 
 this law was never repealed, we find it in the last book : 
 Uevelation xiii., 'If any lead into captivity, he shall 
 go into captivity ; if any man kill with a sword, ho 
 must be killed with a sword.' ' Here is the patience 
 and the faith of saints ;' that is, they believe, and this 
 they verily expect to be performed upon their enemies. 
 So the ordinary rule, without question, is this, He 
 that taketh away the life of man, himself shall like- 
 
 wise perish. Notwithstanding, the maker of the law 
 may, and doth sometimes, dispense with his own law. 
 Many a one, I confess, hath killed his neighbour, him- 
 self not ending his days in the hke manner. Be it so ; 
 yet first he is slain with a sword of his own, as Goliah 
 was, he dieth daily with the stabbing and lancing of 
 his own heart ; and as in that first plague wherewith 
 Pharaoh was smitten, all the waters of Egypt, in their 
 rivers, their streams, their- ponds, their pools, their 
 vessels of wood, and their vessels of stone, were 
 changed into blood, so in tlie mind and conscience of 
 a murderer there shall always remain a plague of 
 blood ; his eyes shall behold no other colour but san- 
 guine, as if the air were dyed into it, the visions of his 
 Jiead in the night time shall cast a bowl of blood in 
 his face ; * all the cogitations and thoughts of his 
 heart shall overflow with the remembrance of that 
 blood which he hath effused. Again, if he that hath 
 killed a man dieth in his bed, or otherwise by the 
 hands of God, without the irrogation of this judgment 
 upon him, to be killed or executed by the hands of 
 men, yet let him know that he is dead by the law 
 ah-eady ; the sword of the Spirit of God hath fallen 
 upon him, the sword and sentence of the law hath 
 condemned him, and that he is 'reserved to the judg- 
 ment of the great day,' where the sword of eternal 
 damnation, the double and triple edge whereof can 
 never be rebated, shall feed upon his flesh, and be 
 drunken with his blood without ceasing. Or, lastly, 
 if he escape the dint of all these swords, temporal in 
 this life, internal in the conscience, eternal in the 
 world to come, let him thank his crucified Redeemer, 
 whose stripes have healed him, the wounding and 
 bleeding of whose precious body hath made interces- 
 sion with his Father in heaven, that the wounds and 
 bloodshed which he was worker of, are not thought 
 upon. 
 
 (2.) Secondly, We inquired how the iSood of Jonah 
 might be termed innocent. A man that fled from the 
 face of God, whom the winds and the sea hated with 
 a perfect hatred, even unto death; a man whom the 
 mariners themselves rebuked, and now by the instant 
 voice of God are ready to cast forth : how is he inno- 
 cent ? I answer, In part, not wholly ; with respect, 
 not absolutely; innocent towards these men, whom he 
 never injured, not with relatiim to God, whom he had 
 heinously ofl'ended. The Pelagians of our time, mag- 
 nifying the arm of flesh and the nature of mankind 
 more than reason admitfeth, by a sophistical and 
 deceitful conclusion, have sought to obscure the truth, 
 and to over-reach the world in this point. For, be- 
 cause they find in the Scriptures often mention of the 
 innocency, justice, perfection of the children of God, 
 they dissembling, or not wisely weighing the drift of 
 the place, simply infer thereupon that the law of God 
 may be kept and fulfilled in this life. Their paralo- 
 gism is easily discovered and disproved by the rule of 
 * riutaich. 
 
110 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 Augustine,* When the perfectiou of any man is name J, 
 •w-e must consider wherein it is named. A man may 
 be a perfect hearer of wisdom, not a perfect teacher.f 
 Thus is he perfect and imperfect ; a perfect knower of 
 righteousness, not a perfect doer ; perfect in this, that 
 he loveth all men, and yet imperfect in the love 
 itself. It were absm-dly concluded Jonah was inno- 
 cent towards the mariners, therefore innocent to- 
 wards the Israelites ; innocent towards man, therefore 
 innocent towards God; innocent in this present be- 
 haviour, therefore innocent in the whole conversation 
 of his hfe. As it hath no just consecution, David was 
 innocent towards Saul, therefore innocent towards 
 Uriah. A man may be righteous, both in comparison 
 of others, for he is the best which hath the fewest 
 faults ; J and in comparison of himself, for we must 
 judge of a man by that whereto the greater part of his 
 life "and disposition hath been inclined. § And because 
 there was no father in the church who had greater 
 reason to ventilate this argument to the bottom than 
 Augustine had, himself in that ambitious age being 
 sifted and proved by so many adversaries to the grace 
 and righteousness of God, I will give you a short taste 
 of his answers and satisfactions to the question, as I 
 find them in his writings. 
 
 Touching perfection, be writetb thus by occasion of 
 the apostle's words, Philippians the third, 'Let us, as 
 many as be perfect, be thus minded.' Yet in the 
 twelfth verse before, it is contraried, ' Not as though 
 I bad already attained it, or that I were already per- 
 fect.' How may these stand together ? Perfect and 
 imperfect. If we take perfection in intention and 
 purpose, not in pervention,|| and obtaining the pur- 
 pose ; in contention, endeavour, inehoation, that is, 
 in imperfection, and not otherwise ; thou canst not 
 otherwise be perfect in this life unless thou know that 
 in this life thou canst not be perfect.*! There is a 
 certain perfeiftion according to the measure and pro- 
 portion of this hfe,"** and to that perfection this is also 
 deputed, if a man know that yet he is not perfect. 
 So as it is not the least part of our perfection to know 
 and confess our imperfections. Bernard upon the 
 former words to the Philippians,! j that I may insert his 
 judgment also by the way, beateth down the arrogancy 
 of all high-minded flesh: Maipium election Is vas per- 
 fectuin ahniilt, pwfectwii, fuletui: The great vessel of 
 election denieth perfection to himself, confesseth his 
 profeclion and going forward : ' I endeavour myself to 
 
 » Cum dicitur ciijusque perfectio, qiia in re dicatur viden- 
 dum est.~2 de pe. vicr. etrem. 15. 
 
 t Perfectus sapientia; auditor, nun perfectus doctor, &«. 
 
 t Otitimns ille est, qui minimis urgotur. — Ilorat. 
 
 J Qua major pars vita; atque jugcni stetit.— ^«i«. Pollio. 
 
 II Secundum intentionem nou secuudiini perventiontm. — 
 In Psalm xxxviii. . . 
 
 ^ Miter liic non potea esse perfectus, uisi scias luo tc non 
 esse posse perfecluni. 
 
 *♦ Secundum istius vita) modum. — Co:il. Farm. 
 
 tt Serm. 49 in Cant. 
 
 that which is before.' I proceed with Augustine : 
 ' We may be perfect travellers in righteousness before, 
 hereafter we shall be perfect owners and possessors of 
 righteousness.* We may be perfect by anticipation,! 
 carrj-ing the name of the thing before we have attained 
 unto it, as we are said already to be glorified, though 
 our glorification shall be consummate in time to come. 
 ' We are the sons of God,' saith the apostle, ' and yet 
 it appeareth not what we shall be.' What moaneth 
 this. We are and we shall be, but that we are in hope, 
 and shall be indeed ?J Finally, he alloweth a certain 
 perfection sufficient to converse and hold society with 
 mankind, § a perfection for the model and capacity of 
 this life, II for the state of passengers and wayfaring 
 mcn,^ and whatsoever he alloweth more in this kind, 
 I am sure be concludetb, that the perfection of all 
 righteous men, while they are in the flesh,** is im- 
 perfect. H This of perfection. 
 
 Of righteousness and justice thus he affiiTueth in 
 other places. The evangelist Saint Luke reporteth 
 of Zacharias and Elizabeth his wife, that ' they were 
 both righteous before God,' that is, without hypocrisy, 
 ' walking in the commandments of God.' Now, be- 
 cause they u'dlhrd, it is an argument that they were 
 not yet come to the mark, iv '^aei, in all the command- 
 ments and justifications of the Lord. The testimony 
 is already very large, but yet he addcth more, They 
 walked in them all without reproof, A,'/.;',affro;. How 
 without reproof '? Augustine interpreteth it to Inno- 
 ccntius,;i Sine qnerctd, non sine pecciito, not without 
 sin, but without grievance, quaiTel, just complaint, or 
 exception to be made against them. Nay, he proveth 
 out of the same scripture that because Zacharias was 
 a priest, therefore a sinner, so he was bound to ' ofl'er 
 for sins, as well for his own part as for the people's,' 
 Heb. V. In another place, §§ speaking of their right- 
 eousness, he limiteth it thus,j| They wore righteous 
 after a probable and laudable conversation amongst 
 men. He often distinguisheth between these two, 
 peecatnm el querela, peccatum et crimen ; the one, sin 
 in general, which no man is freed from, for it is an 
 absolute sentence, and needeth no exposition: Hlf 'If 
 we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves,' we are 
 but blown bladders ; the other, some gi'eat ofl'encos, as 
 David calleth it, malicious wickedness, some heinous, 
 notorious, scandalous sin, culpable in the eyes of men, 
 and worthy of censure and crimination. We say (ia 
 
 * Pcrfecti viatores, — perfecti possessores. — 2 dc pec- mer. et 
 rf?«/», 13. t Per prolepsin. 
 
 X Quid est hoc, sumus ct non sumus? Nisi quia sumus 
 in ape, et erimus in re. 
 
 § Fro consortio societatia luunanas. 
 
 II Pro fiujus vitoo capacitate. ^ Pro statu viatoris. 
 
 ** Pro liujus vitiu modulo. — Ad Boni. 1. 3. 
 
 ft Omnium in carne justorum iniporfceta perfectio. 
 
 tt Epist. 'J-'). §? De grat. elir. cont. I'elag. et Ccolest. i. 48. 
 
 III! Secunihmi quandani inter liomines probabilem conver- 
 sationem, atquo laudabilem. 
 
 W Absolula seutentia, expositore non indiget. 
 
Ver. U.] 
 
 LECTURE XVII. 
 
 11] 
 
 his Eiicliiridion to Laurentius) that the life of holy 
 men may be found, though not without fault, yet with- 
 out an ofi'ensive fault. •:= Again, in his books of the 
 City of God, it is not the speech of vulgar and common 
 men, but of those that arc righth* saints, if we say that 
 we sin not,t &c. ; then shall this liberty and immunit}' 
 from passions, A-a.hia,, be, when there shall be no 
 sin in men. Now, we live well enough if without 
 scandal ; but he that thinketh he liveth without sin, he 
 doth not therebj' free himself from sinning, hut from 
 receiving remission of sins. J In the first epistle of 
 John, the third chapter, the apostle seemeth to favour 
 the opinion of absolute righteousness in man : ' He 
 that is born of God sinneth not." Peradventure, saith 
 Augustine, he meaueth some certain sin, not all sin.§ 
 Understand hereby a definite special sin,|| which he 
 that is born of God cannot commit. It may be the 
 want of love, di/rctionis airciUici. It may be the 
 great sin of infidelity, which our Saviour noteth in the 
 Jews, John the fifteenth, ' If I had not come and 
 spoken unto them, they should not have had sin ;' 
 the sin wherein all other sins are held, the sin unto 
 death, the sin not to be repented of, and therefore not 
 to he pardoned. Against Parmenian he answereth it 
 thus,1I Although we sin not so far forth as we are born 
 of God, yet there rcmaineth in us some part of our 
 birth from Adam. Bernard upon the Canticles giveth 
 the reason why he sinneth not,** the heavenly gene- 
 ration preserveth him, that is, the everlasting predesti- 
 nation. "Which reason the apostle himself seemeth to 
 accord unto, ' for his seed rcmaineth in him.' Surely 
 there is no man that sinneth not ; Solomon precisely 
 affirmeth it in the dedication of the temple. ' God 
 hath concluded all under sin ;' Omnes odit qui iiialos 
 odit, he that hateth evil men hateth all men, because 
 there is none that doeth good, no not one. Noah may 
 be a righteous man in his time and generation com- 
 pared with those amongst whom he lived ; Tamar may 
 be more righteous than Judah, yet Tamar sinful 
 enough ; the publican may go to his house more justi- 
 fied than the pharisee, yet not simply justified thereby ; 
 the spouse in the Canticles may be fair amongst 
 women, yet her beauty not such, but that she justly 
 complaineth of her blackness. ff Though she es- 
 
 * Sanctorum homiuum vilam invcuiri posse dicimus sine 
 crimine. cap. xiii. 
 
 ■f Non qualiumcunqne vox ilia, seil vcre sanclonim, xiv., 
 cap. ix. 
 
 J Satis bene vivitur, si sine crimine. Non id agit ut 
 peccatum non habeat, sed ut veniam non accipiat. 
 
 § Fortasse secundum quoddam peccatum dixit, non se- 
 cundum omne peccatum. 
 
 II Certum quoddam peccatum. tract. 5. 
 
 ^ Quamvis in quantum ex Deo nati sumus non peccamus, 
 in est tamen adhuc etiam quoad ex Adam nati sumus, lib. iii. 
 cap. vii. 
 **Genoratioccelestisservat cum.id cst,3eternapra;dcstinatio. 
 ft Pulclne quidem pulchram non omnimode, sed inter 
 mulieres dicit. — JSem. eer. 38. Inter raulieres, id est, animas 
 carnales, non angelicas perfectiones. — Ibid. 
 
 ceedeth the souls of men whilst they live in the body, 
 yet she is short of angelical perfection. John Baptist 
 had not a greater amongst the sons of women ; but 
 whosoever was least in the kingdom of God, and all 
 the celestial spirits, are far beyond him.* The best 
 that live upon the earth, have brevia, leviaque jicccata, 
 short and light sins, yet sins ; qua)nvis pauca, quamvis 
 parra, non tamen nulla, though few in number, small 
 in measure, yet sins in nature, f Therefore we may 
 conclude with the same father, + whose shield I have 
 hitherto used against the enemies to the grace of 
 God, ' Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after 
 righteousness.' We must know our poverty, and 
 become suitors and beggars for justice, mendici jus- 
 litiir, if we mean to speed. Our righteousness in this 
 life is such, as rather consisteth in the remission of 
 our sins, than in the perfection of our virtues. § And 
 to speak the truth in the whole question of justifica- 
 tion betwixt the papists and us, our justice is not 
 justice in proper and direct term, but mercy ; for 
 that righteousness that we have is merely of mercy, 
 not active but passive, not that which we work our- 
 selves, but God worketh it for us. Abluti estis, 
 justificad estu, you have w^ashed or justified your- 
 selves ? No, ' you are washed and justified ; ' and 
 therefore it is called ' the righteousness of God,' 
 because it cometh from abroad, not inherent in om'- 
 selves, but from God derived, and by him imputed. 
 And 1 Cor. i., 'Christ is made unto us of God, 
 wisdom and righteousness, and sanctification and re- 
 demption.' First, wisdom in preaching and instruc- 
 tion ; secondly, righteousness in the forgivenness of 
 our sins ; thirdly, sanctification in the holiness of our 
 lives ; fourthly, redemption in his mighty deliverance 
 from all our enemies ; that as it is written, ' he that 
 rejoiceth may rejoice in the Lord,' and know that 
 neither of all these is of himself. God objected to 
 the king of Tyrus in derision ; Ezekiel the twenty- 
 eighth, ' Thou art wiser than Daniel ; ' I ask of the 
 children of Babylon what they think of themselves, 
 whether they go beyond Daniel, in holiness and in- 
 tegrity of life. He in the ninth of his prophecy con- 
 fesseth sin, and iniquity, and rebellion in all the men 
 of Judah, and inhabitants of Jerusalem, and the 
 whole people of Israel far or near, kings, princes, 
 fathers, and that righteousness is with God alone, 
 and with them confusion of face ; he utterly dis- 
 claimeth their own justice, ' We come not to pray 
 before thee for any righteousness in om'selves,' and 
 appealeth unto the righteousness of the Lord, ' 
 Lord, according unto all thy righteousness, let thine 
 anger be turned away,' ver. IC; ' For the Lord's sake,' 
 
 * Inter nates mulierum, non autera inter choros coalestium 
 spirituii m. — Ibid. 
 
 ■f Encliir. cap. Ixxi. % De sanct. virginit. cap. 1. 
 
 § Justitia in liac vitii tanta est, ut potius con.stct remis- 
 sione peccatoruni, quam perfectione virtutum. — Lib. xix. 
 de civ. Dei. cap. xxvi. 
 
112 
 
 KIXG OX JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 tlnat is, tby Christ, thine anointed, ver. 17; 'For thy 
 great tender mercies,' ver. 18; finally, ' For thine own 
 sake,' ver. 19. This was the spirit of Daniel; and 
 they that come in the confidence of their own pure 
 spirits, neither shall their own prayers avail, and the 
 prayers of Daniel and Noah, and all the righteous 
 saints in heaven, which they hang upon, shall not 
 help them. You see our innocency, justice, and per- 
 fection ; not that our sins are not, but that they are 
 remitted, but that they are covered by the mercy of 
 God, but that they are not imputed, which is the chief 
 blessedness of man, as we read in the 32d Psalm. 
 I could have noted so much unto you by a phrase, 
 which my text affordeth ; ' Lay not upon us innocent 
 blood,' for then are we clear in the sight of God, when 
 the sins whereof we are guilty are not laid to our 
 charges nor remembered. Blessed are all those who 
 
 are thus discharged of their unsupportable soul's 
 burden, that though they have many sins, they are 
 bound up in a bundle, and drawn into a naiTow room; 
 though insolent, climbing, aspiring sins, yet they are 
 cast into the bottom of the sea ; though they are as 
 red as crimson and scarlet, yet their hue is changed, 
 they are made as white as wool or snow, by the blood 
 of Christ ; though they fill all the corners of heaven, 
 from the rising of the sun to the going down thereof, 
 yet they are driven from the face of God, as far as 
 the east and west are sundered ; lastly, though they 
 are libelled and entered into his court, by the accusa- 
 tion of the devil, and by his most righteous justice 
 registered, yet the books are defaced, and all those 
 writings against us nailed to the cross of Christ, by 
 whom we are redeemed. 
 
 LECTUEE XVIII. 
 L(i>l not unto our charge innocent hlood : for then, Lord, hast done as it pleased thee. — JoxAn I. 14. 
 
 THE prayer of the mariners, without longer re- 
 petition, w-as common, fervent, discreet, vocal, 
 humble, importimate, pertinent to the time and 
 occasion, well grounded. In the 7th of those, where- 
 in I observed how rightly they applied themselves to 
 the deprecation of their present dangers, I examined, 
 besides their general intent in asking pardon for blood- 
 shed, two particulars arising naturally from the 
 words: 1, the proceeding of God in case of murder, 
 life for life ; 2, in what respect the blood of Jonah 
 might be termed innocent blood ; nor that the life of 
 Jonah could no way bo touched with sin, but that it 
 was freed in his present and particular behaviour to- 
 wards this company with whom he sailed. I would 
 further have demanded, but that the time intercepted 
 me, how Jonah could be held innocent towards the 
 mariners, whom he had actually wronged in the loss 
 of their temporal commodities (for he only was the 
 cause of that general detriment), and the hazard was 
 as gi-eat, that he might have eased them of their 
 better treasure, I mean their lives, if God had not 
 stayed it ; these, though having sense of the one, 
 fear of the other, j-ct call his blood innocent blood. 
 The answer briefly is, They wrote that in the waters, 
 which others wTite in marisle, injuries ; though their 
 voyage were lost by this means, their business dis- 
 appointed, the season of their mart diverted, their 
 merchandise wrecked, their provision wasted (it ma,y 
 be) to some, their wives and children undone, their 
 estate sunk by it, yet they forgive and forget the 
 damages, and with a mantle of charity cover all his 
 wron °s. The persuasion hokleth by comparison, that 
 if nature so newly reformed, having fasted but the 
 milk of the knowledge of God, have so quick a 
 diaestion of forepassed wongs, much more is required 
 
 of us, who have been dieted with the strongest meat, 
 and to whom the precepts of charity have in most 
 ample manner been revealed. The commendation 
 shall ever live which Ambrose giveth to Theodosius 
 the emperor being dead : Theodosius of happy memory, 
 thought he received a benefit, as often as he was en- 
 treated to forgive ; that was wished in him, which in 
 others was feared, that he would be angry.* Tully 
 reporteth the like of a far unlike emperor, that Ciesar 
 f'orgat nothing but injimes. There is a learned, skil- 
 ful, and virtuous kind of forgetfulness ; it is good .to 
 forget some things. All Manassch went not over 
 Jordan, part stayed behind. Now Manassoh had his 
 name of forgetfulness, and Bernard alluding there- 
 unto saith. It is good to forget Babylon, to remember 
 Jerusalem ; to forget the Hesh-pots and onions of 
 Egypt, to remember the milk and honey of Canaan ; 
 to forget our own people and our father's house, and 
 to remember heaven and heavenly things. f So Paul 
 forgat that which was behind, Philip, iii., his former 
 defects and delinquishments, and it shall be happy 
 for us all to do the like, not in the mercies either of 
 God or man, but in the crosses and grievances which 
 we have sustained. Peter asked his Master in the 
 Gospel, Mat. xviii., how oft he should 'forgive his 
 brother oft'ending against him, whether to seven 
 times ■? ' it is added, Luke xvii., how often in a day ? 
 Our Saviour telleth him, unto seventy times seven ; 
 that is as. Jerome \ accountoth it, four hundred and 
 ninety times ; so often in a day as is not possible for 
 
 * Bcneficiiun se pufahat acci^pisae nugnsta; memoria) 
 Tlieodosiua, quotios riiyaf)alur ignoscere ; optabafiir in eo, 
 quoi! tiiiu-batiu- in aliis, ut irasceretur. — O: oliilii Theo. 
 
 f Serin, fi, in vigil, natal. Dom. 
 
 \ Da verb. Dom ser. xv. 
 
Ver. U.] 
 
 LECTURE XVIir. 
 
 113 
 
 thy brother oftenerto trespass against thee. Augustine 
 in efl'ect hath the same note, Why doth our Savioui- 
 say seventy times seven times, and not an hundred 
 times eight times ? He answereth, From Adam to 
 Christ were seventy generations ; therefore as Christ 
 forgave all the transgressions of whole mankind, 
 parted and diffused into so many generations, so also 
 we should remit as many offences as, in the term and 
 compass of our life, are committed against us. 
 
 Examine (shall I say, one day?) nay, all the days of 
 our life, if all might go for or.e, have we forgiven, 
 have we forborne, — that were one degree less, — have 
 we not persecuted, Turks, infidels, vessels of dis- 
 honour, nay, our own brethren, seven, yea, and 
 seventy times seven times, without number or measure, 
 the sun rising and the sun going do^NTi upon our ^Tath, 
 our ways being the ways of destruction, our beds the 
 beds of mischief, as the psalm calleth them, days and 
 nights, openly, privately, meditating, talking, practis- 
 ing how to avenge ourselves of the least discontent- 
 ments ? It were as rare a matter in our age, as to see 
 the sun go back, to hear of any amongst us patient 
 of injuries, as that patriarch sometimes of Jerusalem 
 was, of whom the proverb of those times went. Nihil. 
 titilius qiu'tm Alexandra malefacere, nothing can more 
 profit a man than to hurt Alexander. Yet he kept 
 but that rule, which the}' that keep not are no part of 
 the Israel of God, not to resist evil, to give cheek after 
 cheek, cloak after coat, to take all that was offered, 
 whether upon or without the body, as that precept 
 implieth ; nay, rather to return good for evil, Eom. 
 xii., love for enmit}-, blessing for cursing, good deeds 
 for hatred, prayers for persecutions, Mat. v. We 
 rather embrace the instigations of gentility, and such 
 as the nature of man easily propendcth unto, bear 
 one injury and bear more, veterem foendo iiijuriam 
 invitas novam ; he that wrongeth one, threateneth all, 
 multis minatiir qui uni fucit iiijuriam, and such like 
 provocations. I wUl end with the exhortation of our 
 Lord, Luke vi., ' Forgive, and you shall be forgiven;' 
 or rather with that which. Mat. vi., is more peremp- 
 tory, ' If you forgive him not, you shall not be for- 
 given.' He intendeth for that by mercy, which he 
 might exact of duty and equity ; and he that shall be 
 our judge, almost against the nature and right of his 
 office, sheweth us the way to escape his judgments. 
 The conditions betwixt God and man in this exchange 
 are veiy unequal : (1.) Thine enemy was created by 
 God, as thyself wert ; God hath an enemy of thee, 
 whom he bath created. (2.) Thou pardonest thy fel- 
 low-servant ; God merely his servant. (3.) Thou par- 
 donest and staudest in need of pardon again ; God hath 
 no need to be pardoned. (4.) Thou forgivest a definite 
 sum ; God an infinite debt, requiring the proscription 
 of thyself, wife, and children, and all that thou hast, 
 body and soul, if thou shouldst defray it. lucredihili 
 miser icordia nos ad certain rcniain vocat* by incredible 
 * Chrysost. 
 
 compassion he draweth us to a limited and bounded 
 pity, the extension whereof maketh us ' the children 
 of our Father which is in heaven ;' but the straitening 
 of our bowels of compassion, as it taketh from us the 
 name and privilege of sons, so it marketh us for ser- 
 vants of the worst condition, naughty and ungracious 
 servants, for whom is justly reserved the wages of 
 Balaam, I mean the repayment and stipend of ever- 
 lasting destruction. 
 
 8. The last commendation in the prayer of the 
 mariners is, their grounding thereof upon the pleasm'e 
 of God: ' for thou. Lord, hast done as it pleased thee ;' 
 which soundeth thus : We ask thy favour in this 
 respect, that we have not departed from the rule of 
 thy will, but followed as near as we could the verdict 
 and answer of thy heavenly oracle. The lot hath 
 informed us, the mouth of the prophet himself con- 
 firmed unto us, the constant indignation of the sea 
 maketh it past question, that thou in thy counsel hast 
 decreed that Jonah shall be cist forth. It was a sanc- 
 tified judgment in them, both to acknowledge the finger 
 of God in so casual an accident, — ' Thou, Lord, hast 
 done it,' — and withal to assent in secret, that the will 
 and pleasure of God is the exactest rule of equity that 
 can be imagined, ' as it pleased thee.' They gather 
 thus in effect. We do but the will of the Lord, therefore 
 more justly to be pardoned. The Wisdom of God 
 itself, in whom the Deity dwelt bodily, was content to 
 forsake his wisdom, and to be ordered and rectified by 
 this square of his Father's will, ' Father, not my will, 
 but thine be fulfilled.' I know the measure of thy 
 will is straight, shall I be crooked and perverse in my 
 ways ? I will not. Bernard demandeth upon that 
 submission of Christ, Lord, the will whereof thou 
 speakest — ' Not my will be done' — if it were not a 
 good will, how was it thine ? if good, why relinquished 
 and forsaken ? He answereth, Non oportchat propria 
 prajudicare communihus, private aflairs must not hinder 
 public. It was both the will of Christ, and it was a 
 good will, whereby he said, ' If it be possible, let this 
 cup pass ;' but that whereby he spake otherwise, ' thy 
 will be done,' was better, because it was common not 
 only to the Father which gave his Son, but to the Son 
 himself, who was oflcred because he would, and to us 
 who heartily desii'ed it.* The will of a righteous man 
 may miss of the will of God sometimes, and yet be 
 justified and approved before God. A child may wish 
 the life of his father, whom God hath visited with sick- 
 ness, and mindeth not to spare. Here have you the 
 will of a man against the will of God in some sort. 
 Doth he offend herein ? Nay, rather should he not 
 offend, if, nature and duty forgotten, he wished other- 
 wise ; for whatsoever the secret will of God hath 
 decreed, yet, by his open and revealed will, parents 
 must be honoured, and their life and well-doing by 
 prayer commended to the gooduess of God. It is the 
 
 "•■' Communis eiat non solim patris, sed et Chiisti et nos- 
 tra.— Sur. iii. de res Dom. 
 
 H 
 
114. 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 will of Gofl permanent ami unchangeable, that Jonah 
 be cast forth ; it is the will of the mariners to save 
 •Jonah, if it may bo. Do they displease God hereby ? 
 Rather they should displease, if, laying apart humanity, 
 they bear not compassion to the life of Jonah. For 
 howsoever bis secret will hath determined, yet by his 
 open and revealed will, the life of man must be ten- 
 dered. ' Who hath ascended into heaven to know the 
 counsels of the Lord ?' Therefore it is ever safe to 
 cast the anchors of all our purposes, and to stay our 
 wills upon the will of God, before we see the event of 
 things, to say as our Saviour willed us, ' Thy will be 
 done ;' and when it is clearly decided what his plea- 
 sure was, to join with these mariners, ' Thou, Lord, 
 hast done as it pleased thee ;' we acknowledge thy 
 supreme authority ; thou sittest upon the circles of 
 heaven, thou boldest the sceptre and ball of the world 
 in thy right hand, thou art the king and commander 
 of the earth, be it never so unquiet, the hearts of 
 kings and subjects are in thine hand. Thou woundest, 
 healest, killest, quickenest, where thou thinkest good ; 
 and whatsoever man purposetb, thou disposest as thy 
 pleasure is. 
 
 Others confess no less of the will of God than these 
 mariners do, ' Thou, Lord, hast done as it hath pleased 
 thee,' but with another construction. For as they 
 confess the efficacy and power thereof, so they deny 
 the equity ; as if he held a tyranny, and governed the 
 world not by law but by lust, drawing it to obedience 
 not b}' reason and justice, but bj' the violent chain of 
 his unchangeable purpose, so making his will in the 
 moderating of the world as immoderate as the wills of 
 inordinate princes, who having the reins of dominion 
 given into their hands, if they proclaim not outright 
 with Nero, My authority giveth me license to do all 
 things, furtitim nostra cnncta pcrmitlit mihi ; He is 
 a fool that knoweth not what he may do, inertis 
 est nescire quid liceat sibi ; yet they say to them- 
 selves, I am a king; who dareth call me to account, 
 and ask me. What doest thou ? yea, what is that 
 God that can deliver out of my hands ? This 
 kind of impetuous and masterlcss will, the servants of 
 God (mistermed) have challenged to their chair at 
 Rome, Dan. ili. For howsoever they behaved them- 
 selves, no man might say unto them, Gur ila fcicis / 
 Why dost thou so ? Whatsoever they enacted, Sic 
 volo, s(cj«//('o, their will and commandment was warrant 
 enough. Franciscus Zabarella complaineth of those 
 that drew them into such arrogant error. Thoy have 
 persuaded the popes that they can do all things, even 
 whatsoever pleased thorn, things unlawful too, and that 
 they are jiliis cjuam Dfua, more than God. Silvester 
 the First, in the first council of Rome, proved it by 
 Scripture, The highest bishop is not judged of any, 
 quia script}!!!! est, noa est discipulns, &c., because it 
 is written, tlic disciple is not above his master. And 
 shall .the saw boast itself against him that moveth it ? 
 Isaiah the tenth; therefore let no man judge the pope. 
 
 So was the speech of the Donatists, as Augustine* 
 remembereth it, when they had nothing to answer, sic 
 !-oli!!}iiis. Why ? For who art thou that jadgest 
 another man's servant? The pope giveth another 
 reason. Thou art a servant, a disciple ; who art thou 
 that judgest thy Lord '? Saint Augustine's answer 
 shall tit them both, both the Donatists of Africa and 
 the great Donatist of Rome : What else do all flagi- 
 tious and lewd men, riotous, drunkards, adulterers, 
 shameless and dishonest persons, thieves, extortioners, 
 murderers, robbers, sorcerers, idolaters, what else do 
 they answer the word of truth and righteousness when 
 it reproveth them but this, Hrjc valo, hoc me delectat. 
 Thus I will do, this delighteth me? Now, it is most true 
 that the will of Go 1 is an absolute, predominant, sove- 
 reign will : ' Where he will he taketh mercy, and where 
 he will he hardeneth.' The ground of their complaint 
 is good, though they misapply it: ' Who hath resisted 
 his will ?' Rom. is. ; and if we go too far to inquire 
 and examine, we are met in the way, and willed, as 
 it were, to stand back, O homo, in qiiis es qui disputas? 
 
 man, who art thou that disputest, and pressest so 
 boldly into the secrets of God ? But it is as true 
 which the apostle demaudeth on the behalf of the Lord, 
 ' Is there any iniquity with God?' Far be it; there- 
 fore they sin a sin which the darkest darkness in hell 
 is too easy to requite, who, when they have spilt the 
 blood of the innocent like water lapon the ground, 
 defiled their neighbour's bed, troubled the earth, and 
 provoked heaven with many pernicious, infamous mis- 
 chiefs, rapes, robberies, proditions, burnings, spoiling?, 
 depopulations, Ac, spue out a blasphemy against right- 
 eousness itself, countenancing their sins by autho- 
 rity of him who hateth sin, and pleading that they 
 have done but the will of God in doing such outrages. 
 
 1 know that the will of God, though they had staves 
 of iron in their hands and hearts to resist, shall be 
 done. Ungracious, unwilling, and unbelieving instru 
 ments shall do that service to God which they dream 
 not of. When God saith. Kill not, and we contradict, 
 We will kill, even then, though they violate the law of 
 God, yet is his will accomplished. He hath hooks for 
 the nostrils, and bridles for the jaws of the wicked, 
 which they suppose not. I will add more: 'Judge 
 ye what I say, and the Lord give you understanding 
 in all things." He hath spurs for their flanks and 
 sides, which they never imagined. Sennacherib found 
 a bridle to stay him, and an hook to turn him back ; 
 Pharaoh had a spur to drive him forward, ' I will harden 
 the heart of Pharaoh,' F,xod. iv., and in many other 
 places. Let him alone, let him take his pleasure and 
 pastime ; but when he hath ' hardened his own heart 
 by malice,' Fxod. viii., then will 1 also harden it by 
 justice. 
 
 Thus the will of God is one way renounced, and as 
 sure as he liveth and reigneth in heaven, shall at the 
 same time, and iu the same action some other way, bo 
 * J.ib ii. clc bapt. cent. Doiiat., c. x. 
 
Ver. Ik] 
 
 LECTURE XVIII. 
 
 115 
 
 performed. Aiid yet are the men wicked, tliough they 
 do thiit which God would, and God most holy and 
 just, though he would that which the wicked do. They 
 beguile themselves herein by a fallacy ; they are taken 
 in their own nets, which they lay for another purpose. 
 For thus they presume. He that dotb the will of 
 God sinneth not. True ; keep the commandments, 
 honour God, obej' the prince, love thy neighbour as 
 thyself, this is rohnitas aifpii, his will recorded in 
 Holy Writ published abroad, signified to all flesh, and 
 as it were proclaimed at a standard, by precept, 
 threatenings, promises, terrors, reward, earnestly and 
 openly required. Now, the murderer assumcth upon 
 the former ground, I do the will of God ; for had it 
 not stood with his will, my power had failed, my heart 
 had not been able to conceive a thought within me, 
 and my hand had withered and shrunk together before 
 I had given the stroke ; true likewise. But this is 
 another will, a secret will of God, his will at the second 
 hand, if I may so call it, and by an accident, a will 
 against a will ; that because he did not that which 
 God had publicly enjoined, he should do another thing 
 which he had privately determined. Augustine''^ de- 
 livereth it in wise and pithy terms : Drjiis qitifaciinit 
 qua: non vult, facit ipse qua; vult, Of those which do 
 ■what God would not, he doeth what he would ; and 
 by a marvellous ineflable means, it cometh to pass 
 that it is not done without (or besides) his will, which 
 is even done against his will.f Euclid, to one that 
 never rested to inquire of the gods, answered deser- 
 vedly : Other things I know not ; this I know, that 
 they hate curious and busy inquisitors, ciiiera qnidcm 
 iu'scio ; iUud scio, quod oderc. ciiriosos.^ " Adam was 
 driven out of paradise for aifecting too much know- 
 ledge. Israel had died the death, Exod. xix., if they 
 had passed their bounds to climb up unto the mount, 
 and to gaze upon the Lord. The men of Betbshemesh 
 were slain, to the number of fifty thousand, for prying 
 into the ark, 1 Sam. vi. The question is as high as 
 the highest heavens, and dwelleth in light as unsearch- 
 able as God himself, covered with a curtain of sacred 
 secrecy, which shall never be drawn aside till that day 
 come wherein ' wo shall know as we are known,' and 
 then but in measure and proportion. Who is able to 
 decide, that dwelleth with mortal flesh, how far the 
 counsel of the Lord goeth in ordering and disposing 
 sinful actions ? This I am bold to say, because I am 
 loath to lead you farther into a bottomless sea than 
 where the lamb may wade without danger of miscarry- 
 ing ; and if there be aught behind which is not opened 
 unto you, let this be your comfort, Dcits revehihit, God 
 will one day reveal it. But in this present question there 
 is an error, I suppose, in two extremities, either to think 
 that God is the author of sin, which sensual and fan- 
 tastic libertines, rubbing their filthiness upon his purity, 
 
 * Do corrupt, et grat., cap. xiv. 
 
 t Miro fit ineffabili modo non fit propter ejus voluntatcm, 
 quod ttiara fit contra ejus voluntatcm. — Enchirid. ca. cix. 
 
 have imputed unto him ; or that God doth only but 
 suffer and permit sin, sitting in heaven to behold the 
 stratagems of the wicked without intermeddling, as if 
 his Godhead were bound like Samson's arms, half of 
 his power and liberty restrained, a greater part of the 
 world and the manners thereof running upon wheels, 
 and the cursed children of Belial hasting like drome- 
 daries to fulfil the lusts of their own godless hearts, 
 without the government and moderation of the highest 
 Lord. Either of these opinions, methinks, denieth 
 the Godhead. For howsoever in words both may 
 admit it, they deny it in opinion. They receive it at 
 the gates, and exclude it at the postern. The one 
 destroyeth the justice and goodness of the deity, in 
 that they charge God to be the author of sin ; the 
 other his omnipotency and providence, in that they 
 bereave him of a great part of his business. 
 
 The latter of these two positions, that God doth 
 permit sin, is sound and catholic enough, if more be 
 added unto it (for God doth more than permit ) ; the 
 former is filled to the brim with most monstrous impiety. 
 If the devils in hell may be heard to speak for them- 
 selves and against God, what could they say to deprave 
 him more than this, Indeed we have sinned and for- 
 saken our faith, but God caused us ? It is a most 
 damnable and reprobate thought, that any vessel of 
 clay should so conceive of his former, who, in the 
 creation of all things, made all things good, and 
 passed not a work from his fingers without the ap- 
 probation of his most prudent judgment. Behold it 
 was good, very good, and God saw it. Ask but the 
 masters of human wisdom, they will inform you in 
 this behalf, Qihg ohhaij/fi ohoaiJjOjg, uhr/ioc, aXXd iig oirrjTi 
 Sixai^TuTo;* God by no means is unjust, but as 
 righteous as possible may be. Seneca asketh the 
 cause why the gods do good ? He answereth, their 
 nature is the cause. f They can neither take nor do 
 wrong ; they neither give nor have mischief in them. 
 You have the same doctrine, James i., ' Let no man, 
 when he is tempted, say that he is tempted by God ; 
 for God is not tempted with evil, and he himself 
 tempteth no man.' 
 
 Therefore I blame not Edmund Campian, if he hold 
 it in his eighth reason of his pamphlet cast fjrtb,a para- 
 dox, that is, an insolent, unwonted, uncrcdible position, 
 to make God the author of sin. But to charge our 
 reformed churches with the conception and birth of so 
 vile a monster, is as unrighteous a calumniation against 
 us, as God, whose justice we maintain, is most right- 
 eous. If I should answer slander by slander, we 
 should prove two slanderers, duo maledici csscmus, 
 as Augustine sometimes answered Petilian.+ These 
 are convicta coiivicia, ancient reproaches, dead and 
 rotten long since. We never said it. Oin- church 
 
 * Plat, in Th. 
 
 t Qu:b causa diis benefaoiendi ? Natura. Nee aocipere 
 injuriam queuut, nee facere. Dii ncc habcnt nee dant 
 malum. J Lib. iii. cap. i. 
 
116 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 hath hcen justified by her chikben a thousand times 
 in this point. This we have said, that in a sinful 
 action there are two things, the act, and the defect ; 
 essence and privation ; the material and the formal 
 part ; the substance and the quality. The latter 
 whereof is that deformity or irregularity, as they call 
 it, unlawfulness, transgression, pravity, that in every 
 such action is contained. Aquinas* observeth it in 
 the definition of sin, which Augustinef gave against 
 Faustus the Manicbee, Sin is anything spoken, coveted, 
 or done against the everlasting law. One thing, saith 
 he, in this definition belongeth to the substance of the 
 act, the other to the nature of the evil that is therein, 
 utium ad suhstantiaiii actus, alterum ad nitioitein mail. 
 God is the author of the act, because all motion cometh 
 from him, but not of the act as it hath defect in it. 
 He bringeth the example of a lame leg, wherein are 
 two qualities, ability to go, but unability to go upright. J 
 The going and stirring it hath, is from the virtue that 
 moveth it (as when a rider driveth his horse), the 
 lameness and dobilitj' belongeth to another cause, dis- 
 tortion, or crookedness, or some other impotency in 
 the leg itself. The like is, in the striking of a jarring 
 and untuned harp, the fingering is thine, the jarring 
 and discord is in the instrument. § The earth giveth 
 fatness and juice to all kind of plants ; some of those 
 plants yield pestilent and noisome fruits : whei'e is 
 the fault ? In the nourishment of the gi-ound, or in 
 the nature of the herbs, which by their native corrup- 
 tion decoct the goodness of the gi-ound into venom and 
 poison ? The goodness and moisture is from the 
 earth, the venom from the herb ; the sounding from 
 the hand, the jarring from the instrument ; the motion 
 from the rider, the lameness from the leg ; so the 
 action or motion is from God, the evil in the action 
 from the impure fountain of thine own heart. How 
 could the mind of Cain ever have thought of the death 
 of Abel, his eyes have seen any oti'ensive thing in his 
 accepted sacrifice, his heart have prosecuted with de- 
 sire, and his hand executed with power, so unnatural 
 a fact, more than a stone in the wall, which if it be 
 not stirred, forsaketh not his place, if God had not 
 given him strength and activity to have used the ser- 
 vice of all these faculties ? To think, to see, to desire, 
 to move the parts of the body, were the good crea- 
 tures of God (therein consisteth the action) ; but to 
 turn these gifts of God to so vile a purpose, was the 
 sin of Cain, the fault of the action, proper and singular 
 to bis own person. 
 
 It is scarce credible to report how Campian goeth 
 forward against us, that as the calling of Paul, so the 
 adultery of David, and the treason of Judas, by our 
 doctrine, were the proper works of God all alike ; as 
 if we mingled iron and clay together, and the Spirit of 
 God had given us no wisdom to discern things in 
 
 * 1. 2 a;, quic. 71 , art. 6, conchis. 
 J Quest. 79, artii', ii. coiicl. 
 § Just. Lii'3. (!e Co:i. 1. i. o. xx. 
 
 t Lib. ii. c. xx\ii. 
 
 nature and quality most repugnant. I again borrow 
 St Augustine's* words, PetUianus dkit, ego neijo, eU<jite 
 cui credatis, Petilian; affirmeth it, I deny it, choose 
 whether you will believe. The conversion of Paul 
 was the regeneration and new birth of one that was a 
 stranger to the covenants of God ; the adultery of David, 
 the fall and escape of a saint ; the treason of Judas, 
 the damned apostasy of a reprobate. The conversion 
 of Paul was the proper work of God, whom Satan had 
 held in darkness and in the shadow of death whilst 
 the world had stood, if God had not cast him into a 
 trance, blinding the eyes, and kilhng the senses of his 
 body for a time, but illuminating his mind, changing 
 his heart, creating a new spirit within him, and speak- 
 ing both to his ears and conscience with an eflectual 
 calling. Finally, he found no will in him fit for his 
 mercies, but wrought both the will and the work too. 
 In the adultery of David, and the treason of Judas, he 
 found the will eagerly prepared to iniquity ; God doth 
 but use that will, they run of themselves ; God stayeth 
 not behind, but runneth with them, though to another 
 end — they to the satisfaction of their naughty lusts, 
 God to the declaration of his righteous and wise judg- 
 ments. And although he loveth not their sins, yet he 
 loveth and is delighted with the execution of his ad- 
 mirable justice hanging thereupon. And albeit neither 
 the adultery of David, nor the treason of Judas, be his 
 proper works, yet God hath his proper working iu 
 hoth their works. For as from unhonest actions may 
 come good creaturesf (as when a child is bom in 
 adultery, the commixtion of adulterers is wicked, the 
 creature good), so from the lewdest and corruptest 
 wills God can produce efiects : not unlike the wisdom 
 of physicians in using the poison of serpents ; for how 
 harmful a nature soever the poison hath, the phj-sician 
 tcmpereth it by degree, and healeth his patient thereby', 
 the poison itself notwithstanding hurtful, the skill of 
 the physician commendable, the cflect profitable. 
 
 Thus we have ever distinguished, not only the works 
 which we know are indifl'erent, but in one and the 
 same action the diversity of agents, and dealers, both 
 in this manner of working, and in their ends. In the 
 afHictingof Job(for example's sake), Satan hath leave to 
 lay his hand upon Job : his servants are slain, his 
 oxen, asses, and camels taken and driven away by 
 Sabieans and Chaldeans ; slaughter and spoil without 
 mercy. For ' if a grape-gatherer should come to a 
 vine, would he not leave some grapes '?' Here neither 
 camel nor beast is left, nor any servant, save one alone 
 to bring news. Yet Job con I'csseth after all this, 'The 
 Lord hath given, and the Ijord hath taken.' Here 
 arc three sundry agents. A man might imagine, that 
 either Satan and the Sabwans shall be excused for 
 having society in this action with God, or God brought 
 into question for having society with them. Neither 
 of both ; the diftcronce of their intentions setteth 
 
 * Lib. iii. conf. tit. Polil. en. x. 
 t .\ntoIm. do casii Diub. cup. xci. 
 
Veu. U.J 
 
 LECTURE XIX. 
 
 117 
 
 them as far asunder, as Leaven is frora the earth at 
 her lowest centre. God hath a purpose to try the 
 patience and constancy of Job, to reform the opinion 
 of his own iunoeency, to make him know that he was 
 but man, and to tind an occasion of pouring greater 
 blessings upon him ; Satan to shew his envy and malice 
 to mankind, to drive him to desperation ; the Sabajans 
 to store up treasures of wickedness, and to shew that 
 stolen bread is sweet unto them. The envy and 
 malignity of Satan, whence is it ? Of God ? No. 
 God borroweth and useth his service, I grant, but 
 Satan first proffered it ; so the malice is his own, ' who 
 was a murderer from the beginning,' he only adding 
 government and moderation thereunto. The furious 
 and bloody rapines of the other, whence are they ? 
 From God ? No. They lay in the cisterns of their 
 own hearts ; Satan then drew them forth by instigation, 
 themselves let loose the stream, and when it was once 
 on float, the Lord directed and disposed the course by 
 his wisdom. 
 
 For this present I end. ' God is of pure eyes, and 
 can behold no wickedness ; he hath laid righteousness 
 to the rule, and weighed his justice in a balance ;' his 
 soul hateth and abhorreth sin : 'I have served with 
 
 your iniquities.' It is a labour, sei-dce, and thraldom 
 unto him, more than Israel endured under their 
 grievous task-masters ; his law to this day cm-seth 
 and condemneth sin, his hands have smitten and 
 scourged sin, he hath thrown down angels, plagued 
 men, overturned cities, ruinated nations, and not 
 spared his own bowels whilst he appeared in the simi- 
 litude of sinful flesh ; he hath di'owned the world with 
 a flood of waters, and shall burn the world with a 
 flood of fire, because of sin. The sentence shall stand 
 unmoveable, as long as heaven and earth endureth, 
 ' tribulation and anguish upon every soul that doth 
 evil, Jew or Gentile.' All adulterers, murderers, 
 idolaters, sacrilegious, blasphemous, covetous wretches, 
 liars, swearers, forswearers, and whom the apostle 
 calleth dogs, barking at the justice of God, and making 
 a causeless complaint against him, as if he were cause 
 of their sins, shall one day see the folly, and feel the 
 price, of their unrighteous inseotation. Let God there- 
 fore be true, and let all men be liars ; let God be just, 
 and all men sinners ; let God be justified in all his 
 judgments, and let all his accusers vanish and con- 
 sume in the madness of their hearts, as the foam upon 
 the waters. 
 
 LECTUEE XIX. 
 
 For thuu, Loid, hast done as it pleased thee. — Jonah I. 14. 
 
 THE mariners, in this reason of their petition, 
 acknowledge two things directly: 1, the work 
 of God in the casting forth of Jonah, ' Thou, Lord, 
 hast done it ; 2, the gi'ound of his works, his own 
 will, ' as it pleased thee.' A third thing is acknow- 
 leilged by implication, the equity and justice of that 
 will, as the warrant for their deed (' for thou, Lord,' 
 &c.). Their meaning is not therein, either to charge 
 him with a tyrannous will, quod Uhet lieet, as the 
 manner of grievous princes is to think that lawful 
 whatsoever pleaseth them, either to insimulate and 
 accuse him of injustice, to make him actor or patron 
 of any their sins, who dealeth in the actions of men, 
 sometimes with open, sometimes with secret, but 
 always with a righteous judgment. Therefore I noted 
 their corruption, who think themselves excused in 
 their most enormous and execrable sins, because they 
 fulfil the will of God in one sense, not that open and 
 revealed will which he hath given in tables, published 
 by sound of a trumpet, specified by blessings, cursings, 
 promises, threatenings, exhortations, dehortations, and 
 such like, whereunto they stand strictly bound, but 
 a secret and hidden will, written in another book, 
 wrapped up in the counsels of his own breast, which 
 neither they intended when they did their misdeeds, 
 neither were they ever charged therewith fi-om God's 
 lips. Secreta Domino, revelata nobis et fiHis nostris, 
 ' Secret things belong to the Lord, revealed to us 
 
 and our children,' Deut. xxix. 1. Quantum ad ijjsos, 
 fecerunt quod lU'us noiuit,* touching their own pur- 
 pose and intendment, they have done that which God 
 would not ; they have transgressed his law with con- 
 tentatlon of heart, perhaps with gladness, it may be 
 with greediness, taking a solace and pleasure therein, 
 and not wishing to have done otherwise ; they have 
 pursued it to the third and fourth generation, from the 
 first assault or motion of sin to consent, from consent 
 to delight, from delight to custom, and yet not giving 
 over till they come to a spirit of slumber, or rather a 
 death in sin. 2. Quantum ad omnipotoitiam. Dei, 
 nullo modo id efficere vcduerunt, touching the omni- 
 potency of God, they were never able to do it ; he 
 sitteth in heaven that laugheth them to scorn ; he be- 
 siegeth them round about, and his hand is upon them. 
 They are not able to depart from his will, more than 
 if a ship were going from Joppa to Tarshish (as this 
 ship was), from west to east, and one by walking 
 upon the hatches a contrary course, as if he would go 
 from east to west, from Tarshish towards Joppa again, 
 might stay the motion or flight of the ship ; he doth 
 his endeavour to hinder it, by bending both his face 
 and his pace backward, but the ship is too well 
 winged, and of too huge a burden, to be resisted ; so 
 those others shew their will to frustrate and fail the 
 will of God by committing sin prohibited, but yet 
 * August. Enchir. c. 100. 
 
118 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 they shall do a will of his, or rather his will shall be 
 done upon them, maugre their malicious and sworn 
 contradictions. Be his qui faviuitt qiuc noii vult,facit 
 ipse qiKc viilt, Of those that do what he would not, he 
 doth what he would ; and as he commanded light to 
 shine out of darkness, so he can command good out 
 of evil, treasure from out the midst of dross, and 
 commodity from the very heart of deepest wickedness ; 
 at least he will execute his justice upon offenders, as 
 he professeth, E.xod. xiv., ' I will get me honour upon 
 Pharaoh, and all his host :' ' for this cause he set him 
 up, to shew his power in him, and that his name 
 might be declared to the whole earth,' Rom. ix. 
 
 To reduce a diffused but a dangerous and intricate 
 question (wherein, as I then protested the wariness 
 of my proceeding, so now I again protest the subjec- 
 tion of my spirit to the spirit of prophets, ahsit iit 
 non sill) jjaralior discere qnmn docere : God forbid that I 
 should not be readier to learn than to teach), I say 
 to reduce it to heads, I proposed unto you the errors 
 of some in two sorts of extremities : some going too far, 
 in that they make God the author of sin ; others 
 coming as short, that God doth only permit sin : the 
 former an error fitter for devils than men, the latter 
 an error of humanitj-, offending of simplicity rather 
 than malice, speaking a truth of God when they 
 acknowledge his permission of sin, but not the whole 
 truth, because they think God only permitteth it. 
 Both deny the Godhead in effect, the one destroying 
 the goodness and justice, the other impairing the 
 omnipotency, providence, government thereof, in that 
 they restrain it from some things. 
 
 The former of these two opinions, that God is the 
 author of sin, most prodigious to conceive, though 
 engendered in the brain, I know not whether of men 
 or devils, yet is taken by Ed. Campian, our charitable 
 countryman, and laid at the doors of our church, yea, 
 brought into the streets of our universities, as if we 
 were the fathers and patrons of it. We never said it 
 (1 say once again), and to redeem a thousand deaths, 
 if more were due to our sins, we would not affirm it. 
 This we say, whatsoever hath substance and being, 
 and perfection in the action of sin, God is the author of 
 it, because it is good; ipsiimqucnitiitncuiique esse, bonum 
 est* the least essence in the world is good, but not 
 of the fault and defection therein. I must once more 
 repeat, sin hath a positive and privative part, a subject, 
 and the quality of the subject, nature and corruption. 
 I'lorstis (lb illo est, qiiieqiiid jiciiinet ad natunnn, et pror- 
 sus ab illo non est, quieqiiid est conlni natunnn :■]■ what- 
 soever belongeth to nature is wholly from him, and what- 
 soever is against nature is in no respect from him. Now 
 death, and whatsoever belongeth to the train of death, 
 sin and the like, arc against nature. ' In him wo live, 
 and move, and have our being;' there is a pillar of our 
 
 * Aug. de vcr. rel. cap. .\x.\iv. In quantum sunt, in tantum 
 bona sunt. — Id. in qnast. Ixxxiii. 21. 
 t Id. ad artic. falso impas. acl. 5. 
 
 truth. A poet of the Gentiles delivered it, but an apostle 
 sanctified and ratified it, and every creature in heaven, 
 in earth, in the deep, crieth anicn to it. And as that 
 gentility and heathenishness of that unbelieving poet 
 could not mar God's truth, so the corruption and 
 depravation in the quality either of man or action 
 cannot hurt the substance. Life is his, whether we 
 live to him as we ought to do, or the lusts of om- own 
 flesh, or after the pleasure of the God of this world, 
 the prince of darkness. Motion is his, whether we 
 lift up our hands to prayer, or whether to murder. 
 Essence is his : the natm'e, being, and substance of 
 men, of serpents, of reprobate angels, are from him, 
 and his good creatures. He made not death ; he gave 
 charge to the waters and earth to bring forth creatures 
 that had the soul of life in them ; and when he made man, 
 he breathed in his face the breath of Ufe, and made him 
 a living soul. He made not darkness, he created the 
 light ; neither was the author of sterility and barrenness ; 
 he made the bud of the earth which should seed seed, 
 and the fruitful tree. And to speak a trath in proper 
 terms, these privations, corruptions, and defects in 
 nature, as death, darkness, sterility, blindness, silence, 
 and the like, have rather deficient than eificient causes. 
 For, by the removing of the things themselves which 
 these destro}', they of their own accord succeed and 
 take their places. Abandon the light of the sun, 
 whereby our air is brightened and illuminated, you 
 need not carefully iuquu'e or painfully labour how to 
 come by darkness ; the deficiency and failing of the 
 light, is a cause sutficient to bring in darkness. If 
 the instrument of sight be decayed, the strings and 
 spirits which serve for the eye inwardly wasted and 
 corrupted, there is no more to be done to purchase 
 blindness to the eye ; the very orbity and want of 
 seeing putteth blindness forthwdth in possession. If 
 there.wcre no speech or noise in this church, what 
 would there be but silence and stillness ? Will you 
 ask me the cause hereof? It hath rightl}" none. I 
 can render the cause of speech ; there are instruments 
 in man to form it, and there is an air to receive it 
 from his mouth, and bear it to theii' ears that should 
 partake it, upon the ceasing whereof silence hath a 
 course to supply, without the service and aid of anj' 
 creature in the world to produce it. And these things 
 we know and are acquainted with, not by the use of 
 them, for who can use that which is nothing? We 
 know what light is, by the use thereof, because we 
 behold it ; but who ever saw darkness ? If the apples 
 of his eye were as broad as the circle of the sun and 
 the moon, waking and w'ide open, how- could he see 
 darkness ? We know what speech is, by the use 
 thereof, because we receive it by the ear ; but who 
 ever heard silence ? Only we know them, not bj' 
 fruition of themselves, but by want of their opposites, 
 which erst wo enjoyed and now are deprived of I 
 speak the more that I might speak plainly. Wo were 
 to inquire the eilicieut cause of sin ; it hath none 
 
Ver. U.J 
 
 LECTURE XtX. 
 
 119 
 
 Ijroperly, it bath a deficient cause. Adam and Eve 
 forsook as it were the guide of their youth, the word 
 of God, and his grace forsook them. Natm-e is now 
 corrupted, the soundness, integrity of all the faculties 
 therein diseased, the image of God wholly defaced. 
 Upon the decay and departure whereof, sin like a 
 strong man entereth the house ; the body and soul are 
 taken up with a mass of iujnstiee, the understanding 
 is filled with darkness, the will with frowarduess, the 
 senses wilb vanities, and every part, both of outward 
 and inward man, becometh a servant to unrighteous- 
 ness. Basil, in a sermon upon this argument now 
 in hand, willeth those that inquire of the author of 
 siu likewise to answer, whence sickness and orbities 
 in the body occur ; for they are not, saith he, the 
 work of God. Living creatures were at the iirst well 
 created, having a proportion convenient to them ; but 
 th«y fell into diseases and distemperatures, wlien they 
 feU from healthiness, either by evil diet, or by some 
 other cause; notwithstanding, God made the body, 
 he made not sickness, and he likewise made the soul, 
 but not the sinfulness thereof.* Jerome, upon the 
 second of Habakkuk, givcth the like judgment : El si 
 aniiiia vitio suo cjficitiiy hospitliiin ChahUcorutii, naturd 
 taiiien sua est iabcmaculniii Dei : though the soul by 
 ber own fault is made an habitation or lodge for the 
 Chaldeans, strangers to dwell in, yet by her nature 
 she is the tabernacle of God. Therefore he should 
 shew himself too ignorant, that could not discen: 
 between the corruption of nahrre and the author of 
 nature. And because we further were charged, that 
 ■we made the conversion of Paul, the adultery of David, 
 and the treason of Judas, the one the uprising of a 
 sinner, the other the ftxlliug down of a saint, the last 
 final revolt of a reprobate, the works, and the proper 
 works of God, all alike, 1 proved the contrary. The 
 first I acknowledged his proper and entire work ; he 
 opened the understanding, changed the will, did all 
 therein. In the other two, he took the will as he found 
 it, and without alteration thereof, applied it to some 
 ends which he had secretly pm-posed ; and though 
 neither the adultery of David, nor the improbity of 
 Judas, were his proper works, yet God had his proper 
 ■works in them both ; for as he is a most holy creator 
 of good natures, so he is a most righteous disposer of 
 evil wills : that whereas those evil wills do ill use good 
 natures, he on the other side may well use the evil 
 wills themselves. f 
 
 To conclude ; he is jaywn cvve^yoi, a worker in the 
 ■works of all sorts of men. Communiler anlhor, fateor, 
 sed nan nisi honi J'aulor : commonly and indiflcreutly, 
 
 * Corpus nihilnmimis Deus fecit, morbiira non fecit, et 
 auimam similiter fecit, non autem peccatum. Nirais indoc- 
 tus est qui vitium naturje non discernit ab authore natural. 
 — Artie. 3, ad artic. faUd imp. 
 
 t Sicut naturarum bonarum optimys creator est, ita mal- 
 arum voluntatum justissiraus ordinator. Ut cum male 
 ilke utuntur naturis bonis, ipse bene utatur etiam voluntati- 
 bus malis. — De corrup. et grat. cap. xiv. 
 
 I gi'ant, an author in a common and largo signifi- 
 cation, but a favourer only of good. Dost thou adcbess 
 thyself to vu-tue "? It is done both by the pri^^ty and 
 assistance of God. To ■vice '? With his privity ancl per- 
 mission, not with bis help ; some think, saith Lipsius, 
 with his will too.'* It is most true that God doth 
 sufl'er sin ; there is nothing visibly and sensibly done 
 which is not cither commanded or tolerated from that 
 invisible, intelligible court of the highest emperor, 
 AiKjust. 58, siiiten., for it could not be done if God did 
 not sutler it. In his Enchirid. to Laurmt., 100, it 
 followeth. And truly he doth not sufl'er it against, but 
 with, his will, nee utiqite nolens sinit sed rolens ; and 
 being good, as he is, he would never sufl'er anything 
 to be ill done, but that being also almighty, he can do 
 well of that which is e'sdl, nee sineret bonus fieri male, 
 nisi omnipotens ctiam de malo faeere posset bene, cap. xv. 
 Undoubtedly he doth not sufl'er against his will, for 
 that would be with grief, and must needs argue a 
 power greater than himself; then, if he willingly sufl'er, 
 pcnnissio est quoddam r/enus vnlu)ttaiis, his sufl'erance 
 is a certain kind of will. In his book of predestina- 
 tion and grace, he comparcth Nebuchadnezzar and 
 Pharaoh together, both which bad the same plaster 
 of chastisement laid unto them, though converted in 
 the one to his soul's health, in the other to his de- 
 struction. Touching natiuv, they were both men ; for 
 honour, both kings ; concerning the cause of coiTec- 
 tion, both held the people of God in captivity ; and 
 lastly, for theii- punishment, both were admonished by 
 the scourges of God. Yet the ends of their punish- 
 ment were diverse ; for the one fought against God, 
 the other by repentance obtained mercy. Now what 
 objections soever a man may frame herehence against 
 the eqvnty of God, intelH(jal ista tamen vel adjurante 
 Duntino peijici, vel deserente pennitti, ut noverit tamen 
 nolente Domino nihil prorsus admitti, let him under- 
 stand that all these things are either brought to pass, 
 God aiding them, or sufl'ered, God forsaking them ; so 
 that he know withal, that nothing in the world can be 
 done if God be unwilling. 
 
 If, then, I sin by the will of God, how can I help 
 it ; and ' why doth he yet complain '?' as Paul objectetb, 
 Komans the ninth. I ■will remove this stone of ofl'ence, 
 and then retmii to my puiisose. My ■will, I say, is 
 borne by a stream of the will of God ; or it is my 
 destiny to sin ; the stars have foresigned mj' going 
 awry. Mars committed the mui'der, Venus the adul- 
 tery ; thus was I born and marked ; the fault is not 
 mine, I sin by compulsion. I put them altogether, 
 because it is the fashion of some to set up a judgment- 
 seat in their erroneous phantasies, and thereat to 
 arraign God of injustice, .nve per transennam, sire per 
 cannain lomjain, sire per pro.rimum, either by the case- 
 ment, or through a long caue, obliquely, or farther of, 
 and some hard at hand and directly, some by destiny, 
 
 * Lips. lib. i. de Constant, cap. xx., Sciente et siuente : qua- 
 dam etiam seutentia, volente. 
 
120 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. T. 
 
 some by stars, others reaehing immediately at God 
 himself, Driis hoc voliiil, ct si nollet Ueiis, nonfucerciii, 
 God v.ould have it thus ; if God would not, I could 
 not have done it. One in a monastery bemf; reproved 
 that he did some thuigs not to be done, and omitted 
 others which he should have done, answered those 
 that rebuked him. What kind of man soever now 1 
 am, I shall be such as God hath foreseen I should be ; 
 who therein, saith Augustine, both spake a truth, and yet 
 was no whit bettered to amendment of life by that tnith.* 
 Oh damned absm'dity, rooting her wickedness in heaven, 
 as if the prescience and will of God were the cause of om' 
 sinning, whereas his prescience is but the antecedent to 
 our sins, going before them ; for because we sui, therefore 
 they are foreknown, not because they are foreknown, 
 therefore we sin ; and his will is but the consequent 
 following upon them. I say again, God hath a will 
 and purpose in the sins of unrighteous men ; not 
 that he liketh the sins, but he ordereth and govemcth 
 them in wise manner, and tumeth them to some end 
 that well pleaseth him. And though he willeth not 
 the evil itself, yet the doing of the evil doth in some 
 respects content him. And that will in God is conse- 
 quent to om' will. For albeit it were before om's in 
 time, because his will is as ancient as himself, even 
 from everlasting, yet in order and course of things it 
 cometh behind it ; and he that fulfilleth the will of 
 God in this manner, or rather the will of God is ful- 
 filleu upon him, shall hang in hell for his ser^-ice, so 
 little thanks is ho likely to reap at God's hands ; for 
 there is no question but God doth fulfil good pm-poses 
 of his own by the ill pmiioses of ill men. Judas was 
 not yet formed, nor any member of his body set to- 
 gether or fashioned, when they were all wi-itten in the 
 book of God. He saw his treason in the glass of his 
 foreknowledge, and understood his thoughts afar off; 
 there was not a word in his tongue but God was long 
 since acquainted with it ; he knew that his will was 
 bent to mischief from before the world was established. 
 Now God liath a will upon and after the will of Judas, 
 and thus he bethiukcth himself: Judas hath a will to 
 betray his master ; I will not stop his will, but con- 
 vert it to some good use ; I vdW draw a preservative 
 against poison from the veiy poison of the serpent ; I 
 will declare my power and skill thereby. The world 
 shall know that of the imnatm-alcst treason that ever 
 the sun beheld, I can work a good effect. I will 
 
 * Quali.-^cimqup nunc sim, tiilis ero, qualcm mo Deus prse- 
 scivit cs-sc futunim, Qui proftclo ct vcnim dicebat et hoc 
 vero non profioitbat. in bonum. — Aiiff. 2 de bono pcrscvcr. 15. 
 Euodiiis objpcted the like, 3 do lib. aibit. iii. Non video 
 quomodo sibi non adversentur hsec duo, piu'scientia, et libertas 
 arbitrii. Augustine answered: Deus est pia3scius volun- 
 tatis nostrne, ct cujus est praiscius, ipsa crit. Pra;dcstinatio 
 vol est illigationia et potcntia;, vcl condilionis ct justilia;. 
 This latter is willi God, even in evil actions. Non Tult 
 malum, vult hoc ipsum, fieri malum.- — Zanch, Deus quas- 
 <lam voluntates suas uliipie bonaa, implet per malorum 
 houiinum voluntates malas. — Aug. £nchir. c. ci. 
 
 shew my judgments amongst all nations upon Judas 
 and his accomplices ; and by the fruits of that bitter 
 root, the \ilest treacherj' that ever hell cast up, I will 
 save mankind. Judas himself never intended therein 
 either to magnify the power of God, or to manifest 
 his justice, or to deliver any of his brethren, who, I 
 dare say, never conceived therein how his own singular 
 soul might be saved. So, then, Judas committed a trea- 
 son, and God foresaw a treason, whose knowledge is as 
 great as himself, and the works of a thousand generations 
 to come as present unto him as that which is done at the 
 present time. What of that':* Fr<rscii-it,)ioiipra(lcstinarit 
 rd fecit ; he only foreknew it, he neither predestinated it 
 nor committed it. For this is the rule : Mala tanliim 
 pi/cacit, et non jiradestincit ; bona vcio et pricscit et pra- 
 (lesli)iat:* e%dl things he onlyforeknoweth ; good he both 
 foreknoweth and predestinateth ; that is, appointeth 
 and taketh order for them beforehand. He also foretold 
 the infidelity, malice, mischievousness of the Jews in 
 complotting the same villanj- against the Son of God.]" 
 What of that? Pradixil, von fecit; he only foretold, 
 and not wrought it. Ipsorum pnescivit peccata, non 
 sua : he foresaw their sins, not his ovm. The Jews 
 committed a sin which he compelled them not to do, 
 who is displeased with sin, but only foretold that they 
 would do it, because nothing is hid from him. Justus 
 Lipsius as acutely as any man, vidit ah aterno ; sed 
 ridit non coei/it ; scirit non san.rit ; 2i>'<edi.vit non pr(C- 
 sciipsit : he saw it from all eternity ; but he saw it, 
 enforced it not ; knew it, decreed it not ; foretold it, 
 prescribed, ordained it not. For tell me, ye adulterers, 
 murderers, usurers, drunkards, traitors, and the rest 
 of this accursed seed, when you commit such things 
 whereof you are now ashamed, and seek unlawful 
 helps to be rid of them, whether you do Uiem against 
 your wills, whether you find any force offered unto 
 you, whether you are di-awn imto them with lines, or 
 rather draw not them unto you \\ith cart-ropes ? When 
 the devil prompteth and suggesteth iniquity unto yon, 
 whether you yield not your necks to his yoke with 
 easiness ; if the least object of pleasure alliu-e not, 
 pull not yom- senses after it ; if ever your meat and 
 druik were sweeter to yom- palate and throat than 
 these sins to your souls ; if there be any Christian 
 resistance in you, quod nolo niuhnn, hoc facio, that 
 evil which I would not, that do I ; if you set not 
 windows and doors open, that the strong man who 
 carrieth the nmids of men captive, may enter in ? 
 Have you not will in all these ; or is it a possible 
 thing that will can be constrained ? It is as proper 
 to will to keep a liberty, I mean from coaction, as for 
 fh-e to bum ; else it were not voluntas, but noluntas, 
 not will, but no will, if violence could be offered unto it. 
 
 * Aug. lib. vi. hypognost. Ylooyivuaxii rroura, u'/.Xa o!/ 
 cravra cr^oo^ii^ii. — Dam. 
 
 t Atiff. tract f>'i, in .Joan. Fccomnt pcccatum Judivi, quod 
 eos non conipulit faccre, cui pcccatum non jilacet ; sed fac- 
 turos esse priiedixit, quern nihil latet. — Ibid. i. de Const. 20. 
 
Ver. 14.J 
 
 LECTURE XIX. 
 
 121 
 
 I desire to open my meaning. The foreltnow- 
 ledge of God is unto liim, if shallow and deep may be 
 compared together, as memory is to us ; as memoiy 
 presenteth unto us things that are past, so pre- 
 science unto God things which are to come. Memory 
 is om- book wherein we read the one, and jire- 
 science his book w-herein he readeth the other ; and 
 as memoi-y in us is not the cause why things past 
 were done, but only recoimteth, so God's prescience 
 is not the cause why future things shall be done, but 
 only foreknoweth them; and as we remember some 
 things which we do, but do not all things which we 
 remember, so God foreseeth all things whereof he is 
 author, but is not author of all things which he for- 
 seeth. Lastly, we remember and God foreseeth the 
 doing of everything in the nature and kind thereof ; 
 we remember a stone thrown wherewith a man was 
 slain : by violence ? No ; by chance, so God foresaw it ; 
 •we remember since a \dneyard was planted, and the 
 trees thereof brought forth grapes : b}' violence ? No ; 
 by nature, so God foresaw it ; we remember a thief 
 which lay in wait for blood, and committed a miu'der 
 by the highway side : by violence ? No ; by will, so 
 God foresaw it. Thus all things are done according 
 to the forelmowledge and will of almighty God, 
 necessary things of necessity, contingent by con- 
 tingency, and hap, as we call it, natural by kindly 
 coui'se, volimtaiy with election and choice, their 
 natures neither changed nor any waj* enforced by the 
 foresaid means. I conclude with Saint Augustine :* 
 God created me with free will (he speaketh of fi'ee- 
 dom from coaction). If I have sinned, it was I 
 that sinned ; it was neither destmy, nor fortiuic, nor 
 the devil. I will pronounce against myself, not 
 against the Lord. I know I sin of necessity in one 
 sense, because the corruption of natm'e has removed 
 that original integrity wherein man was fii'st created ; 
 but I sin not violently, because mine own will is re- 
 served unto me. For as it was true of man in the 
 state of innocency, potest noii peccare, he may, if he 
 will, not sin, because God left him in the hand of his 
 O'vvn counsels, and gave him liberty both vi'ays, so it is 
 now as true in the state of corruption, iion potest iion 
 peccare, he cannot choose but sin, the whole lump of 
 his natm-e being som-ed with that ancient leaven ; 
 neither shall he ever be delivered from the coniiption 
 whereunto he is subject, till he attain to the state of 
 glorification wherein it shall as certainly be verified, 
 non pioteU peccare, he cannot sin though he would, 
 coiTuption having put on incon'uption both in body 
 
 * lu Ps. xxxii. Si peccavi, ego peccavi, non fatiim, non for- 
 tuna, non diabolus. Adversus nic pronunciabo, non ailversus 
 Dominum. — Jlcrn. ser. Ixxvi. in Cantic in illud Ps. cxvii. 
 Impulsus sum ut caderem. Quseris, quis lllo impulsor? 
 Non eft unus. Impulsor diabolus, impulsor niundus, im- 
 pulsor homo. Quis iste homo sit, quajrisV Quisquosui. Usque 
 adeo homo impulsor sibi est, et suimet precipitator, ut non 
 sit quod ab altero impulsore formides, si ipse a te proprias 
 coutineas manus. 
 
 and spirit ; wliich necessity of sinning the mean time 
 is not in any external cause, either creator or creatures, 
 but in the decayed nature of man, upon the fall where- 
 of Cometh vanity in the mind, and a frowardness in 
 the will to depart from the hving God. 
 
 Now I retm-n to my former assertion, that nothing is 
 done without the will of God, and yet the will of man 
 thereby no way corrupted or compelled. And surely 
 the veiy tenor and sound of the Scriptm-e phrase 
 bewTayeth a degree of some forwarder dis2iosition from 
 God in the actions of umighteous men, than his bare 
 toleration. For why was it said, not only in the 3d 
 of Esodus, ' I know that the king of Egypt will not 
 let you go but by strong hand,' which is referred to 
 the prescience of God foreseeing what would come to 
 pass ; and in the 7th chapter, ' The heart of Pharaoh 
 was hea\'j' and dull,' which is referred to his own 
 obstinate hardening of it, ' but I will harden the 
 heart of Pharaoh, and he s'uall not let the people go,' 
 Exod. iv.; and ' Pharaoh shall not hearken unto you,' 
 Exod. vii. ? For when Pharaoh hardened his own 
 heart, both against the people of Israel, — 'give them 
 no straw: get you to your burdens,' Exod. v., — and 
 in the same chapter against the Lord himself, — ' Who 
 is the Lord that I should hear his voice ?' — then did 
 God permit all this to be done, and ' held his peace,' 
 as the psalm speaketh, gave him the hearing and the 
 looking on ; but afterwards, when he putteth as it 
 were iron to iron, adamant to adamant, — ' I will 
 harden his heart,' — it cannot reasonably be supposed, 
 but that, besides his sufferance, there was an accession 
 of some work of his. When the| sons of Zeruiah 
 would have taken Shimei his head from him, because 
 he railed at the king, throwing stones at him, and 
 calling him a mm-derer, the son of Belial, &c., 2 Sam. 
 xvi., David stayed them with strange and unex- 
 pected speech, ' What have I to do with you, ye sons 
 of Zeruiah ? for he curseth me, because the Lord hath 
 bidden him curse David ;' and fm-ther, as if the railer 
 were safe under the wings of God's authority, ' Who 
 then dare say. Wherefore hast thou done so ?' and 
 once more, ' Suli'er him to curse, for the Lord hath 
 bidden him.' Nathan the prophet had told him be- 
 fore, chap, xii., that for his mmxler and adultery the 
 Lord had thus decreed against him : ' I will raise up 
 evil against thee out of thine o■^^^l house, and will take 
 thy wives before thy face, and give them to thy 
 neighbom", and he shall lie with thy wives in the sight 
 of the sun : for thou didst it secretly ; but I will do 
 this thing before all Israel, and before the sun.' 
 Micaiah told Ahab : 1 Ivings xxii., ' The Lord hath 
 put a lying spiiit in the mouth of all thy prophets, and 
 the Lord hath appointed c\i\ against thee.' Jeremiah 
 to the face of God chargeth him, chap, iv., ' Surely 
 thou hast deceived this people and Jerusalem, saj-ing, 
 You shall have peace ; and behold a sword.' And 
 the Lord in plainer terms taketh it upon him : Ezek. 
 siv., ' If the prophet be deceived when he hath spoken 
 
122 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 a tiling ; I the Lord Lave deceived him.' God gave 
 the Gentiles up, Kom. i., ' to the desii-es of their 
 hearts, to uncleanness, to defile their bodies between 
 themselves, &c., unto vile affections ' (aflections of dis- 
 honom-, dishonesty, contumely, shame), ' to do against 
 uatm-e itself, unto a reprobate mind.' Julian inter- 
 preted all these speeches by peninttere, as if then 
 God did it when he suffered it to be done (so did 
 many ancient writers, by words of the like importance, 
 Passus est, haai aiprr/.i). Augustine answered him that 
 God doth not only permit them, but declare his 
 wrath and power therein. Julian replied that they 
 were phrases hT,-perbolical ; that is, in some sort ex- 
 ceeding truth. Augustine answered they were proper. 
 Julian replied, What needed God deliver them to these 
 lusts wherein they were before ? It was sufficient to 
 let them stick fast therein. Augustine answered. It is 
 one thing to have them, another to be given over unto 
 them ;^the wicked arc given over to their lusts, not only 
 to have them, but to be had, that is, held and possessed 
 of them.* We have the like specified, 2 Thes. ii., ' God 
 shall, send them operation of deceit, that they may be- 
 lieve lies ;' I omit a hundred places of no less signifi- 
 cance. Can there be mightier sins committed, nay, 
 conceived and comprehended in the mind of man, than 
 those I have named ; than hardness of heart, the only 
 rock to build all iniquity upon, when one neither is nor 
 can be ashamed ; than cursed and slanderous speech, 
 railing at the gods of the earth ; than adulteries, con- 
 stuprations, open, shameless, even in the sight of the 
 sun, Ij'ing, decei\ing, sins of Sodom ; unnatural lusts 
 in men, women, not to be spoken of, reprobate sense, 
 mighty illusions, and such like ? All which, notwith- 
 standing, the Spirit of the counsels of God, of whom it 
 is most true that wisdom shall live and die with him, 
 who neither deceived any man, neither can be de- 
 ceived, hath not forborne largely to speak of, and to 
 derive them in some sort from the throne of God, 
 where justice itself is seated : God did thus and thus. 
 To tm-n this night into day, and to make it appear 
 unto you how God shall be just still, and yet both 
 [the] nature and the workers of such things ab- 
 horred, and abominated before him to the bottom of 
 hell ; consider, I beseech you, attentively these two 
 things : fii'st, that in all the Scriptures to-ibre alleged, 
 there is mention made of some precedent iniquity, in 
 those ungracious persons whom God so dealeth with, 
 desei-ving and procuring the hand of God thus heavily 
 upon them. Itccivsiiiuin iioii dcscrit (iiilt'ijiiaiii dcserat; 
 God never forsaketh a man tljat will depart from him 
 before he forsaketh God ; ct pleruiitqiie facit ne deserat, 
 and oftentimes he worketh so that ho shall not for- 
 sake him. Hath God hardened Pharaoh ? Pharaoh 
 hardened himself before. God hardened Pharaoh by 
 his just judgment ; Pharaoh himself by his free will.f 
 
 * Aliud est liaboro, aliurl tradi;: traduntur impii non modb 
 ut ]iab(;aiit, sc'd ut ab iia liabcaiilur. 
 
 t Anijust. ad attic falsd irnpos. ad 14. Dcus iiiduravit per 
 
 Bade he Shimei curse David ? Gave he his wives to be 
 defiled by his o-mi son ? David had deserved both 
 for touching both the wife and life of Uriah. Willed 
 he a lying spirit to seduce Ahab ? Ahab would not 
 give credit to the right spirit, and he had ' sold him- 
 self to work all manner of wickedness in the sight of 
 the Lord.' Did he seduce both people and prophets, 
 the leaders of the people ? They had before set up idols 
 in their hearts, and put a stumblingblock of iniquity 
 before their faces. Did he give over nations to lusts, 
 uncleanness, dishonest affections, actions agaiust 
 natm-e, reprobate senses? Kom. i., the apostle 
 answereth in God's behalf, it was avrifiia^Ia t^: TXdtir}; 
 a recompense of then' former errors, because ' they 
 changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped 
 the creatm-e more than the Creator ; and tm-ned the 
 glory of an incon-uptible God into the image of cor- 
 ruptible men, bmls, fom'-footed beasts, creeping 
 things.' And wherefore were they misled with strong 
 illusions, 2 Thes. ii., but because they ' received not 
 the love of the truth, that they might be saved' ? 
 Now where sin is plagued with sin, as in the policy 
 of God wherewith he governeth the world, you shall 
 find it a thousand times, then is not peccatum pec- 
 catiini, but judicium ; though sin in natvu'e, yet in 
 respect of God not sin, but judgment ; it changeth the 
 name, cometh in another natiu'e, presenteth itself 
 with another face and countenance ; sin of itself, I 
 must confess, but as it cometh from God justice, for 
 it is the repayment and retaliation of some former sin. 
 Jussiiti Doiniiw, et veri sic est, ut omne jicccatum sit 
 pfcna peccaiilis, O Lord, thou hast commanded, and 
 indeed so it is, that all sin shall be a punishment to 
 him that committeth it. Envy hath much justice in it, 
 juslius invidid nihil est, though a malicious, unjust 
 quality in itself, for it eateth up the heart and marrow 
 of her master, as he desu'eth to eat up another. 
 Wlicn David gave charge for Shimei, ' Let him alone,' 
 was it to justify Shimei in his wickedness '? No ; he 
 acknowledged the scourge of God for his sins in the 
 tongue of Shimei, bound together, not of whip-cord, 
 but of the venomous reproaches which Shimei cast 
 forth. He looked to the judge, from whom it was 
 justice, not to the instrument and rod in the hand of 
 the judge from whom it was malice, and therefore 
 said, ' It may be the Lord will look upon my tears, 
 and do me good for his cm-sing this day,' knowing 
 that by the wisdom of God these bitter waters could 
 easily be made sweet. Things that ai'e evil in nature, 
 God can handle not in evil manner, potest Dens prai-n 
 non 2)rare f(tcere. Hemlock of itself is a pestilent and 
 noxious herb ; yet tlie magistrates of Athens pro- 
 nounce in judgment, that Socrates shall drink a bowl of 
 hemlock. What ! is judgment turned into worm- 
 wood, justice into hemlock '? Is there poisoning and 
 destroying of men at a judgment-seat ? Yea, and good 
 
 justum judicium Pharaoneni, ct ipse se Plioi'ao por liberum 
 arbitrium, — Au. dc ffrat, ct I. arhit. 23. 
 
Ver. U.] 
 
 LECTURE XIX. 
 
 123 
 
 enough. All action evil simply iu itself may be good 
 by a circumstance ; the poison is in the heib, not in 
 the magistrate ; he commaiuleth it to be drunken, 
 though as a bane to the malefactor, to shorten his 
 life, yet a preseiTative of the commonwealth, and for 
 the terror of others, a punishment to him that hath 
 poisoned and annoyed the welfare thereof; and as it 
 proceedeth from the magistrate, so leaveth it as it were 
 the name and nature of poison, and is called judgment. 
 The next thing which I wish to be hearkened unto 
 is this, that whatsoever God doth in the hardening of 
 Pharaoh's heart, or irrogating any the like judgment, 
 that he doth no)i itnpurt'u'iido inalitiaw, not by infus- 
 ing anj' wickedness, as the magistrate putteth no 
 venom into the herb, sed non imparliendo mhericordiain, 
 but by not imparting his mercy, or aufcrendo Spiiitiiiii, 
 by withdrawing his Holy Spirit ; as when ye withdraw 
 the pillars or props of the house, which Samson did, 
 the house folleth to ruin, with the veiy weight of the 
 building that is laid thereupon ; or if a country lie 
 waste and unpeopled, it bccometh a desert of itself, 
 and for lack of better inhabitants, it is covered with 
 nettles and briers ; and satjTs, screech-owls, and hedge- 
 hogs take it up : so when the aid and assistance of God's 
 grace forsaketh a man, whose body and soul were 
 appointed to have been the temples of the Lord of 
 hosts to dwell iu, jjreseutly wildness and barbarousuess 
 succeedeth, and that which by the mercies of God 
 might have been as his garden and pleasant jjaradise, 
 through the absence thereof becomcth an habitation 
 for foul and unclean spirits. For as the remo\'ing of 
 the sun from these upper parts of the earth where wo 
 live into the other hemisphere bringeth darkness 
 upon us ; not that the body of the sim is not alto- 
 gether lightsome, and his natm-al office to lighten, but 
 because he is gone and departed further off ; so the 
 departure of God, himself most righteous, from an 
 unrighteous soul, by the only remove of his gracious 
 presence, leaveth it to itself in an habit of injustice 
 never to be recovered. Wherein notwithstanding the 
 case is not so hard against God as some imagine it, 
 that it is all one to thrust an old man down, and to 
 take away his staff, the only stay to keep his feet from 
 falling, for his help being gone he can no longer stand ; 
 as if in God the withdrawing of his grace (which is his 
 rod or staff to sustain us) were eflcctually no less 
 than to thrust us into wickedness, for thus they should 
 rather propose it, that as when an old man wilfully 
 casteth away his staff, and no man rcstorcth it to him 
 again, he falleth through his own folly, not by another's 
 instigation, so when the wicked despisers of the world 
 not only neglect but contemn and defy that saving 
 grace whereby they stand, through their own stubborn- 
 ness and perversity they run a wearisome race of 
 wretchedness, the Lord not lending them his helping 
 hand to bring them back again. And, therefore, as 
 they that purposedly abandon the light of the sim, to 
 go into a darksome cave of the ground where the sun 
 
 never shone, have no reason to complain that the sun 
 would not follow them, so they that wittingly and stiffly 
 renounce the acceptable visitation of God, whereby 
 he would have led them into the ways of peace, let them 
 blame their own impenitency, that they are not after- 
 wards attended upon by the like compassion. Or, to 
 match these incomparable things, with Irenpeus ;* as the 
 sun, which is the creature of God, blindeth the eyes of 
 such as, for the infirmity of sight, cannot behold his 
 beams, so God, the creator of the sun, hardeneth the 
 hearts of such as, for the hardness of belief, will not 
 receive his goodness. For whom he foresaw undisposed 
 to believe, those he delivered to their infidelity, and 
 tm-ned a\\ ay his face from them, leaving them in dark- 
 ness which they chose to themselves. f 'Wliat is it, 
 then, to harden the heart of Pharaoh and others ? 
 Nollo ciiioUbe ; this, that he will not . soften it, non 
 vidt emoUbc. What is it to make blind '? This, that 
 he will not illuminate. What to reject, or to cast off ? 
 This, that he will not call (which is meant not of his 
 general calling, but of that which is effectual, and 
 belongeth to the chosen) ; and j'et, methlnks, there is 
 more in it. For not only ho is unwilling to soften, 
 illuminate, call the impenitent, but he hath fui'ther a 
 will not to do it. For there is great difference betwixt 
 these two speeches, lie nil! not, and he liaih a will not. 
 do it : the former arguing but an indifferent and 
 milder alienation of the mind, and rather a careless 
 neglect than a purposed and propounded hatred ; the 
 latter, a bent and resolved decree. As when a poor 
 man askcth an alms, some are unwilling to relieve 
 him, not weighing his necessity, and bidding him go 
 iu peace, &c., others have a will not to relieve him, 
 it is determined in their hearts not to afford him com- 
 fort, either because they are unmerciful towards all the 
 poor, or for that they are out of likuig with the manners 
 or person of this man. 
 
 Augustine in three words decideth this whole ques- 
 tion against Faustus the Maniehee,|. touching the 
 hardening of hearts, and the like judgments : Dia- 
 holus suijijerit, homo consenlit, Dens deserit, the devil 
 worketh it by suggestion, man by consenting, God by 
 forsaking, by sufl'ering an hard heart to wax as fat 
 as brawn, bj' giving success to ill piu'poses which he 
 could have stopped, by not communicating the help of 
 his blessed Spirit, ut non ah illo irrogdur aliquid, quo 
 sit homo detcrioi; sed tantiim, ijiio sit nielior, non 
 iivi/etiir. God were able, I confess, to soften the 
 hardest heart, open the blindest eyes, when, and in 
 whom, and where he listed. But when he doth so, 
 he doth it by mercy ; and when he doth it not, he 
 doth it not by judgment. § Meanwhile let this be held 
 
 * Lib. iv. cont. lireres. c. xlix. 
 
 f Reliutjuens eos iu teneliris, quas sibi elcgerunt. — August, 
 de grat. et prcedesl. 8. 
 
 J Lib. i. ad Simplician, qiiicst. 2. 
 
 § Sed ciim facit, per inisericordiam facit ; cum autem 
 non facit, per judicium non facit. — Enchi. cap. xcvii. 
 
12i 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 for a constant and infallible rule, that although there be 
 
 many whom God lifteth not up, _yet there is none whom 
 properly he throwcth down.* Ah iUo est quad staltir, noii 
 est ah illo quod riiitiir, from bim it cometh that we all 
 stand, but not from him that any falletb ; and many 
 have been held that they fell not, no man pushed at to 
 cause him to fall. Only he casteth them down hj a con- 
 sequence, because he giveth not his grace, which might 
 have sustained them ; as if a nurse lend not her hand 
 to support her child, the child will fall, I grant ; but 
 the cause of the falling is the weakness and debility 
 of the child, the nurse no further the cause thereof 
 than that she did not hinder it. Which though it 
 be a fault amongst us, because we are members one 
 of the other, and tied together by the bond of charity, 
 yet it is no fault in God, who, having power over his 
 clay, may work at his pleasm-e either in judgment, to 
 make it a vessel of dishonour, or of honour in mercy. 
 For manifestation of this latter point, that God 
 instilleth not malice into the ofl'enders, in this execu- 
 tion of his judgments by punishing sin by sin, but 
 finding these vessels of iniquity full-fraught of them- 
 selves, leaveth them with the season of their own 
 liquor, and only applieth them by his wisdom to some 
 good service of his ; though I were able to open it unto 
 you in all the examples before alleged, yet I will rest 
 in the scducement and foil of Ahab. Wherein it may 
 seem, that God doth not only permit the false spirit, 
 1 Kings xxii., ' Thou shalt seduce Ahab,' but givetli 
 encouragement also, ' Thou shalt prevail,' and addeth 
 a commandment, ' Go forth,' and allowefh of the form 
 of dealing in the matter, ' Do so.' Now, that you 
 may know how innocent the Lord is in an action of 
 such prejudice, observe the circumstances of the place 
 well. 1. The thing intended is, that Ahab might fall 
 at Eamoth-Gilead. Which purpose of God once set, 
 is so unchangeable, that if heaven and earth were con- 
 federate, t!iey cannot save the life of Ahab. God 
 shall send forth a spirit, the spirit deceive prophets, 
 prophets eutice Ahab, Ahab change his apparel, and 
 though Jehoshaphat be the fairer mark, yet Jehosha- 
 phat shall escape, and one shall draw an arrov,- by 
 chance, and smite Ahab betwixt his brigandine, and 
 he shall die at evening ; he did so. Therefore, touch- 
 ing the end of this business, it is no injustice in God 
 to execute judgment and wrath upon a famous adver- 
 sary. 2. Concerning the means, inquiry v;as made 
 who should entice Ahab, because in the nature of God 
 himself it was not to entice him. 3. That which ho 
 doth, he doth by a spirit, not by himself. 4. By an 
 evil spirit, of his band and retinue, who stood before 
 God, Job i. 5. The spirit cometh furnished of his 
 own, for when one said thus, another otherwise, he 
 profl'ered his service to entice him. C. When God 
 demanded of the moans, he invented the practice, by 
 being a false spirit in the mouth of his prophets. 
 
 * Ad artio. fal. imp., art. xiv. Multi, no laberentur de- 
 toiili ; nulli, ut liiboriiilur, imjuilsi. 
 
 7. V/hat were those prophets of Ahab ? Men that were 
 faithless of themselves, whose guise it was, either for 
 rewards, or for favom- of the king, to say they had 
 dreamed, when they had not, and the Lord hath said, 
 when he never said it. So there is both malice in the 
 spirit, and falsehood in the prophets, before God 
 setteth either hand or heart to the business. There- 
 fore what doth the Lord therein ? He sitteth upon 
 the throne as the judge and moderator of the whole 
 action, he commandeth the attendance of all the army 
 of heaven on the right hand and on the left, clean and 
 unclean spirits are in subjection to him ; he giveth 
 leave to them, who without his leave are unable to do 
 anything, ' Thou shalt entice ;' he giveth the success, 
 which all the kingdom of darkness could not effect, 
 if he would hinder it, ' Thou shalt prevail ;' he biddeth 
 go, and they go, run, and they run, to shew that all 
 the creatures of the world serve him ; he disposeth 
 the course. Do so, that is, do so, and no more than so; 
 as much as to say, Since thou hast malice to bestow, 
 extend it upon Ahab rather than Jehoshaphat ; and 
 falsehood to infuse, pom- it forth upon the four hun- 
 dred prophets of Ahab rather than upon IMicaiah or 
 any prophet of mine ; and let the fall of Ahab be at 
 Ramoth-Gilead rather than in another place, and in 
 this battle ■with the king of Aram rather than at another 
 time. Thus, when the matter is their own, God giveth 
 the fashioning and ordering thereof in some sort, 
 touching the persons, time, place, and other the like 
 particulars. But why is it further said, that God put 
 a lying spirit into the mouth of these prophets of 
 Ahab"? 1. He did it by way of a punishment, to be 
 avenged of that custom of lying, which they were 
 inured imto aforetime. 2. He did it by his instrument, 
 having both life and will to do hurt, not by himself. 
 3. He did it in this sense, that he stayed not the 
 wicked purpose, by interposing the aid of his good 
 Spirit. 
 
 By this time, I think, it appcareth, that in the 
 actions and passions of unrighteous men, there is more 
 to be deemed cf God than his bare permission. For 
 doubtless he hath his will tlnu'ein, neither in alluring, 
 neither in counselling, and much less in compelling 
 thereunto, but in ordering and governing them, in 
 apphing them to better ends than the olfenders are 
 aware of, and in ordaining his just judgments conse- 
 quently thereupon. Therefore, when I say ho hath 
 his will therein, mistake me not. He hath not a will 
 in such sort as if he approved sin, chose or desired 
 sin, as if he bare appetite and liking thereto. It is 
 rather voluntas than rolitio, if I may so speak, a will 
 than a willingness ; it is his will by obliquity, a side 
 will, unproper, undirect,* and in respect not to the sin 
 itself, but some other good adjoined unto it ; as when a 
 man is piit to have his ami or leg cut otf for a fm-ther 
 ben(!fit, ho beareth, and beareth it with his will ; not 
 that he liketh of the dismembering of his body, or 
 * Zanch. 
 
Ver. 14.] 
 
 LECTURE XIX. 
 
 12. 
 
 losing of a joint, but that he desireth some other 
 good, TN'hich he foreseeth may ensue thereby'. Thus 
 he permitted, and, more, he decreed the treason of 
 Judas, and iniquity of the Jews against his anointed 
 Son, as you have it confessed by the apostles, Acts 
 the foiu'th : that ' Herod, and Pilate, with the Gentiles, 
 and people of Israel, gathered themselves together 
 against the holy Son of God, Jesus, to do whatsoever 
 his hand and his counsel had determined before to be 
 done.' God had determined it before, not in the 
 favom- of their sin, but of oiu- redemption.* Take 
 away the wickedness of the prodition of Judas, thou 
 shalt also take away the cross and passion of Christ ; 
 if the death of Christ had not been, then neither his 
 resm-rection, nor any first begotten fi-om the dead, nor 
 any hope of om- resurrection. Take away the malice 
 of the brethren of Joseph, thou shalt together kiU the 
 dispensation of God, loUe mathiam fiat nun JoscphI, 
 siinid perinies diapcnsatiouein Dei; a fault never to be 
 excused, the more unnatiu'al because it came from 
 brethren, the more unreasonable because of envy with- 
 out just cause, the more imsufl'erable because they 
 added lying, and bound two sins together, and it was, 
 in likelihood, the hasting of their father's death. Yet 
 Joseph told his brethren when they came into Egypt, 
 Gen. xlv., ' Grieve not yom-selves that ye sold me 
 hither, for God sent me hither for yom' preservation ;' 
 (this they never foresaw, neither was it the end of 
 then- despiteful deaUng) ; ' you sent me not hither, but 
 God, who hath made me a fiither to Pharaoh, and 
 lord of his house, and ruler throughout all Egypt,' 
 when you repined that I was a brother amongst you, 
 and left mo no footing in mine own father's house. 
 Afterwards, when his brethren fell dowm at his feet, 
 and confessed their sin, he answered them, ' Fear not, 
 am I instead of God, set to execute judgment ? When 
 you thought evil against me, God disposed it to good, 
 that he might work, as it is come to pass this day, 
 and save much people alive.' All the wits in the 
 world cannot better set down the state of the question. 
 They thought evil, ' God disposed it to good ;' they, 
 to ungorge themselves of that venomous malice which 
 the prosperity of Joseph, conceived fi'om his dreams, 
 instilled into then- hearts ; God, to preserve them in*a 
 famine to come, and to save much people alive ; they 
 sent him away to remove theu' eyesore ; God, to be a 
 steward both for Egypt and Israel. Nay, ' God sent 
 him thither,' and they sent him not ; the incompre- 
 hensible reaches of God were so far above theirs, and 
 his ^risdom in the good handling of a bad cause doeth 
 so much obscure and discountenance their malice, that 
 it secmeth not to be at all, and the ministers in the 
 action as it were cast aside, the highest dispenser and 
 moderator thereof only is remembered, ' You sent me 
 not hither, but God ;' the purposes of your hearts 
 were nothing in comparison of that everlasting decree, 
 ■which the immortal and only wise God made to himself. 
 * Origeii. in Num. xxii. 
 
 See what a race and pedigree of blessings Origen 
 bringeth down from the rotten stock of that ungi-acious 
 practice. If Joseph be not sold, Pharaoh's dreams 
 are not expounded ; none maketh provision of corn ; 
 Egypt, and the countiy about Egypt, and Israel, 
 starveth in the time of dearth ; the seed of Israel gocth 
 not into Egj'pt to seek bread, neither retm-ueth out of 
 Egypt with miracles ; no wonders are wrought by Moses 
 and Aaron, no passing through the Eed Sea, no manna 
 from heaven, no water from the rock, no law from 
 Sinai, no going into the land of Cannan, &c. These 
 are the blessings and commodities which the envy of 
 the patriarchs bringeth forth, by God's most mighty 
 and wise dispensation. So that we may truly say, 
 Piivata mala, puhlica bona, particular mischiefs are 
 common commodities. The hfe of the lion is main- 
 tained by the death of the lamb, the cruelty of tyrants 
 giveth martyrs their glory and crown, and the' blood 
 of martyrs becomcth the seed and propagation of the 
 chm-ch : Mnf/iiis jnarti/rum sfmcn ecdeda. If any 
 demand whether this good might not better have been 
 procured by good means, I answer with Augustine,* 
 Melius judicarit Dens de malis henefacere, qndm mala 
 India esse permittere : it seemed better to the wisdom 
 of God, to work good out of evil, than to suffer no evil 
 at all. 
 
 I now conclude the pomt. As in the statutes and 
 laws of om- commonwealth, there are many things 
 contained more than the laws either commit or allow, 
 as treasons, felonies, heresies, and the Hke, which 
 notwithstanding the laws order and dispose of, so in 
 the will of God, within the compass and pale of his 
 arbitrement, much more is contained, than either by 
 action or authorisement from him could ever be de- 
 fended, and yet is that will of his judge and disposer 
 of all those particulars. And whether Joseph be sold 
 into Egv-jit, or Jonah thrown into the sea, or the Son 
 of God himself nailed upon a cross, we may safely and 
 universally say with the mariners in this prophecy, 
 ' Thou, Lord, hast done as it pleased thee.' Surely 
 there is not an evil in the city, nor upon the face of the 
 earth, but God hath some use of it. Those sins within 
 om' land that take all from men, as covetousness, 
 extortion, oppression, usuiy, they take not that from 
 God which his wisdom maketh of them, I mean the 
 profit and use of most mmatm-al vices. Hnply they 
 take the substance of their brethren, and by taking 
 such snares away, save thefr souls, or, if they take 
 their Uves, they ease and unlade them of a gi-eat 
 burden of theii' sins to come. The drunkard drinketh 
 himself asleep, not God. and bringeth his own senses 
 and wits into a trance, but provoketh and quickencth 
 the righteous Lord to do a work of justice. The 
 adulterer wi-appeth himself within the amis of his 
 harlot, and thinketh he is safe, and not perceived, but 
 never shall be able to unwrap himself from the arms 
 of God's government. The murderer that spoileth the 
 * Euch. c:)p. xxvii. 
 
126 
 
 KIXG ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 life of his mortal brethren, if every wish of his heart 
 were a two-edged sword, shall never kill the life of 
 God's immortal pro\'idonce. He shall say to the 
 hardest heart, at which the preaching of prophets and 
 dcnnneiation of .judgments hath often recoiled, Open 
 thy doors, that I may enter into thee to declare my 
 justice ; and to the reprohatest mind that ever hath 
 been dulled and benumbed with sin, Though thou 
 fcelest not my grace, thou shalt feel my vengeance. 
 Em-y cannot hinder his benignity, nor the hottest malice 
 under heaven di'y up this spring of his goodness. 
 
 What shall we say then ? Because God maketh 
 use of thy sins, art thou excused ? Is not thine e\-il 
 e\il, because he picketh good out of it ? Deceive not 
 thyself therein. When thou hast done such service 
 to thy master and maker, though seven and seven 
 j-ears, as Jacob did to Laban, thou shalt lose thy 
 wages, and thy thanks too. Oh, well were thou if 
 thou didst but lose, for thou shalt also gain a sorrow- 
 ful advantage. It is unprofitable, nay, miserable ser- 
 vice which thou hast thus bestowed. Babylon shall be 
 the hammer of the Lord a long time to bruise the 
 nations, himself afterwards bruised ; Asshur his rod 
 to scourge his people, but Asshur shall be more 
 scourged. These hammers, rods, axes, saws, other 
 instruments, when they have done their offices, which 
 they never meant, shall be thro^;!! themselves into the 
 fire, and bm-nt to ashes. Satan did service to God, 
 it cannot be denied, in the afflicting of Job, winnowing 
 of Peter, buffeting of Paul, executing of Judas, and 
 God did a work in all these, either to prove patience, 
 or to confirm faith, or to tiy strength, or to commend 
 
 justice ; yet is Satan ' reserved in chains, imder dark- 
 ness, to the retribution of the gi'eat day.' Judas did 
 service to God, in getting honom- to his blessed name 
 for the redemption of manldnd, whilst the world en- 
 dureth ; yet was his wages an alder-tree to hang him- 
 self upon, and, which is worse, he hangeth in hell for 
 eternal generations. He had his wages, and lost his 
 wages. That which the priest gave him, he lost, and 
 lost his apostleship, but gained the recompense of 
 everlasting unhappiness, and lieth in the lowest lake, 
 for the worm and death to gnaw upon 'n-ithout ceasing. 
 Will you hear the end of ail ? ' Fear God, and keep 
 his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.' 
 This is the will of God, wherewith we are highly 
 charged, and he will strictly require it. The book 
 that is clasped up, let us leave to the Lamb and to the 
 blessed Trinity. Those of Moses, the prophets, the 
 Psalms, of Christ and his blessed apostles, wherein we 
 may run and read the ordinances of the Most High, 
 belong to us, and our seed after us. These let us 
 carefully search, and meditate in them day and night ; 
 let them wake and sleep, walk and rest, live and die 
 with us ; and whatsoever he hath secretly decreed, 
 whether by cm- weakness or strength, sickness or 
 health, falling or standing, which in his hidden coun- 
 sels is locked up, and cannot be opened but by the 
 key of David, let us beseech him for Christ's sake to 
 tiu-u it to our good, that his name may be glorified, 
 his arm made known, his wisdom, justice, and mercy 
 more and more magnified, and our sinful souls bj- the 
 abimdant riches of his gi'acc finally saved. Amen. 
 
 LECTUEE XX. 
 
 -So tlicy took up Jonah, and cast liim into the sea ; and the sea ceased from Jut raijinij. Then the men feared the 
 
 Lord, d'c. — Jonah I. 15, IG. 
 
 IN the former verse, was the dedication of the sacrifice, 
 wherein they sanctified themselves b_y prayer, and 
 commended their action to God's good favom- ; in this 
 is the offering of the sacrifice ; before the attempting 
 whereof, being their final doom and animadversion 
 upon the life of Jonah, a judgment without redemption, 
 they observe the charitablest and wariest principle in 
 exercising discipline that may be held ; that is, not 
 to tiy an extremity till they have tried all means, 
 cuncta prius tenlamUi, and then, if the wound be im- 
 ciu'able and past hope, to apply the fire or the sword 
 to it. They dealt with Jonah in this com'se, as a 
 skilful surgeon with his patient, a part of whose body 
 being putrefied, and eating on by degrees, throateneth 
 the loss of the whole, if it be not stayed, as the trans- 
 gression of Jonah, being but a member in the ship, 
 went forward like a canker, and was at hand to have 
 invaded the whole company. The professor will fii-st 
 inquire the cause of the malady. How cometh it ? 
 
 What hath thy diet, thine exercise been ? as these ask 
 Jonah, ' What hast thou done ? What is thine occupa- 
 tion ?' &c. ; and when he is answered by his patient, I 
 have eaten and drank intemperately, exceeded the 
 strength of my body, incontinently lived (as Jonah 
 reported how far he had disobeyed), perhaps he may 
 chide him, as these chide Jonah, ' Why hast thou done 
 this ?' a man of thy years, education, discretion ? as 
 these imply to Jonah, a man of thj- laiowledge, calling, 
 and commission ; yet he will do more than expostu- 
 late (for that were to afflict the afflicted, and to heap 
 grief upon grief), he will advise with the patient him- 
 self, as these with Jonah, who best Icnowcth the state 
 of his body, as Jonah the counsels of God, ' What 
 shall wc do unto thee '?' And though he be answered, 
 there is no help but one, mine arm must bo cut, 
 or my leg sawed off', and then the rest of my body 
 may be saved, as Jonah answered, ' Cast me into the 
 sea, and the sea shall be calm unto you,' yet he will 
 
Ver. 15, 1G.] 
 
 LECTURE XX. 
 
 127 
 
 prove his skill othcrwiso, as they theu' endeavoiu'S by 
 ro-n-ing, to save the joint, if possibly it may be done. 
 But when there is no other help, the sore retaining his 
 anger, as the sea her inijiatieuce, both fretting on still, 
 and ciying for a desperate remedy, theu \^-ill the one 
 use his corrosives and sharpest instniments, commend- 
 ing the success of the cm-e imto God, as these, after 
 prayer, ' took up Jonah and cast him forth.' In the 
 two next verses ensuing, we may observe, 1, their 
 proceeding (as it were by steps) to the action : ' They 
 took up Jonah ;' 2, the accomplishment thereof : 
 ' They cast him into the sea ;' 3, the event : ' The sea 
 ceased from her raging ;' 4, the demeanour of the 
 mariners, after their release, both in their inward 
 afl'ection, ' Then thej" feared the Lord exceedingly,' 
 and in the open testificatiou thereof, (1.) l)y sacrifices, 
 witnesses of theii' present thankfulness, and (2.) vows, 
 pledges, and earnests of their duty to come. 
 
 Eleazar, an ancient inteipreter of the Bible, think- 
 eth that the sentence is here perfected, ' They took up 
 Jonah,' and by a period or full point, severed from 
 that which followeth, 'They cast him into the sea.' 
 Thereupon he collecteth that the mariners assayed 
 five experiments to acquit themselves from danger : 
 1, the private invocation of evei-y man upon his own 
 God ; 2, the throwing forth of their wares ; 3, their 
 casting of lots ; 4, their common supplication ; 5, 
 their letting down of Jonah into the sea, up to the 
 neck, and pulling him back again, that it might ap- 
 pear unto them that Jonah was the man whom the 
 sea desii'ed, because, whilst his body w'as in the 
 waters, the sea stood ; when taken back, it boiled 
 again. There is no wan-ant in my text for this opi- 
 nion, therefore I charge you not with it. For as 
 there is no reason to lose one word of the writings of 
 God (not the least fragment of the broken meat), so 
 on the other side, to add unto them is an injury-, and 
 a plague will follow it. Only this I observe, as the 
 complement of all their fonncr humanity, specified in 
 many particulars before, that though they could not 
 cast him forth, but they must first take him up 
 amongst them, yet seeing the history might have con- 
 cluded both in one, the latter implying the former, 
 and rather doth it by noting the order and distinction 
 of two smidi-y actions, and by making a space between 
 them, first they took him up, &c., then thej' cast him 
 forth, it argueth a treatable, deliberate, gentle pro- 
 ceeding in them, that that which they did they did by 
 leisui'e, and withoiit violent or turl)ulent invasion. 
 Jerome, with others, comment upon the words, 
 Tidenint, nnn avrijiuerunt, noii invafcrunt, they took 
 him, they haled him not, they caught him not up in 
 a rage, they set not hastily upon him, but bare him in 
 their anns, as it were, with honour and due estimation. 
 Quasi cum ohseqnio portantes, because it was the 
 funerals and exsequies of a prophet of the Lord, their 
 last ser^-icc imto him, they did it with reverence. And 
 in tiiitli there needed no invasion or force to be used 
 
 against him. He was brought to his end, Umquam 
 ovis, which was the emblem of the Son of God, ' as a 
 lamb that is dumb before the shearer, so opened he 
 not his mouth.' Tiileiunt iwiirepur/iiontem, they took 
 him without resistance. For what should resistance 
 have done '? 
 
 Ducunt volentem fata, nolentera trahuut.* 
 I will not say the destinies, as the poet doth, but 
 the will and power of God, for these are the right 
 destinies ; and he that so vmdcrstaudeth them, with 
 Saint Augustine, t tencatsoiteiithim, conir/at Unriiiam, 
 let him keep the opinion, only amending his tongue. 
 But the will and power of God lead bim that is will- 
 ing to go, and i^ul! him that is unwilling. I never 
 read that Moses opposed himself, by the least thought 
 of his heart, to the ordinance of God, when he said 
 unto him, ' Behold, the days are come that thou must 
 die,' though Moses might have lived many years ; 
 for in the last of Deuteronomy, ' his eyes were not 
 dim, nor his natural force abated. Piather he spake 
 unto the people with cheerfulness and alacrity of 
 heart, embracing the tidings of his death, ' I am an 
 hundred and twenty years old this day. I can no 
 more go out and in ; also tlie Lord hath said unto 
 me. Thou shalt not go over this Jordan.' Young 
 men amongst us think they are privileged because 
 they are in their full strength ; old men, though they 
 have a foot in the gTave, think they may be long old. 
 There is none so stricken in years but thinketh he may 
 hve a year more. Nemo est tain senex qui non annum 
 sc piilet })osse vivere. Be we young or old, if ever the 
 message of God be sent imto us, as to Hezekiah, ' Put 
 thy house in order, despatch thy worldly aflairs, for 
 thou must die and not live,' though we tiu'n our fiices 
 to the wall, and pray, and weep, and mourn like a 
 dove, and beg for life, as he did, yet if the pm-jiose of 
 God be fixed, let us patiently entertain it. Cur quod 
 nccesse est, non voluntus occujiat .- Prudentius, a 
 Christian and pradent poet, spake it. That that must 
 be shall be, blessed be the name of God, let us not 
 refuse it. Let a lieast be piilled from his den by 
 force, but let a Christian be taken from bis life with 
 patience. For it is not inheritance but debt, and he 
 that is the Lord of the spirits of all flesh, will as glo- 
 riously restore as he will certainly require it. 
 
 2. Jonah is now at length executed. If this had 
 been done before, the sea had been quiet ; but the 
 Lord loveth to hold and suspend an action, for he 
 hath many works in one, and this amongst the rest, 
 that man may know that howsoever he be favoured 
 by the intercession and respite of time, and by other 
 helps, he cannot strive with a mightier, nor go to law 
 with his IMaker, but his i-eckonings and accoimts must 
 be made when all is done. Adam may run into 
 thickets, and spend the time a while, and cover him- 
 self with leaves, and think to beguile God's eye, but 
 Adam shall be called forth of his bushes, and stripped of 
 * FruJent. f I^ib. v. de civ. Dei, cap i. 
 
128 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. T. 
 
 his gaiinents as tkin as spiders' webs, and cast out of 
 paradise, and have a sentence of death pronounced, 
 and perfonned too, upon him and his whole Hneage. 
 Doth Sisera think, by running away, to run from the 
 judgments of the Lord ? Though there be peace be- 
 tween Jabin his master, and the house of Heber the 
 Kenite, j-et tliat peace shall be turned into war, he 
 shall come into the tent of Jael, the wife of Heber, 
 and find the hand of the Lord as ready to encounter 
 him there as if he had fallen upon the host of Barak ; 
 a draught of milk, which he beggeth for his comfort, 
 shall be his last and deadliest draught ; and instead of 
 rest to the temples of his head, a nail shall be driven 
 into his temples to despatch his life. The Jews may 
 say in the prophet, ' They will ride upon horses, they 
 will flj' away upon the swiftest, liut their persecutors 
 shall be swifter than they.' Others may go to the 
 mountains and rocks, and say they will lie in the 
 closest, but mountains shall be made as valleys, and 
 rocks shall yield at the pleasure of God, as wax before 
 the sun, to open and disclose his enemies. Jonah 
 shall have his leave to run away on foot with Sisera, 
 to ride upon the swiftest with the Jews, to ship him- 
 self in a vessel, and lie as close in the shrouds thereof 
 as the ribs will give him leave ; ho shall one while 
 sleep, another di"aw lots, a third discourse, now be 
 chid, and then examined, and afterwards consulted 
 with, and fairly entreated ; he shall see the loss of all 
 theii' wares, and think his life may bo saved by that 
 loss, and behold millions of waves broken against the 
 sides of the ship, and hope that millions more shall 
 pass and not touch him ; he shall have what friend- 
 ship and help the whole company of mariners may 
 aflbrd him, either by their' prayers or by their advice, 
 or by the handling of their oars, yet the end shall be, 
 Jonah must be cast forth. This is the v.-ages of sin, 
 aud this is the way of all sinful flesh. When we have 
 stood long, and fought with the dangers of the world, 
 both by land and sea ; when thousands have fallen at 
 our right hand, and ten thousands at our left, and we 
 have not fallen ; when we are compassed with friends 
 so far forth, that we may say with the woman of Shunam, 
 1 Ivings iv., ' I need not speaking for me, either to the 
 king or to the captain of the host, I dwell amongst 
 mine own people,' where I may command ; when we 
 have walked in the light of the sun, om- prosperity I 
 mean, waxen so gi-eat that we have wanted nothing ; 
 when we think that we arc in league with death, and 
 in covenant with the grave, and promise ourselves that 
 we shall multiply our days as the sands by the sea 
 side, even when we have sails and oars at pleasure, 
 that wc may say with Antiochus, I will not sail in 
 the sea (with Jonas), but I will sail upon the moun- 
 tains, and walk upon tho sea as upon diy land, yet 
 there must be a time when all these helps shall be 
 fmstrated, and Jonah shall be cast forth. Though we 
 ' escape the pit, wo shall bo taken in the snare,' 
 Jer. xlviii ; wc shall ' flee from a lion, aud a boar 
 
 shall meet us ; or lean our hand upon a wall, and a 
 serpent shall bite us,' Amos v. ; we may be delivered 
 in sis troubles, and the seventh shall despatch us. 
 him that escapeth from the sword of Hazael shall 
 Jehu slay ; and him that escapeth from the sword of 
 Jehu, shall Elisha slay, 1 Kings xix. As one that 
 shooteth at a mark sometimes is gone, and sometimes 
 is short, sometimes lighteth on the right hand, some- 
 times on the left, at length hitteth the mark, so death 
 shooteth at noble men beyond us, at mean men short 
 of us, on the right hand at our friends, at our enemies 
 on the left, at length hitteth ourselves ; and the longer 
 her hand is practised, the more certain it is. She was 
 aiming at Adam nine hundi-ed and thu-ty years, at 
 last smote him ; at Methuselah nine hundi-ed and 
 sixty-nine years, in the end overthi-ew him ; now she 
 striketh within the compass of thi'eescore years, or 
 threescore and ten, or fourscore at the most, and some- 
 times at the fu-st stroke, even in the day of our birth. 
 ' Cast them out of my sight' (saith God to his prophets, 
 Jer. .xix.), ' and let them depart, some to captivity, 
 some to the sword, some to pestilence, some to the 
 water,' as Pharaoh and the princes of Egj-pt ; some to 
 the fu-e, as the king of Edom, whose bones were bm-ned 
 to lime ; some to the bowels and jaws of the earth, as 
 the congregation of Abiram ; Haman to the gallows, 
 Jezebel to the dogs, Herod to worms, the disobedient 
 prophet to a lion, the sons and daughters of Job to the 
 fall of an house, the mothers and infants of Jerusalem 
 to a famine ; some to a plague, some to the edge of 
 tho sword, some to a sickness by the hand of God ; 
 one crieth, ' My head, my head,' as the Shunamite's 
 son ; another. My bowels, my bowels, as Antiochus ; 
 another. My feet, my feet, as Asa ; one complaineth 
 of a palsy, another of a bm-niug fever, a third of an 
 issue of blood ; but whatsoever the means bo, the 
 ordinance of God in the end is this : Jonah must be 
 cast forth, the ship eased, the world emptied by degi-ees, 
 and new generations successively take place. If this 
 were remembered by us, that as Jonah slept in the 
 sides of the ship, and we in security, so we must both 
 sleep in the dust of the earth ; and, as the lot fell upon 
 Jonah in his time, so the lot must fall upon us in ours ; 
 and as neither counsel nor strength could deliver Jonah, 
 so neither counsel nor strength can deliver us ; and as 
 it was the wnll of God to dromi Jonah, so it is tho will 
 of God, some way or other, to dissolve us ; and whether 
 the time is limited, withm ten, or a hundred, or a 
 thousand years, there is no defence against the hand 
 of the grave ; the very remembrance hereof would be 
 as comfortable, and as fortunate a stalf unto us, to 
 walk the pilgrimage of our few and cwl days, as the 
 staff that Jacob had to go over Jordan with. Oh look 
 unto your end, as the wise men looked mito the star 
 which stood over Bethlehem ; it shall haply guide you 
 to heaven, as that guided them to Bethlehem, where 
 the King of tho Jews now sitteth aud reigneth at his 
 Father's right hand ; it shall lead you from the east 
 
Ver. 15, IC] 
 
 LECTURE XX. 
 
 129 
 
 to the west, as that led thorn from the rising of the sun, 
 I mean the state ami time where youi' life hegan, to 
 the going down of the same. But it is a death unto 
 us to remember death. I will say with the son of 
 Sirach, Ecclus. xli., whilst we are able but to receive 
 meat, whilst there is any strength and livelihood in us, 
 aud but appetite to om' food, it is a death to remember 
 death ; and though we dwell in ruinous and rotten 
 houses, built upon saud and ashes, which the wind and 
 rain of infinite daily casualties shake about our ears, 
 yet we walk in this brittle aud earthen house, as Nebu- 
 chadnezzar in his galleries, and ask, ' Is not this gi-eat 
 Babel ?' Is not this my house a strong house ? 
 Is not my body in good plight ? Have I not blood in 
 my veins, fotncss in myboues, health in my joints? 
 Am I not likely to live these many years, and see the 
 succession of my sons and nephews ? What will be 
 the end of all this ? Duciint in honis dies stios, et in 
 puncto descendunt in infernum, ' They pass their days 
 with pleasm-e, and in an instant of time go down into 
 hell.' Therefore they arc deceived which think it an 
 easj' matter speedily to return unto God, when they 
 have long been straying from him ; that are gone with 
 the prodigal child in lonr/inqnam rei/ionein, ' into a 
 far country,' far from the thought of death, and con- 
 seqviently far from the fear of God, yet promise them- 
 selves a quick return again. Do they not know that 
 it will ask as long a time (if not a longer) to find God, 
 as to lose God ? Joseph and Mary left their son at 
 Jerusalem, and went but one day's journey from him, 
 but they sought up and down thi'ee whole days before 
 they could find him ; these going from the ways of the 
 Lord a journey of forty or fifty years, hope in a 
 moment of time to recover his mercies. I would never 
 wish so desperate an adventure to be made by any man, 
 that the sins of his soul and the end of his Ufc should 
 come so near together as the trespass of Jonah and his 
 casting forth. For think with yourselves how fearful 
 his thoughts were, being at the best to be rocked and 
 tossed to and fro in a dangerful ship, the bones whereof 
 ached with the violence of every surge that assailed it, 
 the anchors, cables, and rudders either thrown away, 
 or torn in pieces ; having more friendship profi'ered 
 him, than he had hap to make use of; at length to be 
 cast into the sea, a merciless and unplacable sea, roar- 
 ing for the life and carcass of Jonah, more than ever 
 the lion roared for his prey,. the bottom whereof seemed 
 as low unto him as the bottomless destruction, and no 
 hope left to escape either by ship, boat, or by a broken 
 piece of board, or to be cast to land ; and, besides all 
 these, the anger of God burning against his sins like a 
 whole river of brimstone. This is the case of us all in 
 any extreme and peremptory sickness, or to speak more 
 largely, in the whole course of om- hves, for our lives 
 are nothing but uncertainty, as Hezekiah sang in his 
 song, ' From day to night thou wilt make an end of 
 me,' Isa. xxxviii. We are tumbled and tossed in a 
 vessel as frail as the ship was, which every stream of 
 
 calamity is ready to break in shivers, where neither 
 anchor nor rudder is left, neither head, nor haud, nor 
 stomach is in case to give us comfort ; where, though 
 we have the kindness of wife and friends, the duty of 
 children, the advice and pams of the physicians to v.-ish 
 us well, we cannot use then- service ; where we have a 
 grave before our eyes, greedy, inexorable, reaching to 
 the gates of hell, opening her mouth to receive us, and 
 shutting her mouth when she hath received us, never 
 to return us back again, till the worms and creepers of 
 the earth have devoured us. There is terror enough 
 in these things to the strongest man ; Aristippus 
 feareth death as well as the common people. Etiani 
 in meiu pcrccUciis sicut vuh/us ? But if the anger of 
 God for oiu' former iniquities accompany them, thrice 
 woe unto us ; om' heavy and melancholic cogitations 
 will exclude all thought of mercy, and our souls shall 
 sleep in death, clogged with a burden of sins which 
 were never repented of. Therefore, if we desire to 
 die the death of the righteous, as Balaam wished, let 
 us first live the life of the righteous ; and as we gird 
 om' harness about us before the battle is joined, so let 
 us think of repentance before death cometh, and the 
 ordinance of God be fully accomplished, that we must 
 be cast forth. 
 
 3. And llic sc'rt ceased from her rni/iiii/. As the 
 rising of the sea was miraculo'us, so it is not a less 
 miracle, that her impatience was so suddenly pacified. 
 Heat but a pot with thorns, and withdraw the fire from 
 it, can you appease the boiling thereof at j'our plea- 
 sure '? Here the huge body and heap of waters raised 
 by a mighty wind in the au', or rather the wind and 
 breath of God's anger (what shall I say?) remitteth it 
 the force of her rage by degrees ? Falleth it by num- 
 ber and measure ? Giveth it but tokens and hope of de- 
 liverance unto them ? Nay, at the first sinking of Jonah, 
 it standeth as unmoveable as a stone, as dead as the 
 Dead Sea, having fretted itself before with the greatest 
 indignation and wrath that might be conceived, as if 
 ho that bounded the sea at the fii'st creation, ' Hitherto 
 shalt thou come, and no further,' had spoken unto it 
 at this time. Thus long shalt thou rage, and no longer. 
 Let me observe unto you thus much from the phrase. 
 If the commotion of the sea, even in the greatest and 
 vehementest pangs thereof (as gi'eater than these could 
 not be), by a translation of speech, for likeness of 
 natm'es, be termed her indignation and rage, then, by 
 as good a reason on the contrary side, the anger of man 
 thoroughly kindled may be matched with the commo- 
 tion of the most unquiet sea. And how unseemly a 
 thing it is, that the heart of man should reek with any 
 passion, as that vast and untamed element foameth 
 with rage, yom'selves be judges. I have foimd this jier- 
 tm'bation diversely compared : by Chi'vsostom, though 
 not to the sea, yet to that confused noise which sea- 
 men sometimes make, when their heads are most 
 busied, with whom there is nothing but tumult, much 
 running to and fro, large and liberal outcries, but no 
 
J 30 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 place left for philosopliy ; that is, wisdom and reason 
 have no leave to speak, or to give their judgment. By 
 Evagrius, to a ship sent into the sea, where the devil 
 is pilot ;* by the poets, to a troubled spring, wherein 
 if you look, and think to behold the image of a man, 
 you see no part of his right composition ; or to that 
 clamorous and disordered behaviour which the priests 
 of Cybele used in Crete, ringing theii' basons, and 
 playing upon timbi-els all the day long,f and by inoom- 
 posed gestures in the open streets, shemng themselves 
 to be nothing less than reasonable creatures. 
 
 Wlicn anger, saith Lactantius,J is fallen into the 
 mind of man, like a sore tempest it raiseth such waves 
 that it ehangeth the very state of the mind, the eyes 
 was fieiy, the mouth tremble th, the tongue faltereth, 
 the teeth gnash, and the whole coimteuance is by 
 course stained, sometimes with redness, sometimes 
 with paleness. But it was never more rightly fitted 
 than by the Spirit of God in this place, where it is 
 likened to the fmy and rage of the sea. I may speak 
 it to the shame of men, in the rage and fmy of the 
 sea there is more mercy. The sea is contented and 
 pacified when Jonah is cast forth ; we, in the lightest 
 displeasure done unto us, never satisfied with the 
 punishment, the damage, the dishonour, no, nor the 
 death of our adversaries, hate the quick, pursue the 
 dead, as if we had made that unchristian and heathenish 
 vow, Nee nwrs milii jhiiet j'/vw, &c.. 
 
 Mine anger with my body shall not die, 
 
 But witli thy ghost my gliost shall battle try ; 
 
 whereas the rule of Lacfantius rather should mode- 
 rate us, Ira wortdlium dihet esse mortalis, the anger 
 of mortal men should be mortal like themselves. 
 Valerius Maximus reporteth Sylla to have been such 
 a one, of whom it was doubted whether himself or 
 his anger was fii'st extinguished. In duhio est Syllane 
 prior, an iranindia Sylhc sit e.vliiicta. These tm-bu- 
 lent pertiu'bations of anger, hatred, and malice, as 
 they are never without the torment of him that useth 
 them, they boil his heart to brine, and eat the mois- 
 ture out of his flesh ; so there is great presumption 
 that the Spirit of God resteth not in a soul possessed 
 therewith. When God appeared to Elijah, 1 Kings 
 xix., lying in the cave of mount Horeb, first there 
 passed liy him ' a mighty strong wind, which rent the 
 mountains, and tare the roeks, but the Lord was not 
 in the wind ; after the wind came an earthquake, but 
 the Lord was not in the earthquake ; after the earth- 
 quake came fii-e, but the Lord was not in the fu'e ; 
 after the fire came a still and soft voice, therein the 
 Lord was, and spake,' and Elijah came forth and 
 answered. Think with yourselves that these winds, 
 earthquakes, and fire, are oiu- boisterous affections, 
 
 15 * Iratus similis navi dccurrcnti in mare, et dremonem 
 habenti gubernatorem. 
 
 t Non sic acuta 
 Ingcminant Corybantes sera. 
 1 De ira Dei, cap. v. 
 
 which the presence and favour of God avoideth, better 
 beseeming biiite beasts, in whom there is no under- 
 standing, and the unsensible sea, which God hath 
 restrained wth bars and doors, than the children of 
 men endued with reason. 
 
 4. Then the men feared the Lord exceedinyhj. I 
 noted in this verse the beha-\-ioiu- of the mariners to- 
 wards God, occasioned by the event that fell out. 
 Surely the rightest use of God's mighty wonders is 
 when we take them for wonders, when we tremble at 
 the sight of them, and fear that almighty God whose 
 hands have wrought them. Such are the acclama- 
 tions in the Psalms, ' This is the Lord's doing, and it is 
 marvellous in our eyes.' ' The gracious Lord hath 
 made his wonderful works to be had in remembrance.' 
 ' Lord, how gi-acious are thy works, and thy thoughts 
 arc very deep ! an iinwise man knoweth it not, and a 
 fool doth not understand this.' God doth not miracula 
 propter niirfieuhi, miracles for their own sakes, but for 
 ours ; not caring so much himself to do them as that 
 we should consider and bear them awaj'. Wherein 
 I will shew om* negligence by a familiar example of 
 om- latest days. Samuel biddeth the people ' stand 
 and see a great thing which the Lord would do before 
 their eyes. Is it not now wheat hai-vest ? I will 
 call unto the Lord, and he shall send thunder and 
 rain, that ye may perceive and see how that your 
 wickedness is great, which j^ou have done in the sight 
 of the Lord, in asking a king. The thimder and rain 
 were sent, and all the people feared the Lord and 
 Samuel exceedingly,' 1 Sam. xii. Apply this scrip- 
 ture to yourselves. Is it not now wheat harvest ? 
 Hath not the Lord sent thmider and rain amongst 
 you ; so miseasonable a season, that the fruits of 
 the earth, wherewith your fields were so fiiir before 
 that they laughed and sang, mourning upon the gi-ound 
 that bare them, and the husbandman was ashamed, 
 and sighed to himself to see his hopes so deceived. 
 Was not every cloud in the air a cloud of WTath upon 
 your fields, to destroy your labours ? Were ye not 
 near the curse of the prophecy, ' You have sown much, 
 and bring in little' '? Hag. i. What was the reason of 
 so sudden an alteration, but that oiu- wickedness was 
 great, as theirs was ; and what other end of this work, 
 but that we might s.ay in our hearts, ' Let us fear the 
 Lord our God, which giveth us rain both early and 
 late in due season, and rescrveth unto us the appointed 
 weeks of the harvest'? Jer. v. Thus the mariners 
 applied this extraordinary work of God, and the in- 
 ference of the text spcaketh no less. 
 
 Then they feared. The dutiful l)eha\iour of the 
 mariners consisletb, 1, in their inward affection, 'they 
 feared;' and 2, in outward observances, they 'sacrificed 
 and made vows.' Their inward affection is explicated 
 by many circumstances. (1.) By the nature and kind 
 of the passion, 'they feared.' Others have seen the 
 signs and wonders of God rather lo admire them than to 
 be touched with them ; as it is often noted of the Jews 
 
Ver. 15, Ki.J 
 
 LECTURE XX. 
 
 131 
 
 in the Gospel, when they beheld the works of Christ, 
 ' they were astonished, and said amongst themselves, 
 AVe never saw it on this wise ; the like was never 
 done in Israel.' Thus Herod was desirous to have 
 seen Christ, hoping that some mii'acle might have 
 been done by him. But this was more than admira- 
 tion and astonishment; for they are afraid when they 
 see the waters stilled. (2.) By doubling their passion, 
 which, in the use of the Hebrew tongue, doth increase 
 the signification, tiiituenint timnrc, ' they feared and 
 feared.' (3.) By the attribute, timore mni/no, their 
 fear was not ordinary, but a great and exceeding fear. 
 (•1.) By the object or matter of the fear, ' they feared 
 Jehovah.' 
 
 If ye will learn the eU'ects of fear, when it is great 
 indeed, where can you better learn them than at 
 the sacking of Nineveh, in the second of Nahum ? 
 For there 'the heart molteth,' that is, the leader and 
 the captain faileth, ' the Itnees smite together, sorrow 
 is in the loins, and the face gathereth blackness.' 
 But I leave to discuss the nature of fear, because I 
 have handled it twice before. This only I observe 
 in the mariners, out of these words, that they ' go 
 from strength to strength ; ' the longer the leaven lieth 
 in the meal, the more it leaveneth; and the longer 
 they retain in their hearts the knowledge of the true 
 God, the more they increase in knowledge. If you 
 compare the fifth and tenth and this sixteenth verses 
 together, you shall find that in the first they only feared ; 
 in the second, thcj feared exceediiuily ; in the third, 
 thetj feared the Lord e.vceediiif/li/. The fii'st declareth 
 no more than the affection ; the second addeth the 
 measure; the third the object. The first was the fear 
 of nature ; the second of grace, in the prime and first 
 sprouting thereof; the third, of grace in a further 
 perfection. At the first they fear as men, next as 
 novices, and lastly as converts. First, they see a tem- 
 pest, and because it threateneth destruction unto 
 them, they are afraid, which is incident to all men ; 
 secondly, they hear a confession of the true Lord, a 
 relation of an ofi'ence done, a declaration of the justice 
 of God, then they are afraid more than before ; now, 
 lastly, they see the event and proof of all things, the 
 truth of a prophet's words, the importunity of judg- 
 ment, the execution of vengeance ; at this they fear 
 as much as before, but their idols wholly relinquished, 
 they fear whom they should fear, the dreadful Lord 
 of hosts ; and, to publish that fear to the whole 
 world, they ofl'er sacrifices and make vows. Thus is 
 the kmgdom of God described. Matt. xiii. : it is as a 
 grain of mustard seed at the first, the least of all seeds ; 
 liut when a man hath sown it in his field, it becometh 
 first an herb ; secondly, the greatest of herbs ; thirdly, 
 a tree ; fourthly, the birds make arbours and shades in 
 the boughs thereof : so do the mariners pass from one 
 fear as the seed, to another fear as the herb, and to a 
 great fear as a gi'eat herb, and yet to a greater fear, 
 the fear of the Lord, as to a tree, and the boughs there- 
 
 of are so large, that birds may build nests in them, 
 that is, their works and fruits so apparent, that others 
 may be drawn by the sight and example of them. 
 There is small hope and comfort to be had of that 
 man who, though he hear the word of God, dzovm, 
 and receiveth it, Xa,a£avwi/, and forthwith, iul)u;, rc- 
 ceiveth it, and, furtheruKn'e, with joy, /isra p/aoas, 
 yet serveth but the time, UoosKaioog sun, applying his 
 religion and conscience to the present conditicm of 
 things. Examine yourselves by these notes, whether 
 you arc sown in the field of the Lord, to take root, 
 and to grow to perfection, Matt, xiii., yea or no; 
 whether ye hear the law, to keep the law ; whether 
 you 'hold that which you have,' as Philadelphia is 
 counselled. Rev. iii. ; and not only hold at a stay, but 
 ' strengthen and confirm the remnant ' (that which is 
 left), that your works may be fulfilled before the Lord, 
 as Sardis wished to do ; whether you run not only 
 to pace the ground, to make up the number of runners, 
 to weary your bodies, to spend your breaths, liut to 
 obtain also, for that is the apostle's exhortation, 1 Cor. 
 ix., ' So run, that ye may obtain.' There is no time 
 of standing in this life ; we must still forwards, and 
 think that every blessing of God bestowed upon us is 
 a further calling and provocation of God, as were his 
 callings upon Elias. When he found him a day's jour- 
 ney in the wilderness sitting and sleeping under a 
 juniper tree, he calleth upon him, 'Up, and eat;' and 
 when he found him a second time, ' Up, thou hast a 
 great jom-ney to go ;' and when he had travelled forty 
 days, and was lodged in a cave, ' What dost thou here, 
 Elias '?' and when he had brought him forth to the 
 mount, 'What dost thou here, Elias? Go and return 
 unto the wilderness by Damascus,' and do thus and 
 thus. So whether we be entered into our way, or 
 have proceeded in it, whether we be babes in Christ, 
 or strong men, whether carnal or spiritual, we must 
 up and eat, and strengthen oiu'selves, first with milk, 
 and then with stronger meat ; we have still a greater 
 journey to go, we must walk from grace to grace, from 
 virtue to virtue, from knowledge to knowledge, and 
 always think that we hear a voice that calleth us for- 
 ward, ' Thou hast yet a greater jom-ney to go, what 
 doest thou here, Elias ?' Our Saviom' telleth his dis- 
 ciples, John xiv., that in his Father's house are the 
 mansions ; they are not in the wilderness, nor in Horeb, 
 not upon the mount where Peter would have had the 
 tabernacles built, nor in any part of this life ; therefore 
 let no man sing a requiem to his soul, Anhna qtiience, 
 ' Soul, take thy ease,' or. Body, take thy rest, till he 
 cometh to that place where his rest is. Christ observed 
 this course himself: Luke xiii., ' Go, tell that fox. Be- 
 hold, I cast out devils, and do cures this day and to- 
 morrow, and the third day I shall be perfected,' 'S/i/j.s^ov 
 xal a'jpiov, xai rfi tqittj TiKuaZixai. The church of 
 Thyatira in the Revelation is thus commended : ' I 
 know thy works, and thy love and thy faith, &c., and 
 that thy last works are more than the first,' Rev. ii. 
 
132 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [C'KAP. I. 
 
 And the conclusion or posie of the epistle written to 
 that church, and of all the other epistles, is this, o »/- 
 y.iiv, Not he that draweth his sword, nor he that fight- 
 eth the battles of the Lord, nor he that spendeth his 
 blood, much less he that fainteth or flieth, but ' he 
 that overcometh ' shall eat of the tree of life, and re- 
 ceive those other blessings. To conclude ; it is a gi-ave 
 and serious e.xhortation which the apostle maketh to 
 the Hebrews, chap, vi., ' Lea\ing the doctrine of the 
 begiuuing of Christ, let us be led forward to perfec- 
 tion ; not lajing again the foundation of repentance 
 from dead works, and faith towards God, &c. The 
 earth, which di-inketh in the rain which cometh oft 
 upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by 
 whom it is di-essed, receiveth blessing of God : but that 
 which beareth thorns and briars is reproved, and is 
 near unto cm'sing ; whose end is to be burned.' You 
 see how the plagues arise: 1. reproof; 2. a cm-se ; 3. 
 burning ; and therefore it is as requisite that we in- 
 crease in our fruitfulness. He addeth a modest and 
 kind (lualification of bis former speech, ' But we are 
 persuaded better thmgs of you, and such as are near 
 to salvation, though we thus speak.' If we should 
 thus speak of our corrupt and unprofitable times, we 
 are persuaded better things ; our persuasion must be 
 stronger than om- proof and experience. For our 
 ground hath drunk this rain, whereof he wrote, and 
 often drank it, not distilled from the clouds of the air, 
 but from an higher region of God's most gracious 
 favour. Where are the herbs fit for the use of the 
 
 husbandman that di-essed it ? I see but briars and 
 thorns, or if there be any herbs, they are buried and 
 choked with weeds, that no man can see them. There 
 are a number within these walls, to whom if a man would 
 say, I will walk in the spu-it of falsehood and flattery 
 another while, I will lie unto you ; I will leave this sour 
 and unplausible vein of reprehension, and call you to 
 the tabret and harp, and put you in mind of Sabbaths 
 and new moons, and festival days, ' I will prophesy 
 unto you of wiue and strong drink, oh, this were a 
 prophet fit for this people,' they are the words of 
 Micah, chap. ii. But I rather say, for my part, as 
 Samuel to the people of Israel, 1 Sam. i. 2, ' God 
 forbid that I should sin against the Lord, and cease 
 praying for you, but I will shew you the good and the 
 right way !' That is, ' He that heareth, let him hear, 
 and he that leaveth off let him leave ofl',' Ezek. iii. 
 He that is unrighteous, let him be more unrighteous, 
 and he that is filthy, let him be more filthy ; but he 
 that is righteous, let him be righteous stiU, and he 
 that is holy, let him be boh' still, Rev. xii. For that 
 was the purpose of my note, that as God hath con- 
 tinued a chain of his graces, 1, by predestinating, 2, 
 by calling, 3, by justifying, 4, by glorifying us ; so 
 we should continue a chain of our graces towards him, 
 that there may be grace for gi'acc, by giving all dih- 
 gence to join virtue with faith, and with virtue linow- 
 ledge, and with knowledge temperance,' and not to 
 leave joining the other links of the chain there added, 
 till our own bodies and souls come to be disjoined. 
 
 LECTUKE XXI. 
 
 Then tlie men feared the Lord e.rceedbujjy, and offered a sacrifice to the Lord, and made roiis. — Jon.\h I. IG. 
 
 UPON the event of their fact in casting Jonah forth, 
 I mean the stillness of the sea, I noted before 
 the behaviour of the mariners, first, in their inward 
 afl'ection (the nature whereof was fear ; the measure, 
 great fear; the matter or object, the Lord of hosts), 
 then in the outward declaration of their minds, partly 
 by sacrifices, in agnition of their present service, 
 partly by vows, as an obligation of duty for time to 
 come. The beginning to the rest is fear. For, as 
 Lactantius * wisely reasoneth, without it there can be 
 no religion : Qnod non melnitiir conlemnitnr ; quod con- 
 temnilnr, ul'ujiw non. colitnr. That that is not feared 
 is contemned ; if contemned, it cannot be worshipjied. 
 For which cause it conioth to pass, that religion, 
 majesty, and honour must needs consist by fear. For 
 even the kingdoms of the earth would be dissolved 
 unless this proji held them up. Thcj'efore the zealous 
 Lord callcth for his tribute and due belonging to bis 
 excellency, ' If I be a master, where is my fear ? ' 
 Mai. i. But of this heretofore. 
 
 The first Mercury or messenger to publish abroad 
 • I)e ira Uci. lib. viii. c. viii. 
 
 their fear, is their otl'ering of a sacrifice. WTiicb, 
 whether they presently did at the sea, of the re- 
 mainder of such things as were left unto them, or 
 whether upon their landing, or whethir their purpose 
 and promise to ofl'er a sacrifice were taken for a per- 
 formance, according to the mind of the Chaldaic para- 
 phrast and others,* who inteiTiret the words thus : 
 they ofl'ered a sacrifice, that is, they had an intent, and 
 gave their word to do it, diavrnnt sc sacrificiiim fncturos; 
 or whctlier be meant an inward and spiritual sacrifice 
 of praise and tlianlisgiving, and a contrite heart, as 
 Jerome conjeclureth, it is unnecessary to dispute, see- 
 ing tlie text defineth it not. Again, what were the 
 profit of my labour to go about Sion, and to tell her 
 turrets, to enter the large field of sacrifices, and to 
 nundier all the kinds of tlieni, which either the book 
 of God or other authors have put down '? It were to 
 compel the Scripture, when it otferetli her company a 
 mile, to go twain with me, and to stretch it beyond the 
 line which the Holy Ghost bath laid forth. If any 
 desii'C to know the causes of sacrifices, and to call 
 * K. Ab. Ezra. 
 
Ver. 16] 
 
 LECTUUE XXI. 
 
 133 
 
 tlicm by their names, let him resort to Carolus Sigo- 
 nuis, in his Hebrew Commonwealth,* who, from the 
 authority of Philo the Jew, hantUeth this matter at 
 li^i'ge. 
 
 The material points, indeed, to be considered in this 
 worship of theirs, are two : 1, the antiquity ; 2, the 
 life and soul of a sacrifice. It cannot be denied, but 
 from the ancient age of the world, and in all the na- 
 tions wherewith it hath been replenished before there 
 was any precept of God expressly to require such form 
 of devotion, there hath been olfering of sacrifices as 
 voluutai-y and religious acts, and a kind of sensible 
 homage to testify the power of some nature superior, 
 able to avenge itself of dishonour and contempt done, 
 and not unable, on the other side, to regi'atify them 
 with kindness that sought mito it. Cleo the flatter- 
 ing Sicilian, in behalf of Alexander the Great, whom 
 he laboured with vehement persuasions to make a 
 god,|- craved no more of his fellows but c.riijumn thuris 
 imjieiisam, the bestowing of a little frankincense, as an 
 essential mark to notify his godhead. The angel bade 
 Manoah, in the book of Judges, chap, sii., when he 
 requested him to stay the dressing of a kid, if he pur- 
 posed therewith to make a bm-nt-offering, to ofler it to 
 the Lord; where, it is added immediately, that 
 ' Manoah knew not that it was an angel of the Lord ;' 
 a person (was meant) of meaner condition than to 
 whom a sacrifice belonged. Aquinas resolveth us 
 thus, i that howsoever the determination of the kinds 
 of sacrifices, together with the circumstances of per- 
 .sons, time, and place, be by the positive law, yet the 
 coi'.iuion received acknowledgment that sacrifice must 
 bo offered, is by the law of nature. For what reason 
 can bo given of so uniform a consent of sacrificing, in 
 so many sundry languages and manners of men, but 
 that everj' one groweth after the seed which nature 
 hath sowed in him ? Nnlura; seqiiilur scinina qiiisqne 
 suir. And therefore in efi'ect they say, with the 
 headstrong kings in the psalm, ' Let us break the cords 
 of natm'e asunder, and cast her yoke from us,' who, 
 as if the service of God were invenlum hnmanwn, the 
 device of man, when they could not avail by reason, 
 to master them by religion, Ut quos ratio not posset, 
 eos ad officium relir/io diweret,^ think it as cheap an 
 offence to contemn the majesty of God as human 
 authority, and to deny the rights of the Godhead 
 (which they vainly imagine is but imagined) as their 
 fealty and allegiance to earthly princes. Tell such of 
 the judgments of God, and the torments of hell, you 
 tell them a tale of Cocytus and Phlegethon, and other 
 fabulous inventions of licentious poets. Urge them 
 with the verdicts of the Scriptures ; you may better 
 urge the histoi-y of Herodotus, or Lucian's true nar- 
 rations. A degenerate generation of men, monstrously 
 misshapen in the powers of the soul, and transformed 
 from the use of reason, whose judgment is already 
 
 * lib. 17. cap ii. J 2 se. q. 85, 1 atl. i. 
 
 t Curt. lib. viii. § Tull. 
 
 past, because they believe not, John iii., or rather be- 
 cause they root up those maxims and principles of 
 reason which the hand of nature itself had planted in 
 them. I take but a little piece of their garment at 
 this time (as David caught fr-om Saul) only for a 
 token, and note them as I pass by the way, who, if 
 they were kindly used, should be pronounced by the 
 priest, and by the prince proclaimed, the uncleanest 
 lepers that ever sore ran upon ; not only to be ex- 
 cluded the host, and to have their habitation alone, 
 but to be exiled the land, and extennined nature it- 
 self, which thej' so unnaturally strive to annihilate. 
 Their usage of pan-icides in Rome were over favour- 
 able for them, whom they sewed into a mail of leather 
 and threw into the sea, that yet the water of the sea 
 could not soak through, nor other elements of nature, 
 earth, air, or lu'e, approach unto them. Nono; /j-iydXT] 
 ■^■'JXi'ii aSioTris* Atheism is the main disease of the 
 soul, not only of that private man in whom it is har- 
 boured, but of the whole land wherein permitted. For 
 which opprobrious and contagious disease, till other 
 remedy were found, I would they might be marked 
 the mean time that are sick of it, as the leper was, 
 that the people might bo wise to eschew them. As 
 the one had his clothes rent, his head bare, his lips 
 covered, and was enjoined to cry, where he passed, 'I 
 am__unclean, I am unclean,' Lev. xiii., so I would the 
 other had either a rent or a writing upon their clothes, 
 and a brand in their foreheads, that all that beheld 
 them might say. An atheist, an atheist. 
 
 2. The second collection in ofl'ering a sacrifice is, 
 that the sensible and ceremonial handling thereof, 
 without the inward oblation of the heart, which the 
 other doth but signify, was never approved. f I might 
 repeat the proofs hereof, from the elements and be- 
 ginnings of the world, the sacrifices of Abel and Cain, 
 the first that ever I find to have been made (although 
 I make no question of Adam himself, wlio nurtured 
 his sons in i-eligious discipline) ; from thence I might 
 come down through all the complaints, that even the 
 soul of the Lord, grieved with abuse and mockery, 
 hath plentifully sent forth against his people of the 
 Jews, shewing thei'ein that not onlj' he refused, but 
 heartity condemned, loathed, abhorred, their ofibrings, 
 and denying with pertinacy that ever he required 
 them, Isa. i., whereas in truth they were the ordinances 
 of his own lips. But when he ordained them, he made 
 male and female, and joined two in one, he created a 
 ] body and a soul, an outward and an inward part, the 
 aspectable sign and the invisible afi'ection, for want of 
 which latter, the better of the two, he renounceth the 
 other as that which he never appointed. In the fii'st 
 of Isaiah, forgetting his people to be the children of 
 Jacob, because they forgat his sacrifices to be the 
 sacrifices of a God, whom the}' rather used like a 
 
 * Hermes. 
 
 •)■ Nunquam in odoribua sacrificionim delectatua est domi- 
 nus, nisi in fide et desiderio offerentis. — August, 
 
134 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 scarecrow in the garden of cucumbers than the 
 Lord of knowledge, he calleth them ' priuces of 
 Sodom, and people of Gomorrah,' asking them in 
 jealousy as hot as fire, ' What have I to do with 
 the multitude of yom- sacrifices ? I am full of 
 burut-ofl'erings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts, I 
 desire not the blood of bullocks, nor of rams, nor of 
 goats. When you come to appear before me, who re- 
 quired it at yom- hands ? Bring no more oblations in 
 ■vain, incense is an abomination imto me. I cannot 
 Buli'er your new moons and Sabbaths, my soul hateth 
 your appointed feasts, they are a bvu'then unto me, and 
 I am weary to bear them.' Of the outward counte- 
 nance and lineaments of their sacrificing you hear more 
 than enough, rams and fed beasts, bullocks, lambs, 
 and goats, incense, Sabbaths, new moons, festival 
 days, solemn assemblies, together with stretching out 
 the hands, and making of many praj'ers. But 1 maj' 
 say, that as the mind of a man is the man, mens 
 cujusque is est quistjiie, so the mind and intention of the 
 sacrifice is the sacrifice, which the searcher of the 
 heart and reins looking for, and finding a carcase of 
 religion without a quickening spirit, protesteth that 
 he hath nothing to do with them, that he is full and 
 over full, and that they are an hatred, burden, and 
 abomination unto him. If thej- will redeem his grace 
 with a sweet-smelling sacrifice, they must ' cease to do 
 evil, and learn to do well, seek judgment, relieve the 
 oppressed,' with such like. The beginning and end- 
 ing of the prophecy is in one tune. For afterwards, 
 chap. Ixvi., it is denounced in the name of the Ijord, 
 ' He that killeth a bullock is as if he slew a man ; he 
 that sacrificeth a sheep, as if he cut ofl' a dog's neck ; 
 he that ott'ertth an oblation, as if he ottered swine's 
 blood ; he that remembereth incense, as if lie blessed 
 an idol.' The reason of this misconstrued devotion of 
 theirs is, ' They have chosen their own ways, and their 
 soul ' (which should have been the principal agent) 
 ' delighteth in their abominations.' The correction of 
 that error, and the erection both of the temple and the 
 sacrifices which the Lord chooseth, are in the next 
 words before, ' To him will I look, even to him that is 
 poor, and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my 
 words.' If this wine be wanting to those bottles, this 
 substance to those shadows, we shall go with ' our bul- 
 locks and sheep' (as it is in Hosea, chap, v.) ' to seek the 
 Lord, but shall not find him,' because we go with these 
 alone. Nay, these we may leave behind us, as un- 
 profitable carriage in comparison of the others, so wc 
 want not those. ' I will not reprove thee,' saith God, 
 Ps. 1., 'for thy sacrifices, and because of thy burnt- 
 oflerings, that they are not commonly before me. I 
 will take no bullock out of thine house, nor goats out 
 of thy folds ; for all the cattle of the forest are mine, 
 and the beasts upon a thousand mountains. I know 
 all the fowl upon the hills, and all the wild beasts of 
 the field are mine. If I be hungry, I will not tell 
 thee, for the world is mine, and all that therein is. 
 
 Thlnkest thou that I will eat the flesh of bulls, or 
 di'ink the blood of goats '? ' Thus the external part, 
 and, as it were, the letter of the sacrifice, is not much 
 less than cancelled and abrogated, that the spirit may 
 take place : ' Offer unto God praise, and pay thy vows 
 to the Most High, and call upon me in the day of 
 trouble ; so will I deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify 
 me.' This was it that Samuel answered Saul, 1 Sam. 
 XV., when he pretended the saving of oxen and sheep, 
 and the best of the spoil, to offer to the Lord in Gil- 
 gal, ' Hath the Lord as great pleasure in burnt-ofi'er- 
 ings and sacrifices as when his voice is obeyed ? To 
 obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken is better 
 than the fat of rams.' This did our Saviour imply to 
 the Scribes and Pharisees, who [did so inwardly stick 
 to the outward keeping of the Sabbath, Mat. xii., ' Go 
 learn what this mcaneth, I will have mercy, and not 
 sacrifice.' This did the learned scribe, Mark xii., 
 (whose praise is in the Gospel, that ' he answered dis- 
 creetly, and was not far from the kingdom of God,') 
 rejoin to the Son of God, when he instructed him in 
 the greatest and the next commandments, ' Well, 
 Master, thou hast said the truth, that there is one 
 God, and there is none but he ; and to love him with 
 all the heart, &c., and his neighbour as himself, is 
 more than all bm-nt-ofl'eiings and sacrifices.' And so 
 far is it ofl", that the slaying of unreasonable beasts, 
 were they in number equal to those millions of bul- 
 locks and sheep, which Solomon ottered at the dedica- 
 cation of the temple, 2 Chron. vii., and adding a mil- 
 lion of rivers of oil, to glad the altars of God, shall be 
 acceptable mito him ; that the gi\'ing of our first-born 
 for our transgression, and the fruit of our bodies for 
 the sin of our souls, Micah vi., shall be an unfruitful 
 present, without serious, hearty obedience to his 
 counsels. ' He hath shewed thee, man, what is 
 good, and what he requireth of thee ; surely to do 
 justly, and to love mercy, to humble thyself, and to 
 walk with thy God.' 
 
 The ends of the Jewish sacrifices, if I mistake not, 
 were these : first, to acknowledge therein that death 
 is the stipend of sin, which, though it were due to 
 him and those that sacrificed, yet was it translated 
 and laid upon the beast that oli'ended not ; secondly, 
 to figure beforehand the killing of the Lamb of God, 
 which all the faithful expected ; thirdly, to testify 
 the submission of the heart, which in these visible 
 samplers shone as a light before the whole world. 
 So, spoiling the sacrifice of the last of these ends, 
 they make it in manner a lying sign, and leave it as 
 void of life and breath as the beasts which they immo- 
 late.* The poet complaineth in his satirel of the cost- 
 liness used in their churches, and asketh the priests 
 
 * Sacrificiuni vl obliitioiiem nohiisti, Ps. xl. Intelli- 
 pciuluin est iiou quod noliiit sinipliciter, sed sceundario. 
 Non voluit ut tea, sed ut sif,'na. Item non voluit ipsa sncri- 
 (icia, sed voluit tlevotionem otTcrenliuin. — Uieron. 
 
 t Pers. eat. ii. 
 
Ver. 16.] 
 
 LECTURE XXI. 
 
 13.5 
 
 ■^-hat gold did there ? willing them rather to bring that 
 which Messala's ungracious son, from all his super- 
 fluities, could not bring, to wit, justice, piety, holy 
 cogitations, an honest heart. Grant me but these, 
 saith he, and I will sacrifice with salt and meal only.* 
 It agreethwith the answer which Jupiter Hammon gave 
 to the Athenians, inquiring the cause of their often 
 improsperous successes in battle against the Lacodae- 
 moiiians, seeing they offered the choicest things they 
 could get, which their enemies did not, Dii muyis 
 curant tdcitam horiiin ohk'slationem, noii ambiliosam, 
 quam vcslram pompom: the gods are better pleased with 
 their inward supplication, lacking ambition, than with 
 all your pomp. Lactantius, handling the true wor- 
 ship of God against the Gentiles,! givoth them their 
 lesson in few and sententious words, that God desu'eth 
 not the sacrifice either of a dumb beast, or of death and 
 bloodshed, but the sacrifice of man and life, Hominis 
 ac viti/: ; wherein there is no need either of garlands of 
 vervain, or of fillets of beasts, or of sods of the earth, 
 but such things alone as proceed fi'om the inward 
 man. The altar for such offerings he maketh the 
 heart, whereon righteousness, piatience, faith, inno- 
 cency, chastity, abstinence, must be laid and tendered 
 to the Lord. For then is God truly worshipped by 
 man, when ho taketh the pledges of his heart, pii/- 
 nora ]iieiitis, and putteth them upon the altar of God. 
 The sacrifices evangelical, which the giver of the new 
 law requireth of us, are a broken spirit, obedience to 
 his word, love towards God and man, judgment, 
 justice, mercy, prayer and praise, which are the calves 
 of the lips, alms-deeds to the poor (for with such 
 sacrifices is the Lord pleased), Heb. xiii., om- bodies 
 and souls, not to be slain upon the altar, for it must 
 be a quick sacrifice, Eom. xii. ; not to be macerated 
 and brought under even to death, for it must be ' our 
 reasonable service,' Phil, ii., and finally our fives, if 
 need be, for the testimony of the truth. All which 
 sacrifices of Christianity, without a faithful heart, 
 which is their Joshua and captain, to go in and out 
 before them (to speak but lightly with Origen J in the 
 hke case), are nutus tantiun ct opus miitiuii, a bare 
 ceremony and a dumb show ; but I may call them 
 sorceries of Simon Magus, Acts viii., whose ' heart was 
 not right in the sight of God,' and not sacrifices but 
 sacrileges, with Lactantius, robbing God of the better 
 part ; and as Jeremiah named those idle repetitions of 
 the Jews, Jcr. vii., ' The temple of the Lord, the 
 temple of the Lord, this is the temple of the Lord,' 
 verba mendacii, lying words, so these opera viendacii, 
 lying works, so fraudulently handled, that, if it were 
 possible, God himself should be deceived. Oh ' how 
 hath Satan filled their hearts, that they should lie 
 
 * In sancto quid facit allium? 
 Compositum jus, fasque animo, sanctosque reoessus 
 Mentis, et iucoctum generoso pectus lioiiesto ; 
 llaec cedo, ut admoveam templis, et farre litabo. 
 t i-'e vei'o cultu, cap. xxvi. I lu Luc. 
 
 unto the Holy Ghost ?' Acts v., in making a show 
 that they bring the whole price of their possession, 
 and lay it down at the feet of God, when they with- 
 held the dearer part from him. ' They have not lied 
 unto men ' (though that were fault enough), ' but unto 
 God,' who will truty require the least untruths between 
 man and man ; but falsehoods and fallacies committed 
 between the porch and the altar, within the courts of 
 his own house, and in the professions of his proper 
 service, by casting up the ejea or hands, bowing the 
 knee, knocking upon the breast or thigh, making sad 
 the countenance, moving the lips, uncovering or hang- 
 ing down the head like a bulrush, grovelling upon the 
 earth, sighing, sobbing, praying, fasting, communicat- 
 ing, distributing, crying Lord, Lord, seeking to abuse 
 the fleshly eyes of men, and the fiery eyes of Omni- 
 science itself, he will right sorely revenge, as a dishonour 
 immediately and directly done to his own sacred per- 
 son. Galieuus the emperor gave this judgment of one 
 who sold his wife glass for pearls, Impusturam fecit 
 et passiis est, he cozened and was cozened ; but 
 this for the good of the cozener. For when he was 
 brought upon the stage, and a lion expected by the 
 people to have torn him piecemeal, a capon was sent 
 up to assault him. The same sentence standeth fu'm 
 in heaven against the deceitful merchandisers of true 
 religion, who ofl'er to the highest Emperor, clothed 
 with essential majesty, as the other with pm-ple, and 
 to his spouse the church, glass for pearls, copper for 
 gold, coals for treasm'e, shows for substances, seem- 
 ingfor being,'fancy for conscience. Iniposturam faciunl 
 et jialienliir, they mock and they shall be mocked, but 
 in another kind than the former was ; for whereas 
 they look for the thanks and recompense of their fore- 
 passed labours, lo, they are like the dreamer in the 
 prophet, who eateth by imagination in the night 
 time, and when he awaketh from sleep, his soul hath 
 nothing. 
 
 And made voivs. The matter of their vows is as 
 uncertain as of their sacrifices. What it was they 
 promised to the Lord, and by obligation bound them- 
 selves to perform, neither ancient nor recent, Jewish 
 nor Christian, expositor is able to determine. By 
 conjectural presumption they leave us to the choice of 
 these fom' specialties : — 
 
 That either they vowed a voyage to Jerusalem, 
 where the lately received Jehovah was best known, or 
 to beautify the temple of the Lord with some rich 
 donaries, or to give alms to the poor, or thenceforth to 
 become proselytes in the religion of the Jews, and, as 
 Jerome explaineth it, never to depart from the living 
 God, whom the}' had begun to serve. 
 
 The conditions of a lawful vow are principally these 
 two : first, that the matter thereof be consonant to the 
 word and will of God, otherwise (as Jerome uoteth 
 upon the 11th of Judges) it is folly to plight, and im- 
 piety to perform it, in torendo stultus, in reddendo 
 impius ; secondly, the end must be to witness our 
 
136 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 thankfulness to our Maker and protector. For albeit 
 we are bought with a price, and both our bodies and 
 spirits are the Lord's, not our own to dispose of, and 
 we ought to do that unvowed which our vow hath tied 
 us unto, because we have no better gift than ourselves 
 (as he sometimes said to Socrates his master), to give 
 even ourselves to our bounteous God, and, as it were 
 by bargain and sale, to mancipate our wills to his 
 obedience ; yet the making of a vow, and entering into 
 bonds with God to pay him some special debt, is a 
 more open mark, and professed badge of a thankful 
 soul. Besides, it coufirmeth the mind of a man in 
 virtue, and sotteth a tutor and overseer over bis will, 
 to keep it within the bounds of promised dutifulness. 
 Whereupon Saint Augustine writeth in his Epistle to 
 Armentarius and Paulina,* Fcli.v tn'cessitas est qua 
 in'iiu'liora compeUit, it is an happy necessity that com- 
 pelleth a man to do better than he would do. And 
 surely, if we well regard it, the mother cause of a vow 
 is an engraifed opinion, in the minds of most men, of 
 returning kindness for kindness, which is the readiest 
 way both to conciliate and preserve friendship, f 
 according to that old proverb, A&'j ri xai XdZs. 
 Friendship, and the life of man, and nature itself, con- 
 sisteth in taking and giving. And although God hath 
 no need of our gifts (for, Ps. xvi., 'Can our goodness 
 extend to him,' who hath the riches of all goodness ? 
 or can he increase by less than a drop of rain, who is 
 more than the main sea of all abundance ?), yet it 
 giveth him to understand that at least his glory is 
 sought, though not his utility ; and of that a man 
 hath, not of that he hath not, there is a purpose and 
 desire to do him worship. The sum is this : the 
 honour is God's, the profit ours. He is our liberal 
 creditor (saith Augustine in the same epistle), and 
 bath not want of our payment. Neither groweth he 
 greater by repaying, but the paymasters by him. And 
 whatsoever is restored or recompensed in lieu of any 
 his benefits, is added to him that returned it.J Thence 
 it comoth that David and the princes give thanks unto 
 the Lord, iu the first of Chronicles, chap, xxix., when 
 they had ofl'^red unto him silver, gold, brass, iron, 
 precious stones, after this manner : ' Now therefore, 
 our God, wo Ibank tliee, and praise thy glorious name. 
 But who am I, and what is my people, that we should 
 be able to oiler willingly in this sort ? for all things 
 come of thee, and of thine own hand w'e have given 
 thee.' It is said before, that the people rejoiced when 
 they offered willingly, and David the king also rejoiced 
 with gi'cat joy. 
 
 To return to the head of my speech ; the vows of 
 these mariners, in any of the four kinds before aimed 
 at, are justifiable by both the properties of a vow. 
 For of their cud I make uo doubt, the snares of 
 
 * Epist. 45. ■)■ Epicharmus. 
 
 X Itenisnug pxactor est et non egcnus, et qui non croscat 
 ex rcdditis, .■^ed in se rrcscero facial rec'ditores. Quod ei 
 redditur, reddcuti additur. 
 
 destruction being so newly broken before their eyes, 
 and they escaped ; and what fault can we find in the 
 matter, whether their pm'pose were to leave their own 
 countries, and to go to the city of God, for better in- 
 structions in his law, as the queen of the south came 
 from her native dominion to hear the wisdom of Solo- 
 mon, such pilgrimage is not amiss ; or to adorn the 
 temple of Jerusalem, where the honour of God dwelt, 
 with voluntary gifts and presents, as David and his 
 nobles before, and as the wise men of the east carried 
 the gold, frankincense, and myrrh to the Son of God ; 
 or to distribute their goods to the needy, as Zaccheus 
 did, and to ' cast their bread upon the waters' for the 
 Lord's sake, where they look to receive again neither 
 thanks nor recompense ; or, lastly, to devote them- 
 selves to the Redeemer of their lives, and with an in- 
 dissoluble covenant to become his faithful servants : 
 the last of which is indeed the substance and centre 
 of all vows. There are two things, saith Lactantius,* 
 that must be ofl'ered unto God, donuin et sucrijicitim, 
 a gift and a sacrifice, the one perpetual, the other 
 temporal ; the one, as silver, and gold, and purple, 
 and silk ; the other, a beast slain, or whatsoever is 
 burnt upon the altar. But God hath use of neither 
 of these, because himself is incorrupt, and they sub- 
 ject to corruption. Therefore we must offer both in 
 a spiritual and unbodily manner, t that God may havo 
 use of them. Our gift must be the uprightness of 
 mind ; our sacrifice, praise and thanksgiving. Some 
 vow one thing, and some another, saith the author of 
 those sermons of the time -.'l some oil, some abstinence 
 fi-om wine, some fasting : this is not the best, nor the 
 perfectest kind of vowing. I shew you a more excel- 
 lent way ; God careth not for thine oil, nor thy fasts, 
 but Jwc quod rcdemit ipsum offer, that that the Lord 
 hath redeemed, that offer, I mean thy soul. And if 
 thou demandcst. How my soul ? I answer. By holy 
 means, chaste cogitations, fruitful works. 
 
 I will not strictly examine, upon this occasion, the 
 vows prescribed and practised in the Church of Rome, 
 somewhat to the imitation of these that are presumed 
 of the mariners. These vowed, perhaps, a voyage to 
 Jerusalem, they to Compostella or Walsiugham ; these 
 to beautity the temple of the Lord, they the monu- 
 ments and shrines of saints ; these to bestow their 
 goods upon the poor, the}- to profess wilful beggary ; 
 these to be proselytes, and to cleave to the service of 
 God, they to renomiee the world, to abandon the 
 society of men, to abjure the company of women, and 
 to biu-y themselves in monasteries and cloisters, for 
 their bettor opportunity thereunto. Shall I say, in a 
 word, the matter of all their vows uniieedful, in some 
 unlawful, in some unpossible, in others idolatrous, 
 impious, diabolical ; and the end, for the most part, 
 
 * De cultu Dei, cap. xxv. 
 
 t Quia ct ipso incnrruptu."!, et illud totura corruptibilo, 
 utrumquo iucorporalo olTerendum est. 
 t Serm. 7 do Temporo. 
 
Ver. IG.J 
 
 LECTURE XXI, 
 
 1&7 
 
 not to be thankful to God, but to arrogate a kind of 
 perfection, and to build merit thereupon. 
 
 But tell me, ye sons of Balaam, you that exalt your 
 synagogue so much by reason of your vows, if in any 
 pai't of the world there be more slothful and sinful 
 desidionsness than in the resty cloisters and dormi- 
 tories of that church, wherein such wearisome pere- 
 gi-inations, and tiring of the legs is enjoined ; if in 
 any part of the world such royal, pontifical, Persian 
 magnificenee as in your priests and Nazarites, the 
 votaries of that church, where poverty is pretended ; 
 if in any part of the world such adulterous, incestu- 
 ous, Sodomitical defiling of women, men, children, 
 not only bj- stealth, but in the sight of the sun, in 
 brothel-houses and stews, erected, maintained, rented, 
 iustified, as in the streets of that mother city, where 
 chastity is imposed ? So the harlot allegeth for her- 
 self in the Proverbs, ' I have paid my vows,' yet she 
 calleth a young man to dalliance and filthiness. In 
 an epistle thej- wrote to the Lords of the Council, from 
 their Cacus den, prefixed before the libel of persecu- 
 tion in England, they plead for the vows of their 
 church, as a custom standing with good policy, and 
 making for the establishment of commonweals. They 
 fetch it in by consequence, that because a vow made 
 unto God must be fulfilled, therefore our promise to 
 om- neighbour, which is also a kind of vow, must not 
 be violated. We, they say, on the other side, by 
 affirming that vows may be broken to God, make no 
 doubt of om- breach with man ; whereupon it ensueth, 
 that there is no trust nor faithfulness in our dealing. 
 Philo,* mcthinketh, rightly expressed the qualities of 
 these Saturnine, sullen, discontented men ; they are 
 alwaj's complaining of the police of their country, and 
 framing an indictment against the laws of it,f with 
 as much right as the vagabonds in the Acts, chap, 
 xvii., complained of Jason and the brethren in his 
 house, ' These are they which have subverted the state 
 of the whole world, and here they are.' Surely, I 
 confess, there is a decay and declination, as of the 
 state and strength of the world, so of all goodness. 
 The refuse and dross of mankind we are, chap, xviii., 
 on whom not the end, but the ends, nor of the world, 
 but of the worlds and ages forepast, are not only come, 
 but met together by conjunction, 1 Cor. x., E/s to; 
 zu. r'O.n ruiti aiwvc^v y.arrivrrisev. The alacrity and vigour 
 of the whole creature is worn away ; justice draweth 
 her breath faintly ; the charity of many is waxen 
 cold, and when the Son of man cometh, though he 
 burn cresset light, shall he find fiiith ? There is a 
 daily defection of the husbandman in the fields, J the 
 mariner at the sea, innocency in the court, justice in 
 judgment, concord in friendship, workmanship in arts, 
 discipline in manners. How should the Scriptures 
 
 * De confusione lingu. 
 
 TUIV V6/MUV //.sXlTUVTi;. 
 
 X Indies deficit in agris agricola, &c. — Ct/pr. contra Dcmetr. 
 
 else be true, that ' in the latter days there should be 
 perilous times,' 2 Tim. iii., such as the golden age 
 never knew ; that men should be 'lovers of themselves, 
 covetous, boasters, unnatural, truce-breakers,' &c., 
 which they might find, if they would clear their eyes 
 with the eye-salve of plain dealing, (juocunqiie sub axe, 
 amongst papists as much as protestants, without 
 whetting their tongue or pen against our innocent 
 religion. But when I hear them hunting for the 
 praise of God and man by such means, I call to mind 
 an ancient history of vows vied and revied between 
 the citizens of Croto and Locrus, or great Greece in 
 Ital,y. They were at hot strife, and ready to discern 
 their variance by dint of sword ; and the fuiiner vowed 
 unto their gods to give them the tenth part of the 
 spoil, if they won the field ; the others, to go a foot 
 before them, promised the ninth, so they might obtain 
 the conquest. Let these admirers of Italy follow the 
 steps of their Itahan predecessors. Kotwithstanding, 
 I doubt not, for all their ambitious ostentation, but 
 though they go before us in making vows, we shall 
 not come behind them in keeping promises — 
 
 Quill dignura tanto feret liic promissor liiatu ? 
 
 What need they gape so wide in telling of their vows 
 and performances, when it is not unknown as far as 
 the world is christened, that they have verified the 
 old proverb, in ' straining at gnats, and swallowing 
 down camels' ? Admit their keeping of promise for 
 ' mint and anise seed, and the smaller things of the law,' 
 yet they will break a promise in a matter more capital, 
 touching the life of a man, though Ln a general coim- 
 cil, and in the face of Christendom plighted unto him.* 
 And whereas ' an oath for confirmation is the end of 
 strife,' Heb. vi., and it is not only a shameful thing 
 to be justly charged, as one of the king's seed in Eze- 
 kiel, chap. xvii. : ' He hath despised the oath, and 
 broken the covenant, yet lo he had given his hand ;' 
 but it evermore pulleth down the judgment of God, 
 for, ' as I live,' saith the Lord, ' I will surely bring 
 mine oath which he hath despised, and my covenant 
 which he hath broken, upon his own head ;' yet will 
 these men take an oath, not to the king of Babel, a 
 stranger, as he did, but to their sovereign lady the 
 queen of England,t to be true to her cro'mi and domi- 
 nions, even with ceremony and solemnity ; and as 
 Abraham's servant put his hand under his master's 
 thigh, taking an oath by him who should come from 
 the thighs of Abraham, so these lay their hand upon 
 theu' master's book, wishing a curse to then' own souls, 
 in the sight of God and angels above, and a whole 
 university beneath, if they perfonn not fidelity ; yet 
 they will break that sacrament with as easy a dispen- 
 sation, or rather, as Bernard termeth it, a dissipation 
 granted by themselves, as if thej' had but tied a knot 
 in a rush, to be undone again at their pleasures. I 
 
 * Read tlie story of Jolm Huss. 
 
 t At the taking of tlicir degrees, &c. 
 
13S 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [ClIAP. I. 
 
 maj' truly say with the apostle St Jobn, ' That which 
 I have heard and seeD, and mine eyes have looked 
 upon, and I have handled with mine hands, that de- 
 clare I unto you.' These he their' holy sanctions, 
 their politic and religious undevout vows, this the 
 event, these the fruits of them, in the number where- 
 of I might insert another accursed vow, not unlike to 
 that of the Jews against Paul, Acts xxiii., ' That they 
 would neither eat nor drink till they had killed him.' 
 Surely they have taken an oath, these runagatss of 
 Ephraim, which run from the chosen of the Lord to 
 Saul's son, and flee to a foreign nest after the patriarch 
 hath bred them, to do a mischief with Herod, and to 
 accomphsh as much as the Herodias of Kome shall 
 require of them ; whereto they have bound themselves, 
 not to the half of a kingdom, which they have not, but 
 to the loss of then- heads, which they daily come in 
 question of. If nothing will please Herodias but the 
 head of John Baptist, the greatest amongst the sons 
 of women, it shall be given her ; if nothing this other 
 strumpet but the head of a queen, the greatest amongst 
 the daughters of men, they will do their best endeavour 
 to make it good. 
 
 When I first began to handle this prophecy, I told 
 you that the argument of it was nothing more than 
 mercy ; and that from the whole contents thereof, 
 knit up in four chapters, as the sheet of Peter at the 
 four corners, proceeded a most lively demonstration 
 of the gi'acious favour of God, 1, towards the mariners, 
 2, tow^ards Jonah; 3, towards the Ninevites ; lastly, 
 in generality, not so much by personal and practical 
 experience, as by strife and contention of argument, 
 to justify his goodness, which Jonah murmured against. 
 The first corner of the sheet hath been untied unto 
 3'ou (for some make an end of the first chapter where 
 I now left) ; that is, the mercy of God, embracing the 
 mariners in their extremity of danger, hath been 
 opened, after that little portion of grace which the 
 Spirit of God hath divided unto nie. This mercy is 
 evident in two singular, and almost despaired, deliver- 
 ances : first, of their bodies from a raging and roaring 
 sea, a benefit not to be contemned, for even the 
 apostles of Christ cried in the like kind of distress 
 upon the waters, ' Help, Lord, we perish ;' secondly, 
 of their souls, from that idolatrous blindness wherein 
 they were drowned and stifled, a destruction equal to 
 the former, and indeed firr exceeding. The hori-or of 
 this destruction was never more faithfullj' laid out in 
 colours than in the eighth of Amos, where, after repe- 
 tition of sorrows enow (if they were not burnt with 
 hot irons past sense), as that the songs' of the temple 
 should be turned into bowlings, feasts into mourning, 
 laughter into lamentation, that there should be many 
 dead bodies in every place, even the number so great 
 that they should cast them forth in silence (without 
 obsequies), the sun going down at noon, and the earth 
 darkened in the clear day ; that is, their greatest woe 
 in the gi'eatcst prosperity ; yet he threatencth a 
 
 scourge beyond all these. Behold, saith the Lord, 
 (I have not yet made your eyes dazzle, nor your ears 
 tingle, with my judgments, though your eyes have 
 beheld suflicient misery to make them fail, yet behold 
 more), the days come (I give you warning of un- 
 happier times ; the plagues you have endured already 
 are but the beginnings of sorrow), ' the days come 
 that I wiU send a famine in the land ;' if the mouth 
 of the Lord had here stayed, /((H(cw immkUim, I will 
 send a famine, had it not sufliced '? Can a greater 
 cross, think you, be imagined than when a woeful 
 mother of her woeful children shall be driven to say, 
 1 Kings xvii., 'As the Lord liveth, I have but a little 
 meal left in the barrel, and a little oil in a cruse, and 
 behold, I am gathering two sticks to go in and dress 
 it for me and my sou, that we may eat and die'? and 
 much rather, if it come to that extremity which another 
 mother felt, 2 lungs vi., when she cried unto the 
 king, ' Help, my lord, O king ; this woman said unto 
 me. Give thy sou that we may eat him to-day, and we 
 will eat my sou to-morrow ; so we sod my son, and 
 did eat him,' &c. ; yet he added to the former by a 
 correction, ' not a famine of bread, nor a thirst of 
 water, but of hearing the word of God ; and they shall 
 wander,' (not as the sons of Jacob, who went but out 
 of Israel into Egypt), but ' from sea to sea, and from 
 the north to the e;ist shaU they run to and fro to seek 
 the word of the Lord, and shall not find it.' This was 
 the case of these men, before a prophet spake unto 
 them, and the wonders of the law were shewed amongst 
 them. And this was the case of our country when 
 either it fared with us as with the church of Jerusalem, 
 slrina non vidciiius, non est aiiiplius prvphcla, we see no 
 tokens, there is no prophet left, Ps. Ixsiv. ; or if we 
 had prophets, they were such as Ezekiel nameth, chap, 
 xxii., ' They saw vanities, and divined hes ;' and the 
 book of the law of the Lord, though it were not hid in 
 a corner, as in the reign of Josiah, 2 lungs xxii., nor 
 cut with a penknife, and cast into the fire, as in the 
 days of Jehoiakim, Jer. xxxvi., j'et the comfortable 
 use of it was interdicted the people of God, when 
 either they could not read, because it was sealed up 
 in an unkno\\ii tongue, or under the pain of a curse 
 they might not ; and such as hungered and thirsted 
 after the righteousness of Jesus Christ were driven 
 into German}', and other countries of Europe, to in- 
 quire after it. But ' blessed be the Lord God of 
 Israel, for he hath long since visited and redeemed us 
 his people.' If our many deliverances besides, cither 
 by sea, from the invasion of the grand pirate of Chris- 
 tendom, or from other rebellions and conspiracies by 
 land, had been in number as the dust of our ground, 
 this one deliverance of our souls from the kingdom and 
 power of darkness, the very shadow and borders of 
 death, wherein wo sat before the sending of pro- 
 phets amongst us, to prophesy right things, to preach 
 the acceptable year of the Lord, and the tidings of 
 salvation, had far surpassed them. Let us therefore, 
 
Ver. 17. J 
 
 LECTURE XXII. 
 
 139 
 
 with these mariners, sing a song of thanksgiving, not 
 only with our spirits (Mj" soul, bless thou the Lord, 
 and all that is within me praise his holy name, Ps. 
 ciii.), but with sacrifices and vows also, as audible 
 
 sermons and proclamations to the world ; let us make 
 it known that great is the mercy of Jehovah to our 
 little nation. 
 
 LECTUEE XXII. 
 
 Now the Lord hath jirepaird a f/irat fish tn siriiUmr iiji JaiiaJi. iiiiil JiduiIi iras in tlie belli/ "/ ''"' f""^'' ''"''''' ''"i/*' 
 
 (iiul Ihrei' iiiijlits. — Jonah I. 17, or 11. 1. 
 
 w 
 
 E are now to come to the second section of the 
 prophecy, wherein the mercj- of God towards 
 Jonah is illustrated. It beginneth at my text, and 
 paiteth itself into three members : 1, the absorption 
 or burial ; 2, the song ; .3, the delivery of the prophet. 
 Isiodore* in three words summeth the contents of it : 
 Cctus ohjcclum, roratiim, oranlcm revomuit, the whale 
 cast up Jonah, first cast forth, then devoured, after- 
 wards making his moan to God. Jonah is swallowed 
 in this present sentence. 
 
 The justice and mercy of God run together in this 
 history, as those that run for the mastery in a race ; 
 and it is hard a long time for Jonah to discern whether 
 his justice will overcome his mercy, or his mercy 
 triumph over justice. They labour in contention as 
 the twins in Rebekah's womb. Gen. xxv. ; and although 
 Esau be first born, red, and hairy all over like a rough 
 gamient, yet Jacob holdeth him b}' the heel, and is 
 not far behind him. I mean, though the judgment of 
 God against Jonah, bearing a rigorous and bloody 
 countenance, and satiate with nothing, in hkelihood, 
 but his death, and that most strange and unaccustomed, 
 seemeth to have the first place, yet mercy speedeth 
 herself to the rescue ; and in the end is fulfilled that 
 which God prophesied of the other pair, ' The elder 
 shall serve the younger.' For when justice had her 
 course, and borne the pre-eminence a great space, 
 mercy at length putteth in, and getteth the upper 
 hand. To us that have seen and perused the history, 
 who have as it were the table of it before our eyes, and 
 know both the first and the last of it, it is apparent 
 that I say, that although he were tossed in the ship, 
 and cast forth into the sea, and devoured, j-et God 
 had a purpose prevised herein, to work the glory of 
 his name, and the others' miraculous preservation. 
 But Jonah himself, who all the while was the patient, 
 and set as a mark for the arrows of heavenly displea- 
 sure to be spent at, and knew no more what the end 
 would be than a child his right hand from the left, 
 what could he think, but that heaven and earth, land 
 and sea, life and death, and all creatures in the world, 
 had sworn and conspired his immortal misery '? First 
 he was driven to forego his native country, the land 
 of his fathers' sepulchres, and take the sea ; when he 
 had shipped himself, the vessel that bare him staggered 
 like a drunken man to and fro, and never was at rest 
 * De patrib. vet. testam. 
 
 till she had cast forth her burden ; being cast forth, 
 the sea, that did a kuid of favour to Pharaoh and his 
 host, in giving them a speedy death, is but in manner 
 of a jailer to Jonah, to deliver him up to a further 
 torture. Thus, from his mother's house, and lap, 
 wherein he dwelt in safety, to a ship, to seek a foreign 
 country ; from the ship into the sea ; and from the 
 sea into a monster's belly (iucowpositiim jiavifiium, 
 an incomposed misshapen ship*) ; therein, shall 1 say, 
 to his death ? that haci been his happiness ; he would 
 have wished for death, as others wished for treasure : 
 ' There are the prisoners at rest, and hear not the 
 voice of the oppressor ; there are the small and great, 
 and the servant is free from his master,' Job iii. So, 
 then, there is a comfort in death to a comfortless soul, 
 if he could achieve it. But Jonah cannot die ; the 
 sea, that swalloNved down volumes of slime and sands, 
 is not grave enough to bury him ; he may rather per- 
 suade himself that he is reserved for a thousand deaths, 
 whom the waters of the ocean refuse to drown, gi'S'ing 
 over their prey to another creature. ' My thoughts 
 are not your thoughts,' (saiththe Lord by his prophet 
 Isaiah, chap. Iv.), ' neither are your ways my ways. 
 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are 
 my ways higher than 3-om- ways, and my thoughts 
 above your thoughts.' It is most true. When we 
 think one thing, God thiuketh another ; he safety and 
 deliverance, when, in the reason of man, there is in- 
 evitable destruction. We must not therefore judge 
 the actions of the Lord, till we see the last act of them. 
 We must not ' say in our haste, all men are liars,' Ps. 
 cxvi. ; the pen of the scribes is vain ; the books false, 
 the promises uncertain ; Moses and Samuel, prophets 
 and apostles, are like rivers dried up, and have de- 
 ceived us, Hab. ii. We must tarry the end, and know 
 that ' the vision is for an appointed time, but at the 
 last it shall speak ' (according to the wishes of our 
 own heart), ' and shall not lie. Though our souls faint 
 for his salvation, j^et must we wait for his word,' Ps. 
 csis. 81. Though 'our eyes fail for his promise, 
 saying. Oh, when wilt thou comfort us ?' and we are 
 as bottles in the smoke (the sap of our hope dried up), 
 yet we must not forget his statutes. When we see 
 the fortunate succeeding of things, we shall sing with 
 the righteous prophet, ' We know, Lord, that thy 
 judgments are right,' (though deep and secret) ' and 
 * Chrysost. 
 
140 
 
 KIXG OX JUNAlf. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 that thou of very faithfulness hast caused us to bo 
 tried ;' that howsoever our troubles seemed to be with- 
 out either number or end, yet thy faithfuhicss, higher 
 than the highest heavens, failed us not. 
 
 To set some order in the sentence propounded, I 
 commend these circumstances unto you : Si'st, the dis- 
 poser and ruler of the action, the Lord ; secondly, the 
 mamier of doing it, lie provided or prepared ; thirdly, 
 the instrument, a fish, together with the praise and 
 exornation of the instiiiment, a ijreatfiah ; fourthly, the 
 end, to strtiUow up Jonah ; lastly, the state of Jonah, 
 and how it fared with him after he was swallowed up. 
 
 1. And first, that you may see the difi'erence be- 
 twixt inspired spirits, and the conceits of profiiue men, 
 who, as if the natm-e of things bare them to their end 
 without further disposition, as when the cloud is full 
 (they say) it giveth her rain, and going no higher than 
 to soeond and subordinate causes, never consider that 
 high hand that wrought them, it may please you to 
 observe, that through the whole body of this prophecy, 
 •whatsoever befell Jonah, rare and infrequent, is lifted 
 above the spheres of inferior things, and ascribed to 
 the Lord himself. A great wind was sent into the 
 sea to raise a tempest ; it is not disputed there what 
 the wind is by nature (a dry exhalation drawn up from 
 the earth, and carried between it and the middle 
 region of the air aslant, fit to engender a tempest), but 
 the Lord sent it. Jonah was afterwards cast into the 
 sea ; it is not then considered so much, who took him 
 in their anns, and were the ministers of that execution, 
 but ' Thou, Lord, hast done as it pleased thee.' Jonah 
 is here devoured by a fish ; it is not related that the 
 greediness and appetite of the fish brought him to his 
 prey, but ' the Lord prepared him.' Jonah again is 
 delivered from the belly of the fish ; it might be 
 alleged in reason perhaps, that the fish was not able 
 to concoct him, but it is said, ' the Lord spake to the 
 fish and it cast him up.' Towards the end of the 
 prophecy, Jonah maketh him a booth abroad, and 
 sitteth under the shadow of a gom-d, ' the Lord pro- 
 \'ided it ;' a worm came and consumed the gourd that 
 it perished, ' the Lord provided it.' The sun arose, 
 and a fervent east wind beat upon the head of Jonah ; 
 ' the Lord also provided it.' Who is he, then, that 
 saith, and it comcth to pass, if the Lord command it 
 not ? ' Out of the mouth of the Most High cometh there 
 not evil and good'?' Lament, iii. Thus, whensoever we 
 find in any of the creatures of God, either man or 
 beast, from the greatest whale to the smallest worm, 
 or in the unsensible things, the sun, the winds, the 
 ■waters, the plants of the earth, either pleasure or hurt 
 to us, the Lord is the worker and disposer of both 
 these conditions. 
 
 2. The liord prepared, that ye may know it came 
 not by chance, brought thither by the tide of the sea, 
 but by especial providence ; for it is not said that 
 God created, but that he ' ordained and provided ' the 
 fish for such a purpose. There is nothing iu the 
 
 works of God, but admirable art and skilfuluess. 
 ' Lord ■ (saith David, Ps. civ.), ' how manifold are thy 
 works ! in wisdom hast thou made them all.' Solomon 
 giveth a rule well beseeming the rashness and unad- 
 visedness of man, who without deliberate forecast 
 entereth upon actions, ' fij'st to prepare the work with- 
 out, and to make all things ready in the field, and 
 after to build the house,' Prov. xxiv. God keepeth 
 the order himself, having his spirit of counsel and pro- 
 vision always at hand to prepare, as it were, the way 
 before his face, to make his paths straight, and to 
 remove aU impediments, to level mountains, to exalt 
 valleys, to turn waters into dry groimd, and dry ground 
 into water-pools, and to change the whole nature of 
 things, rather than any work of his shall be interrupted. 
 He had a pui-pose in his heart not to destroy Jonah ; 
 yet Jonah was thi'own into the mouth of destruction. 
 A man would have thought that the counsel of God 
 (if ever) should now have been frustrated, and that 
 salvation itself could not have saved Jonah ; put from 
 the succour of the ship, from the friendship of his 
 associates, having no rock to cleave unto, far from the 
 shore, and neither able perhaps nor desirous to escape 
 by swimming, yielding himself to death, and to a 
 living grave, with as mortified an aiiection as if lumps 
 of lead had been cast down ; yet God had prepared a 
 means to preserve the life of Jonah. Even the bowels 
 of a cruel fish are as a chariot unto him, to bear him 
 in safety through those unsearchable depths. Oh how 
 many wonders in how few words ! how mam' riddles 
 and dark speeches to the reason of man. He will 
 scarcely beheve, when they shall be told unto him : 1, 
 that so huge a fish should be so ready to answer at 
 the call of the Ijord, and to save his prophet ; 2, so 
 able to devour a man at a morsel, without com- 
 minution or bruise ofi'ered to any one bone of his ; 8, 
 that a man could live the space of three days and 
 nights in a fish's belly ; but so it was. The Lord 
 doth but use a preamble to finish his work intended. 
 He sufiereth not the ship to carry him forth right to 
 the city, but so ordereth the matter, that the mariners 
 deliver him to the sea, the sea to the whale, the 
 whale to the Lord, and the Lord to Nineveh.* That 
 we may learn thereby, when our sins hang fast upon 
 us, the harbour of a warm ship cannot be beneficial ; 
 but when we have shaken them otf, the sea shall make 
 a truce, and the uugentlest beasts be in league with 
 us. The demand of the earthly man in these unpro- 
 bable works hath ever been, rrSic, how can this be ? 
 Though an angel from hea\en shall tell Sarah of a son, 
 after it had ceased to be with her after the manner of 
 women, she will laugh within herself, and say, ' What, 
 after I am waxen old, and my Lord also ?' Gen. xviii. ; 
 but what saith the angel unto her '? ' Shall anything 
 be hard to the Lord '!' When the children of Israel 
 wanted llesh to oat, and cried in the ears of the Lord, 
 Quis dabit ! ' \\ ho shall give us llesh to eat ?' Num. 
 * Cbrys. lloiii. 5. nd pop. Autiocli. 
 
Ver. 17.] 
 
 LKCTURE XXI r. 
 
 141 
 
 xi., God promised it for a month together, until it 
 should come out of their nostrils ; and ' Moses said, 
 Six hundred thousand footmen are there among the 
 j)eoplc, of whom I am, and thou saycst, I will give 
 them flesh to eat a month long. Shall the sheep and 
 the beeves be slain for them to fiiid them ? either 
 shall all the fish of the sea be gathered together for 
 them to suffice them ?' But the Lord answered him, 
 ' Is the Lord's hand shortened ? thou shalt see now 
 ■whether my word shall come to pass unto thee or no.' 
 EUsha prophesied in that woeful famine of Samaria, 
 when they bought an ass's head and dove's dung at 
 an unreasonable rate : 2 Iviugs vii., ' To morrow by 
 this time a measure of fine flom' shall bo sold for a 
 shekel,' etc. Then a prince, on whose hand the king 
 leaned, answered the man of God, ' Though the Lord 
 would make windows in heaven, can this thing come 
 to pass '?' The prophet answered him, ' Behold, thou 
 shalt see it with thine eyes, but shalt not eat thereof.' 
 Saint Augustine in his third epistle to Volnsian and 
 elsewhere, giveth the rules to satisfy these distrustful 
 reasonings. We must gi'ant that God is able to do 
 some things, which we are not able to find out; in such 
 works the whole reason of the doing is the power of 
 the doer ; it is God that hath done them ; consider 
 the author, and all doubts will cease.* Therefore if 
 Maiy, receiving a message of unexpected and unwonted 
 conception, shall say at the first, ' How shall this thing 
 be ?' yet when the angel shall say unto her, that it is 
 the work of the ' Holy Ghost,' and the ' might of the 
 Most High,' and that her ' cousin Elizabeth bath also 
 conceived in her old age, though she had pm'chased 
 the name of ban-en ' by her barrenness, ' because 
 with God,' saith the angel, ' nothing is impossible,' 
 Luke i., then let Mary lay her hand upon her heart, 
 and say, ' Behold the handmaid of the Lord;' that is, 
 without further disceptation I submit myself to the 
 power of God. But if that former reason of his all- 
 sufficient might be not of strength enough to resolve 
 either pagans abroad, or atheists at home, touching 
 the likehhood and probability of such milikely acts, but 
 the innoceucy of the sacred Scriptures, wherein they 
 are WTitten, must be an'aigned and condemned by 
 their carnal reason, and our whole religion derided, 
 because we justify them ; I will say no more unto 
 them, but as Augustme doth in' his books of the City 
 of God,t QiiicquiJ mirahUeJit, in hoc mundo, profectb 
 minus est qttam totns hie mundiis. The very creation 
 of the world (which being the book of nature they run 
 and read, and can deny no part of it, though thej* deny 
 and deprave the book of Scripture) sheweth them a 
 gi-eater miracle in the world itself, than whatsoever in 
 these or the like singularities seemeth most incredible. 
 3. A great fish. Some of the rabbins think that 
 the fish was created at that moment when Jonah was 
 to be swallowed ; others, that he had lasted from the 
 
 * Tota ratio facti, potentia faoientis. Considera authorem, 
 tolle dubilatiouem. f Lib. x. c. li. 
 
 sixth d-ay of the world ; a third sort, that it was a 
 whale that first devoiu'ed Jonah, and that afterwards 
 the Lord beckoned unto him, and then he cast him 
 into the mouth of a female which was full of young, 
 where, being straitened of his wonted room, he feU 
 to prayer. Fabulous inventions, and fruit according 
 to the trees that bare it. Whether the fish were 
 created at that instant or before, sooner or later, I 
 list not inquire ; neither will I further engage myself 
 herein, than the Spirit of God giveth me direction, 
 only that which the prophet setteth down in two 
 words, by a circumlocution, ' a great fish,' it shall not 
 be amiss to note that the evangelists abridge, and 
 name more distinctly in one, shewing the kind of the 
 fish ; therefore Matthew calleth it the belly of ' a 
 whale,' chap, xii., sv xoiXla y.yjro-jg. So do the Seventy 
 interpreters, from whom it is not unlikely the ex- 
 positor of Matthew took his wan-ant. 
 
 I never found any mention of this goodly creature, 
 but the wisdom of God the creator w-as willing to com- 
 mend it in some sort. In the first of Genesis, God 
 said, ' Let the waters bring forth in abundance every 
 creeping thing that hath the soul of life ;' howbeit in 
 all that abundance there is nothing specified but the 
 whale, as being the prince of the rest, and to use the 
 speech of Job, chap, xli., 'the king of all the children 
 of pride,' wherein the workmanship of the maker is 
 most admired ; for so it is said, ' Then God created 
 the whales,' Gen. i. ; and not singly whales, but with 
 the same additameut that tliis prophet usetb, the great 
 whales. So doth the poet term them also iniwania 
 cute, the huge whales, as being the stateliest creatur-e 
 that moveth in the waters. Likewise in the Psalm : 
 ' The earth is fuU of thy riches, so is the gi-eat and 
 wide sea, wherein are things creeping imiumerable, 
 both small and gi-eat beasts. There go the ships,' 
 (the artiticialest wonder that ever was framed), ' and 
 there goeth that leviathan ' (the wonder of that natm-e) 
 ' whom thou hast made to play therein,' Ps. civ. In 
 the book of Job, chap. xL, xli., two arguments are 
 produced to amplify the incomparable power of God ; 
 behemoth by land, leviathan by sea ; and for the power 
 and persuasion of words, I do not think that ever more 
 was used, than w-liere the power of those two creatures 
 is expressed. Of the latter of these it is professed in 
 open terms, ' I will not keep silence concerning his 
 parts, nor his power, nor his comel}^ proportion,' Job 
 xli. Indeed, they are all worthily described, by the 
 tongjie of the learned, even the learnedest tongue that 
 the Holy Ghost had. Never were there rivers and 
 floods of eloquence, neither in the orators of Athens 
 and Rome, nor in the seraphims of heaven, equal to 
 those that are poured forth in that narration. Augus- 
 tine somewhere noteth, that all men marvelled at 
 Tully's tongue, but not his invention ; at Aristotle's 
 invention all men, but not his tongue ; at Plato's in- 
 vention and tongue both ;* but for a tongue and wisdom 
 * TuUi liuguam omnes mirautur, pectus non a;qne. Aris- 
 
142 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 too, uot to be uttered by the tongue, nor to be com- 
 prehended by the wisdom of mortal man, I remit you 
 to those chapters. Jerome writeth of the whole book, 
 Siiii/iila ill eo verba plena sunt sensihiis, every word of 
 it is very sententious. But nowhere through the whole, 
 more sense, more substance, grace, and majesty spent, 
 than where the meaning and intent was, that the 
 majesty of the most high God should fully be illus- 
 trated. To cast my eyes back again from whence I 
 am digressed, it is written of the whale, that when he 
 swimmeth and sheweth himself upon the floods, you 
 would think that islands swam towards you, annare 
 insnliis pntes, cCe., and that very high hills did aspire 
 to heaven itself with their tops. Pliny giveth the 
 reason why many beasts in the sea are bigger than 
 those upon land, causa evidens, huinorh hurnyia .''^ the 
 evident cause, saith he, is superfluity of moistm-e. 
 Howboit, it holdeth not in birds (whose oflspring is 
 from the waters too), quibus vita pendenlibus, because 
 they live hanging, as it were, and hovering or wafting 
 in the air. But in the open champaign sea, in marl 
 tarn late supine, being of a soft and fruitful increase, 
 semperque pariente naturd, and of a nature that is ever 
 breeding and bringing forth, monsters are often en- 
 Tendered. Ho writeth of balisna, the whirlpool, or 
 we may English it also a whale (so doth Tremelius 
 interpret the name of leviathan in Job and the Psalm), 
 that in the Indian sea there are some found to the 
 larfeness of four acres of ground, quaterniim jugei-uin, 
 and that they are laden and surcharged with their 
 own weight. Likewise he reporteth of other beasts in 
 the sea, that the doors of houses were made of their 
 jaws, and the rafters of their bones, some of which 
 bones were forty cubits in length, and that the skins 
 of some were broad enough to cover habitable houses. 
 So true is the opinion of the people commonly received, 
 that whatsoever is bred in any part of natm-e, is in the 
 sea, and many creatures besides, which are nowhere 
 else.|- And therefore the less marvel may it seem, 
 even to a natural man, liy the course of nature itself, 
 his lady and mistress, that God should prepare a fish 
 great enough to swallow up Jonah. For the attribute 
 is not adjoined for waw^i, a ijveal Jish. Seneca the 
 philosopher writeth of one Senetio, surnamed Grandio 
 (others have been called Mai/ni for the greatness of 
 their virtues, Alexander in Greece, Pompey in Kome, 
 Arsaces in Parthia, Charles amongst the emperors the 
 great, and Gregory the great amongst the popes ; but 
 Senetio had to name the grand, or the great, for his 
 gi-eat vanity) he liked of nothing that was not great; J 
 he would not speak but what was great ; he kept no 
 
 totelia [icctus osnncs, linp;uam non rcque. Platonis pectus et 
 linguam reque. — Kp- ad Vaiilin. 
 
 * Plin. lib. i.K. cap. ii. 
 
 t Qnicquid nascilur in parte nalur.-c iilla, et in niari esse, 
 prrctcrque mnlta qua! nusquaui alibi — Plin. Siiasor. 2. 
 
 t Quod granilia omnia probarct niliil volebat nisi grande 
 (licerc. Servos babcre nolebat nisi gramlcs, argentea vasa 
 non nisi grandia, calceos majores sumpsit, &c. 
 
 servants but great ; used no plate but gi-eat ; the shoes 
 he wore were over great ; the figs he ate were great 
 outlandish figs ; and he had a wife besides of a great 
 stature. But whosoever is gi'eatest upon the face of 
 the earth, though his style be as great as that emperor's, 
 of whom Eusebius wTiteth, whose titles were summed 
 together in a long catalogue,* The greatest bishop, 
 greatest in Thebes, greatest in Sarmatia, in Persia 
 five times the greatest, greatest in Germany, greatest 
 iu Egypt, yet I will say unto him, as the Psalm to the 
 princes of that time, ' Give"unto the Lord, ye sons of 
 the mighty, give unto the Lord glory and strength. 
 Give unto the Lord the honour due unto his name,' 
 Ps. xsix. That greatness belongeth unto the Lord 
 alone, we are taught by an excellent phrase of speech 
 proper to the Hebrews. The striving of Rachel \\'ith 
 her sister Leah, about the bearing of children, because 
 it was very great, is called ' the wrestling of God,' 
 Gen. XXX. The mountains of the earth, wherewith 
 the righteousness of God is compared, because they 
 were very great, are called ' the mountains of God,' 
 Ps. xxxvi. The city of Nineveh, because very great, 
 and of three days' journey, is called ' the city of God,' 
 Jonah iii. In all which singular idiotisms the letter 
 itself directeth us rightly where to bestow all greatness. 
 Undoubtedly it was the gi-eat God of heaven and earth 
 that prepared great lights in the firmament, gi-eat 
 fishes in the sea, great men, great beasts upon the dry 
 land, et iiwi/uitudiiiis ejus non est Jin is, 'and thei"e is 
 no end, no limits of his greatness,' Ps. cv. 
 
 4. I'd swalloiv up Jonah. They have a history in 
 profane reading, that Arion, the Lesbian, a famous 
 musician, being embarked with some, who, for tho 
 gain of his money, would have cast him into the sea, 
 he craved a little respite of them before his casting 
 forth, and taking his harp iu hand, and playing a 
 while thereon, at length himself leaped into the wa- 
 ters, and was carried upon the back of a dolphin to 
 the landing-place intended, before the mariners could 
 possibly arrive there. In Herodotus, the father of 
 history, saith Tally, there are innumerable fables, + 
 and haply this amongst tho rest ; but I allege it to 
 this end, that if God had prepared a whale to have 
 borne Jonah upon his back, and to have held him 
 above the waters, where he might have beheld the 
 light of heaven, and drawn the comfort of the air, as 
 other living souls, there had been no fear of miscar- 
 riage. It is quite contrary, for the Lord ' prepared 
 a fish to swallow up Jonah :' whereof one spake, a 
 thing not hoard of before, the belly of a fish is the 
 habitation of a man. Res inaudila. Venter eetes do- 
 mieiliutn hoininis. If of a man dismembered and dis- 
 solved piecemeal, I would never liave doubted. Tho 
 crocodiles of Nilus in Egypt, Ganges in India, and 
 
 * Oalerius Pontifcx Max ; Tliebaicus Max ; Sarmaticus 
 Max; Quinquies Persarum Max, &c. 
 
 t Apud Herodotum patrom bistoria; innumerabiles fa- 
 bula). 
 
Vee. 17.] 
 
 LECTURE XXII. 
 
 143 
 
 other livers of Mexico and Peru, will devour not only 
 men, but whole herds of cattle ; and a physician* of 
 our latter times hath written (Calvin not sparing to 
 testify the same), that in the bowels of a lamiaf hath 
 been found a whole armed man. But Jonah is taken 
 in alive, through ranges and armies of teeth on both 
 sides, without the collision or crushing of any limb in 
 his body ; and entereth the straits of his throat, where 
 he had greater reason to cry, than the children in the 
 prophet, ' The place is too narrow for me ;' and liveth 
 in the entrails of a fish, a prison or cave of extreme 
 darkness, where he found nothing but horror and 
 stench, and loathsome excrements. What shall we 
 say hereunto, but as Jerome did upon the place, Ubi 
 putabatnr iutcritus, ihi cuModi(r, where there was no- 
 thing looked for but death, there was a custody, in a 
 double sense, first to imprison, and yet withal to pre- 
 serve Jonah. 
 
 5. Thus far you have heard, first that a jis/i, and 
 for his exornation n (irecit fish, secondly teas prepared, 
 thirdly hi/ the Lord, fourthly to swallow up his pro- 
 phet. Now, lastly, if you will learn what tidings of 
 Jonah, after his entering into the monster's maw, it is 
 published in the next words, ' And Jonah was in the 
 belly of the fish three days and three nights.' 
 
 Therein I distinguish these particularities : (1.) first, 
 the person, Jonah; not the body of Jonah, forsaken 
 of the soul, as the body of Christ lay in the grave, 
 but the whole and entire person of Jonah, compounded 
 of body and sonl, living, moving, feeling, meditating, 
 not ground with the teeth, nor digested in the sto- 
 mach, not converted into the substance of the fish, 
 and neither vital nor integral part diminished in Jonah. 
 (2.) Secondly, the place where he was, in the re- 
 motest and lowest parts, the bowels of the fish, as 
 Jeremiah was in the bottom of the dungeon, where 
 there was no water, where what nutriment he had 
 amidst those purgaments and superfluities, the Lord 
 knoweth ; but ' man liveth not by bread alone :' or 
 what respiration and breathing, being out of his ele- 
 ment, amongst those stifling evaporations which the 
 belly of the whale reeked forth ; but we may as truly 
 say, man liveth not by breath alone. (3.) Thirdly, 
 the time how long he continued there, ' three days and 
 three nights ;' when, if the course of nature were exa- 
 mined, it is not possible to be conceived that a man 
 could live so one moment of time, and his spirit not 
 be strangled within him. PhysiciansJ give advice, 
 that such as are troubled with apoplexies and falling 
 sicknesses, or the like diseases, should not be buried till 
 the expiration of seventy- two hours, that is, three days 
 and three nights : in which space of time, they say, 
 the humours begin to stop and give over their motion, 
 by reason the moon has gone through a sign the more 
 in the zodiac. For this cause it was that our Saviour 
 
 * P. Plancius. 
 
 t A beast with a woman's face, and horse's feet. 
 
 X Levin. Lem , Ub. ii. cap, iii. 
 
 undertook not the raising of Lazarus from the dead, 
 till he had lain four days in the grave, lest the Jews 
 might have slandered the miracle, if he had done it 
 in haste, and said that Lazarus had but swooned. The 
 like he experienced in himself (besides the opening of 
 his heart), that if falsehood would open her mouth 
 into slander, it might be her greater sin, because he 
 was fully dead. AVho would ever have supposed that 
 Jonah, fulfilling this time in so deadly and pestilent a 
 grave, should have revived again ? But ' the founda- 
 tion of the Lord standeth sure,' and this sentence he 
 hath written for the generations to come, ' My strength 
 is perfected in infirmity;' when the danger is most felt, 
 then is my helping arm most welcome. We, on the 
 one side, when our case seemeth distressful, are very 
 importunate with God, crying upon him for help : ' It 
 is time that the Lord have mercy upon Sion ; yea, the 
 time is come,' Ps. cii. ; and if in the instant he answer 
 not our cry, we are ready to reply against him. The 
 time is past, and our hope clean withered, periit spes 
 nostra. But he sitteth above, in his provident watch- 
 tower, who is far wiser than men, and thinketh with 
 himself, you are deceived, the time is not yet come. 
 They meet the ruler of the synagogue in the 5th of 
 Mark, and tell him, ' Thy- daughter is dead, why 
 diseasest thou thj' Master any further ?' As soon as 
 Jesus ' heard that word' (a word that he lingered and 
 waited for), he said unto the ruler of the synagogue, 
 ' Be not afraid, only believe.' And as Alexander the 
 Great solaced and cheered himself with the greatness 
 of his peril in India, when he was to fight both with 
 men and beasts, their huge elephants, Tandem par 
 aiiiiuo meo pericidiim video, at length I see a danger 
 answerable to my mind, so fareth it with our absolute 
 and true monarch of the world, who hath a bridle for 
 the lips of every disease, and an hook for the nostrils 
 of death, to turn them back the same way they came. 
 It is the joy of his heart to protract the time a while, 
 till he see the height and maturity of the danger, that 
 so he may get him the more honour. Martha telleth 
 him in the 11th of John, when her brother had been 
 long dead, and lain in the grave till he stank, past 
 hope of recovery. Lord, if thou hadst been here, my 
 brother had not been dead. And what if absent ? 
 Was he not the same God ? Yet he told his disciples 
 not long before, ' Lazarus is dead ; and I am glad for 
 your sakes that I was not there, that you might be- 
 lieve.' You see the dift'erence ; Martha is sorr}*, and 
 Christ is glad that he was not there. IMarlha thinketh 
 the cure cometh too late, and Christ thinketh the sore 
 was never ripe till now. In the book of Exodus, 
 chap, xiv., when Israel had pitched their tents by the 
 Bed Sea, Pharaoh and host marching apace, and ready 
 to surprise them, they were very sore afraid, and cried 
 unto the Loixl, and murmured against Moses : ' Hast 
 thou brought us to die in the wilderness, because there 
 were no graves in Egypt ? wherefore hast thou served 
 us thus, to carry us out of Egypt,' &c. Moses, the 
 
144 
 
 KIXG ON JOXAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 meekest man upon oavtb, quieted them thus : ' Fe;ir 
 ye not, stand still, and behold the salvation of the 
 Lord, which ho will shew to you this day : for the Egyp- 
 tians whom ye have seen this day, ye shall never see 
 them again. The Lord shall fight for you, therefore 
 hold you your peace.' Neither did Moses feed them 
 with wind, and prophesy the surmises of his own brain; 
 for the Lord made it good, as followcth in the next 
 verse : ' Wherefore criest thou unto me ? Speak unto 
 the children of Israel, that they go forward.' Thus, 
 when the wound was most desperate, and they might 
 Lave pledged even their souls upon it, we cannot 
 escape ; when their legs trembled u 'er them that 
 they could not stand still, and their h ds fainted that 
 they could not hope, the waters roaring before their 
 face, and the wheels of the enemy rattling behind their 
 backs, they are willed to stand still, not on their legs 
 alone, but in their disturbed passions, to settle their 
 shivering spirits, to ])acif}' their unquiet tongues, and 
 to go forward, though every step they trod seemed 
 to bear them into the mouth of death. 
 
 The state of the danger }'ou see. Jonah is in the 
 belly of the iish three days and three nights ; long 
 enough to have altered his nature, to have boiled him 
 into nourishment, and to have incorporated his flesh 
 into another substance. Yet Jonah liveth ; but if the 
 Lord had not been on my side (might Jo/ir(/( now say), 
 if the Lord had not been on my side, when the beast rose 
 up against me, he had swallowed me up quick, when 
 his wrath was so sore inflamed ; but praised be the 
 Lord, which hath not given me over a pre}' to his 
 teeth. My soul is escaped, even as a bird out of the 
 snare of the fowler : the snare is broken, and I am 
 delivered, Ps. cxxiv. Let all those whom the Lord 
 hath redeemed from the hand of the oppressor, from 
 fire, or water, or from the peril of death, take that 
 tongue of thanksgiving into their lips, and sing it to 
 
 his blessed name in remembrance of his holiness : ' 
 thou, the hope of all the ends of the earth' (saith 
 that other psalm, Ps. Ixv.), ' and of them that are far 
 ofl' in the sea, shew us but the light of thy counte- 
 nance, and we shall be safe :' give us but the comfort 
 of thy mercies, and we will not fear, ' thougli the 
 earth be moved, and the mountains fall down I» the 
 midst of the sea ; and the sea, and the waters thereof, 
 rage fearfully ;' though leviathan open his mouth, we 
 will not quake at it ; yea, though the leviathan of the 
 bottomless pit open the throat of hell never so wide 
 to devour us, we will not be disquieted. We know 
 that there is mercy with the Lord, and that with bim 
 there is plentiful redemption ; I mean redemption a 
 thousand ways, by nature and against nature, by hope 
 and against hope, by things that are and things that 
 are not. He that hath saved his people, by gathering 
 the waters in heaps like walls, and making a path 
 in the Red Sea ; he that hath kept his children in the 
 midst of a fiery oven, when, if art could add any thing 
 to the nature of fire, they should have been burnt 
 seven times for one, because it was seven times hot ; 
 and delivered his prophet in a den of lions, though 
 dieted and prepared for their prey beforehand, yet 
 shutting their mouths so close, and restraining their 
 appetite, that they forebore their appointed food ; and 
 committed this servant of his to the belly of a fish, as 
 if he bad committed him to his mother's womb, to be 
 kejit from harm : he is the same God both in might 
 and mercy to preserve us, no time unseasonable, no 
 place unmeet, no danger uncouth and unaccustomed to 
 his strong designments. ' Our only help, therefore, 
 standeth in the name of the Lord, that hath made 
 heaven and earth ; blessed, and thrice blessed, be that 
 name of the Lord, from this time forth for evermore. 
 Amen,' Ps. cxxiv. 
 
 LECTUEE XXIII. 
 
 Then Jonah prai/ed unto the Lord his God out of the fish' s lellij, and said. — Jonah II. 1. 
 
 THIS second section or division of the prophecy, 
 wherein the mercy of God towards Jonah is ex- 
 pressed, I parted before into three branches : 1, that 
 he was devoured ; 2, prayed ; S, was delivered. The 
 terms that Lyra giveth are these : the place, the 
 manner, the success of his prayer; orantis locns, mo- 
 dus, exitus. The marvels that I have already noted 
 unto you wore, 1, that so huge a creature was sud- 
 denly provided by the providence of God ; 2, that a 
 whole man passed through his throat ; S, that he 
 lived in his bowels three d.ays and three nights. 
 Now, whether he fulfilled that time exactly, yea or no, 
 three natural days complete, consisting of twenty-four 
 hours, neither can I afiirni, neither is it material over- 
 busily to examine. Our Saviour, you know, in the 
 
 Gospel applicth this figure of Jonah to his buri.al — 
 Milt, xii., 'As Jonas was in the belly of the whale 
 three days and three nights, so shall the Son of man 
 bo in the heart of the earth' — but if you confer the 
 shadow and the body together, you shall find in all 
 the evangelists. Mat. xxvii., Mark xvi., that the Lord 
 of life was crucified the sixth hour of the preparation 
 of the Sabbath, and the ninth gave np the ghost; that 
 late in the evening his body was taken down fi'om the 
 cross and buried ; that ho rested in the grave the night 
 that bclongctli to the Sabbath, together with the day 
 and night next ensuing after it; and that in the morn- 
 ing of the first d.ay of the week he rose again. So as 
 indeed the body of Christ was not in the heart of the 
 earth more than thirty-six hours; to wit, two nights 
 
Yer. 1. 
 
 LECTURE XXIII. 
 
 14-5 
 
 auJ a Jay, which is but the half space of soveuty-two 
 hours. Some,* to supply this defect of time, account 
 the light before the passion of Christ, and the dark- 
 ness till the ninth hour, one day and a night; because, 
 they say, there was both light and darkness. And 
 then the light that followed from the ninth hour, and 
 the succeeding night, a second day and night, likewise 
 the third, till the time he rose again. Others expound 
 it by a m3'story, thus : thirty-sis hours, they say, to 
 seventy- two, which is the absolute measure of three 
 days and three nights, is but xiiiqilnni ad ditplnni, one 
 to two, or the half of the whole. Now, ours was a 
 double death, both in soul by sin, and in bodj' by 
 pain ; Christ s was but single, only in the body, because 
 concerning his soul he was free from sin ; therefore 
 they infer that the moiety of time might sufBce him. 
 Hugo Cardin. hath another conceit, that from the 
 creation of the world till the resurrection of Christ, 
 the day was evermore numbered before the night, 
 both iu the literal and in the mystical understanding. 
 First tliere was light, then darkness ; but from the 
 resurrection of Christ forwards, the night is first 
 reckoned (for which cause he thought the vigils were 
 appointed for Sabbaths and other festival days, that 
 we might bo prepared with more devotion to solemnise 
 them) ; hcrehence he concludeth, that the night which 
 followed the Sabbath of the Jews was the angular 
 night, (iiKjuhtris est, and must twice be repeated, as 
 the corner of a square serveth indifferently for either 
 side which it lieth betwixt ; for both it belonged (saith 
 he) to the Sabbath preceding, and must be ascribed 
 again unto the Christian Sabbath or Lord's day, 
 whereon the Son of God rose from death. And he 
 thinketh there is great reason of his invention, because 
 Christ by one night of his took away two of ours : et 
 iiirrito: quia C'ltiistnti shiijild node sua ihiplain nostrain 
 abstiilil. So they are not content to be sober inter- 
 preters of the mind of God, but they will guess and 
 divine at that which he never meant : iJiiiiiatnres et 
 rales, »o» iutrrpretes. They think their cunning abased 
 if they go not beyond the moon to fetch an exposition. 
 What needcth such curious learning, to appoint 
 every egg to the right hen that laid it, as some did in 
 Delos;t so these to think their labour unprofitable in 
 the church of God, unless they can make the devices 
 of their own heads reach home to the letter of the 
 book in all respects. Our soundest divines agi'ee, 
 that the triduan rest of Christ in the gi'ave must be 
 understood by the figure sijnecdochc, a part put for the 
 whole. And thus they make their account : the first 
 day of his passion and interment (which was the pre- 
 paration of the Jewish Sabbath) must have the former 
 night set to it ; the second was fully and exactly run 
 out; the third had the night complete, and only a 
 piece of the first day of the week, which by the figure 
 before named is to be holpen and supplied. 
 
 Now I go forwards to explicate the behaviour of 
 * Lyra. t Senec. TuU. hi Aca. 
 
 Jonah in the belly of the fish. Therein we are to 
 consider, 1, what the history speaketh of Jonah; 2, 
 what he speaketh himself. The words of the history 
 testifying his demeanour are those iu the head of the 
 chapter, which you have already heard. 
 
 Tlien Jonah praijed unto the Ijord liis God out of the 
 belli/ of the fish, and said. Wherein, besides the per- 
 son of Jonah, needless to be recited any more, we arc 
 stored with a cluster of many singular meditations : 
 1, the connection or consecution after his former 
 misery, or if you will, you may note it under the cir- 
 cumstance of time ; then, 2, what he did, how he 
 exercised and bestowed himself, he praijed ; 3, to 
 whom he prayed and tendered his moan, to the Lord ; 
 4, upon what right, interest, or acquaintance with 
 that liord, because he was his God; 5, from whence 
 he directed his supplications, out of the hclhj of the 
 fish; G, the tenor or manner of the song, and request 
 he offered unto him, and said. Thus far the history 
 useth her own tongue, the words that follow Jonah 
 himself indited. 
 
 1. Many things have been mentioned before, whereof 
 we may use tlie speech of Moses, ' Inquire of the 
 ancient days which are before thee, since the day that 
 God created man upon the earth, and from one end 
 of heaven to the other, if ever there were the like 
 thing done,' as that a man should breathe and live so 
 long a time, not only in the bowels of the waters (for 
 there Jonah also was), but in the bowels of a fish 
 within those waters; a prison with a double ward, 
 deeper than the prison of Jeremiah, wherein, by big 
 own pitiful relation, Jer. xxxviii., he 'stuck fast in 
 mire, and was ready to perish through hunger;' and 
 when he was plucked from thence, it was the labour 
 of thirty men to draw him up with ropes, putting rags 
 under his arms between the ropes and his flesh, for 
 fear of hurting him. Closer than the prison of Peter, 
 Acts xii., who was committed to four quaternions of 
 soldiers to be kept ; and the night before his death 
 intended, ' slept betwixt two soldiers, bound with two 
 chains, and the keepers before the door.' Yea, stricter 
 than the prison of Daniel, the mouth whereof was 
 'closed with a stone,' Dan. vi., and sealed with the 
 signet of the king and the signet of his princes ; and 
 the keepers of the ward, by nature harder to be en- 
 treated than ten times four quaternions of soldiers. 
 Name me a prison under heaven, except that lake of 
 fire and brimstone, which is the second death, com- 
 parable unto that wherein Jonah was concluded ; yet 
 Jonah there livcth not for a moment of time, but for 
 that continuance of days which the great Shepherd of 
 Israel afterwards took, and thought a term sufficient 
 v/hereby the certain and undoubted eviction of his 
 death might be published to the whole world. But 
 this is the wonder of wonders, that not only the body 
 of Jonah is preserved in life and livelihood (where if 
 he received any food, it was more loathsome to nature 
 than the gall of asps ; or if he drew any air for breath, 
 
 K 
 
146 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 it was more Viiiplcasrint than tlie vapours of sulphur) ; 
 but his soul also and iuward luan was not destroyed, 
 and stitied under the pressure of so unspeakable a 
 tribulation. For so it is, he lieth in the belly of the 
 fish, as if be bad entered into bis bed-ehamber and 
 cast himself upon his couch, recounting his former 
 sins, present miseries, praying, believing, hoping, 
 preaching unto himself the deliverances of God, with 
 as free a spirit as ever he preached to the children of 
 Israel upon dry land. He is awake in the whale, that 
 snorted in the ship. What a strange thing was this ! * 
 Oh the exceeding riches of the goodness of God, the 
 height and depth whereof can never be measured, that 
 in the distresses of this kind (to use the apostle's 
 phrases, 2 Cor. i.), above measure, and beyond the 
 strength of man, -ao-S i<c7£^£o>.-/5i' uctej hmafj-n, wherein 
 we doubt whether we live or no, and receive the sen- 
 tence of death within oui selves, that if you should ask 
 our own opinion, we cannot say but that in nature 
 and reason we are dead men ; yet God leaveth not 
 only a soul to the body, wherelsy it mftveth, but a 
 soul to the soul, whereby it pondereth and medifateth 
 within itself God's everlasting compassions. Doubt- 
 less there are some afilictions that are a very death, 
 else the apostle in the place aforesaid wonld never 
 have spoken as he did : ' We trust in God, who 
 raiseth up the dead, and hath delivered us from so 
 great a death, and doth deliver us, and in him we 
 hope that yet he will deliver us.' Hearken to this, 
 ye faint spirits, and lend a patient ear to a thrice 
 most happy deliverance ; be strengthened, ye weak 
 hands, and feeble knees receive comfort; he hath, he 
 doth, and yet he will deliver us, ijsuiraro, p'jsrai, xai 
 in ^{jdirai, not only from the death of our bodies, 
 when worms and rottenness have made their long and 
 last prey upon them, but from the death of our minds 
 too, when the spirit is buried under sorrows, and 
 there is no creature found in heaven or earth to give 
 it comfort. 
 
 2. The next thing we are to inquire is, what Jonah 
 did. Tie pidiji'd. All things pass, sayeth Seneca, to 
 return again. I sec no new thing ; I do no new.f 
 A wise man of our own to the same effect, Eccles. iii., 
 ' That that bath been is, and that that shall be hath 
 been.' I have before handled the nature and use of 
 prayer, w^ith as many requisite conditions to commend 
 it as there were chosen souls in the ark of Noah. You 
 will now ask me, Qtiniisq}(e iridcui. How often shall we 
 hear the same matter? I would there were no need 
 of repetition. But it is true which Elihu speaketh in 
 Job, chap, xxxiii., God sprakcth once and twice, and 
 man seeth it not. There is much seed sown that mis- 
 cari'ielh, some by the highway-side, some amongst 
 thorns, some otherw'ise ; many exhortations spent as 
 upon men that are asleep, and when the tale is told, 
 
 * Vipilat in cfto, qui stfrtebat in navi. Wnn rc^.^Zcno, 
 ep, VrrovfTis., lib. ii, sor. RS. 
 
 t Nihil novi video, nihil novi facio. — Lib. iii. cp. 2, i. 
 
 they ask, What is the matter '? Therefore I answer 
 your demand, as Augustine sometimes the Donatists, 
 when he was enforced to some iteration, Let those that 
 know it already pardon me, lest I otieud those that 
 are ignorant ; for it is better to give him that hath, 
 than to turn him away that hath not.* And if it were 
 truth of Homer, or may be truth of any man that is 
 formed of clay, uinis Homeni.i sat ietalem omnium ejffurjit, 
 one H(jmer never cloyed any man that read him, much 
 more it is truth that one, and only Jesus Christ, the 
 precepts and ordinances of his law, his mysteries of 
 faith, have been often preached, often heard, and yet 
 never wearied, never satisfied those that hungered and 
 thirsted after his saving health. I go back to my 
 puipose. Jonah, you hear, pi-ayed. This is the life 
 of the soul which before I spake of. When being 
 peri)lexed with such grief of heai-t as neither wine, 
 according to the advice of Solomon, nor strong drink 
 could bring ease unto ; her tongue cleaving to the roof 
 of her mouth, and her spirit melting like wax in the 
 midst of her bowels ; when it is day, calling for the 
 night again, and when it is night, saying to herself. 
 When shall it be morning ? finding no comfort at all 
 either in light or darkness, kinsfolks or friends, plea- 
 sures or riches ; and wishing as often as she openeth 
 her lips, and draweth in her breath unto her, if God 
 were so hasty to hear those wishes, ' Oh that thou 
 wouldst hide me in the grave, and keep me secret until 
 thy WTath were past,' Job xiv. ; yet then she taketh 
 unto her the wings of a dove, the motion and agility, I 
 mean, of the Spirit of God, she fheth by the strength 
 of her prayers into the bosom of God's mercies, and 
 there is at rest : ' Is any afflicted amongst you ? Let 
 him pray.' Afflicted or not afflicted, under correc- 
 tion of apostolic judgment, let him pray. For what 
 shall he else do ? Shall he follow the ways of the 
 wicked, which the prophet describeth ? Ps. x., ' The 
 wicked is so proud that he seeketh not after God ; ho 
 sailh evermore in his hciirt, there is no God ; he 
 boasteth of his own heart's desires ; he blesseth him- 
 self, and contemneth the Lord ; the judgments of God 
 are high above his sight, therefore he snuffeth at 
 his enemies, and saith to himself, I shall never be 
 moved, nor come in danger.' I can name yon a man 
 that in his prosperity said even as they did, Ps. xxx., 
 ' 1 shall never be moved : thou. Lord, of tliy goodness 
 hast nn)de my hill so strong.' But see the change : 
 ' Thou didst l>ut hide thy face, and I was troubled. 
 Then cried I unto the Lord, and prayed unto my God, 
 saying. What profit is there in my blood'?' Ac. Or 
 shall he, with those unrighteous priests in Malachi, 
 use big words against the Lord, Mai. iii., 'It is in 
 vain that I have served him ; and what profit is it 
 that I have kept his commandments, and walked in 
 humility before him ? ' 'Oh the counsel of the wicked 
 
 * iKnoFOnnl Fciinlca, ne oilontlnntur ncsciontcs. Satiua 
 est cniin eflVrre Imbcnti, quam diffeire non liabentcm. — 2 de 
 hapt. emit. Venal, i. 
 
Ver. 1.] 
 
 LECTURE XXII [. 
 
 U7 
 
 be far from me,' saith Job, cbap. xxi. ; ' tbeir candle 
 shall often be put out ; and the sorrow of the fathers 
 shall be laid up for theii- children, and they shall even 
 drink the wrath of the Almighty.' And all such as 
 ' fear the Lord ' speak otherwise, ' every one to his 
 neighbour, and the Lord bearkeneth and heareth it ; 
 and a book of remembrance is written for them that 
 fear him and think upon his name,' Mai. iii. Or shall 
 he, on the other side, when his sorrows are multiplied 
 upon him, say, as it is in the psalm, ' Who will shew 
 me any good thing '?' Ps. iv. Let him answer the distrust 
 of his mind in the next words, ' Lord, lift thou up the 
 light of thy countenance upon me. Thou shalt put 
 more joy thereby into mine heart, than the plentifullest 
 increase of corn, wine, and oil can bring to others.' 
 Or lastly, what shall he do ? Shall he add grief unto 
 grief, and welcome his woes unto him? Shall he drink 
 down pensiveness, as behemoth drinketli down .Jordan 
 into his mouth ? Shall he bury himself alive, and drown 
 his soul in a gulf of desperation '? Shnll he live the life 
 of Cain, or die the death of Judas ? Shall he spend his 
 wretched time in bannings and execrations, cursing 
 the night that kept counsel to his conception, cursing 
 the day that brought tidings of his bringing forth, 
 cursing the earth that beareth him, the air that in- 
 spireth him, the light that shineth upon him ? Shall 
 he ' curse God and die,' or, perhaps, curse God and 
 not die ? Or shall he keep his anguish to himself, and 
 let his heart burst like now bottles that are full of 
 wine, for want of venting ? Or shall he howl and yell 
 into the air like the wolves in the wilderness, and as 
 the manner of the heathen is, not knowing where or 
 how to make their moan, feeling a wound, but not 
 knowing how to cure it '? Or what shall he do when 
 he findeth himself in misery, his ways hedged up with 
 thorns, that he cannot stir to deliver himself there- 
 hence, what should he do but pray '? Bernard, nnder 
 a fiction, proposetb a table well worthy our beholding : 
 therein the kings of Babylon and Jerusalem, signifying 
 the state of the world and the church, always warring 
 together ; in which encounter, at length it fell out, 
 that one of the soldiers of Jerusalem was fled to the 
 castle of Justice. Siege laid to the castle, and a multi- 
 tude of enemies entrenched round aboijt it. Fear gave 
 over all hope ; but Prudence ministered her com- 
 fort. Dost thou not know, saith she, that our king 
 is the king of glory ; the Lord strong and m'ghty, 
 even the Lord mighty in battle ? Let us therefore 
 despatch a messenger that may inform him of our 
 necessities. Fear replieth, But who is able to break 
 throu'^h '? Darkness is upon the face of the earth, 
 and our walls are begirt with a watchful troop of armed 
 men, and we utterly inexpert of the way into so far a 
 country. Whereupon Justice is consulted. Be of 
 good cheer, saith Justice ; I have a messenger of 
 especial trust, well known to the king and his court, 
 Praj-er by name, who knoweth to address herself by 
 ways unknown in the stillest silence of the night, till 
 
 she cometh to the secrets and chamber of the king 
 himself. Forthwith she goeth, and findeth the gates 
 shut, knocketh amain, ' Open, ye gates of righteous- 
 ness, and be ye opened, ye everlasting doors,' that I 
 may come in and tell the King of Jerusalem how oar 
 case standeth. Doubtless the trustiest and eftectuallest 
 messenger we have to send is Prayer. If we send up 
 merits, the stars in heaven will disdain it, that wo 
 which dwell at the footstool of God dare to presume 
 so far, when the purest creatures in heaven are impure 
 in his sight. If we send up fear and distrustfulness, 
 the length of the way will tire them out. They are 
 as heavy and lumpish as gads of iron ; they will sink 
 to the ground before they come half-way to the 
 throne of salvation. If we send up blasphemies 
 and curses, all the creatm-es betwixt heaven and 
 earth will band themselves against us. The sun 
 and the moon vnll rain down blood ; the fire, hot 
 burning coals ; the air, thunderbolts upon om- heads. 
 Prayer, I say again, is the surest ambassador; which 
 neither the tediousness of the way, nor difficulties 
 of the passage, can hinder from her purpose ; f[uick 
 of speed, faithful for trustiness, happy for success, 
 able to mount above the eagles of the sky, into the 
 heaven of heavens, and as a chariot of tire bearing us 
 aloft into the presence of God to seek his assistance. 
 
 3. And Jonah prayed uitlo the Lord. I handled 
 also this point before more largely than at this present 
 I intend. I noted therein their wisdom and choice, 
 who take theu' mark aright, and du-ect theii' petitions 
 to their true and proper period. I will briefly say, 
 Nun miuM est Deum. fiwjere quam ner/arc.'^ It is as 
 gi-eat an oflenee to make a new, as to deny the true 
 God. ' In the Lord put I my trust ; how then say ye 
 unto my soul ' (ye seduc("rs of souls), ' that she 
 should fly unto the mountains as a bird,' Ps. xi. ; to 
 seek unnecessary and foreign helps, as if the Lord 
 alone were not sufficient ? Ps. xviii. : ' The Lord is 
 my rock, and my fortress, and he that delivereth me, 
 my God, and my strength ; in him will I trust : my 
 shield, the horn also of my salvation, and my refuge. 
 I will call upon the Lord which is worthy to be praised, 
 so shall I bo safe from mine enemies.' Whom have I 
 in heaven but thee,' amongst those thousands of 
 angels and saints, what Michael or Gabriel, what 
 Moses or Samuel, what Peter, what Paul ? ' and there 
 is none in earth that I desu'e in comparison of thee.' 
 ' Put not yoiu- trust in princes ' (which are the ablest 
 upon the earth), ' nor in the son of man, for there is 
 no help in him. His breath departeth, and he return- 
 eth to his earth, and then all his thoughts perish. 
 But blessed is the man that hath the God of Jacob 
 for his help, whose hope is in tftie Lord his God,' Ps. 
 cxlvi. In that lamentable siege and famine of Sa- 
 maria, 2 Kings vi., a woman cried to the king as he 
 passed by, ' Help my Lord, king ! ' The king 
 answered, ' Seeing the Lord doth not succour thee 
 * nil. in Ps. i. 
 
148 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 how should I help thee, with the ham or the wine- 
 press ? ' The king coneluilod soundly, that if the 
 Lord withdrew his helping hand, it lieth not in any 
 prince of the earth to aflbrd it. ' God hath spoken 
 once, and I have heard it twice, that power belongeth 
 unto God, and thine, Lord, is salvation, even thine 
 alone ! ' Ps. Ixii. As much as to say, God is very 
 constant in the asseveration of this doctrine. To drive 
 it into oiu- conceits he hath spoken it once and twice, 
 that is, not once, but many times, he hath spoken it 
 eternally, immoveably, efleetually, without retraction : 
 semel ct bis, i. e. noii senwl, sirpius, aterniUtcr, 
 penitiis, inconcxtsse. Once in the law, and a second 
 time in the gospel. Both the breasts of the chm-ch 
 give this milk ; Moses and Christ, prophets and evan- 
 gelists, run upon this point. Surely they forsake 
 their fii-st and better husbands, and go after lovers, 
 Hoseaii., whose company they will dearly repent (for 
 they will see an alteration, and be driven to confess. 
 It was better with me at that time than now), which 
 think that their bread and water, wool, and flax, and 
 oil, and drink, are not the blessings of God, much more 
 the gifts and virtues of the soul, inward and spiritual 
 graces ; that cry for deliverance whore there is none ; 
 that lay out their ' silver, and not for bread; bestow 
 their labour, and are not satisfied,' Isa. Iv. ; spend and 
 consume their prayers and are not heard. Or (as 
 Irene* maketh the comparison) they are not unlike 
 .SSsop's dog, who having meat in his mouth, caught at 
 the shadow which he saw in the waters, and lost the 
 substance. ' Is not the gleaning of Ephraim of more 
 worth than all the vintage of Abiathar ? ' Is not the 
 staff of the Lord of more strength, — whereof David 
 spake, ' Thy staff and thy rod comforted me,' — than 
 all the staves of Asshur and Egypt, staves of reeds, 
 staves of flesh and blood '? Is not the least finger of 
 his right hand of more puissance than the whole arm, 
 either of flesh or any spirit besides, yea, than the 
 whole loins, whole bodies, whole substances of angels, 
 men, silver, gold, purple, all other creatures? 
 Olympias, the mother of Alexander the Great, wrote 
 to her son, when he called himself the son of Jupiter, 
 not to do it, for fear of procuring unto her the envy 
 and displeasure of Juno. The angels and saints in 
 heaven are much displeased, I dare affirm, to have 
 such dangerous honour thrust upon them, that bringeth 
 them into emulation with their fearful Lord, whose 
 presence they tremble at; and if it were possible for 
 them to hoar such unlawful prayers of men, they 
 would, I doubt not, with a contrary sound of words, 
 labour to purge themselves before the Lord of hosts. 
 ' Not unto us, Lord, not unto us; ' it belongeth not to 
 thy servants to receive such sacrifice. They that 
 refused a far smaller offer upon the earth, the only 
 bowing of the knee unto them, ' see thou do it not,' 
 when the knees of the heart shall stoop, and prayers 
 be pouredjunto them, they will much more be dis- 
 * Lib. ii. cap. xii. 
 
 contented. I conclude out' of Saint Bernard, sperent 
 in iiliis alii: Let others put their trust in other things: 
 some in the knowledge of letters, some in the wili- 
 ness of this world, some in nobility, some in prefer- 
 ment, or in any the like vanity ; and let him that 
 listeth trust in uncertain riches ; but it is good for mo 
 to hold me fast by the Lord, and to put my hope in 
 God. Who ever hoped in the Lord and was con- 
 founded ? ' The lions lack and suffer hunger, but 
 they that fear the Lord shall want no manner of thing 
 that good is.' 
 
 4. The specialty followeth, whereupon he took en- 
 couragement to pray unto the Lord. He had a par- 
 ticular feeling of the love of God towards him, and 
 knew him to be his God. Ho had not only heard and 
 seen in others, but tasted in himself how sweet the 
 Lord was : some little experience of deliverance he 
 had already made, because the waters choked him 
 not, and albeit he were swallowed into the belly of the 
 fish, yet his life remained in him, and there is no other 
 likelihood but he lived in hope of a far greater salva- 
 tion. The former circumstance is as the alabaster 
 box of spikenard, that contained precious ointment in 
 it, but kept it close and uncommunicated ; this latter 
 breaketh the box, and poureth out the ointment, that 
 the savour of the perfume may fill the whole house, 
 and comfort both the body and soul of him that will 
 use it. The former at large delivereth the arguments 
 of the might and mercy of God, telleth us there is a 
 Lord above, whom all the ends of the world have a 
 portion in, whose name is Jehovah, and his aid most 
 requisite to be sought unto. 
 
 This latter bringeth him home, as it were, under 
 the roof of our private houses, and giveth him enter- 
 tainment in our particular consciences. The former 
 giveth counsel, and showeth the way the latter putteth 
 in execution ; the one teachcth knowledge, the other 
 application ; the one what to believe, the other what 
 to hope ; the one to pray unto the Lord, the other to 
 pray unto the Lord our God. Dirit rhii's, parnta sunt 
 lionii, &c. ; faith salth, there are good things, which 
 cannot bo told, prepared for believers. Hope saith, 
 Tliey are kept for me. Charity, which is the third 
 sister, saith, I run and endeavour to attain unto them.* 
 Before he had said, that there was a near affinity be- 
 tween faith and hope ; for that which the one belioveth 
 shall bo, the other beginneth to hope shall be for her.f 
 The prophet breaketh not the order of these two vir- 
 tues : first he belioveth, then hopeth ; for ' faith is 
 the substance of things hoped for ;' and no more can 
 a man hope after that which he believeth not, than a 
 painter paint in the air, or upon emptiness, super 
 inline Augustine, in his Enchiridion to Laurentius,' 
 allegcth many differences betwixt faith and hope ; 
 
 * Bern. Serm. x. 
 
 t Nompo germana fiilei spcique cognatio est. l^t'.jue 
 ilia fnturum credit, baec sibi incipiat sperare futurum. 
 I Cap. viii. 
 
Vee. ].] 
 
 LECTURE XXIIL 
 
 149 
 
 namely, these, that more is believed thau is hoped for, 
 as the pains of hell ; but nothing is hoped which is 
 not believed. Again, faith apprehendeth both good 
 and evil ; reward and punishment ; things past, 
 things present, and things to come ; as the death of 
 Christ for the first, for the second his sitting at the 
 right hand of God, for the last his coming to judg- 
 ment. JVIoreover faith hath to do in matters both 
 concerning ourselves and others ; for we also believe 
 that that appertaineth to angels ; but hope is the ex- 
 pectation only of good things, and such as are to come, 
 and are proper to ourselves.- So faith is evermore 
 ampler than hope, and hope is in a manner a con- 
 tracted and abridged faith. Clemens Alexandrinusf 
 saith, that hope is the blood of faith ; and when hope 
 hath given up the ghost, it is as if the blood of faith 
 had flowed out, and all her vital power were exhausted. 
 The devils both know and obey God, Job i., and they 
 acknowledge his Son Jesus Christ, not only in the 
 substance of his deity to be the Son of God, but in 
 his office of mediation : ' Thou art that Christ,' Mark i. ; 
 and they profess and publish that knowledge of theirs, 
 for Christ rebuketh them for it, Luke iv. ; neither are 
 they ignorant of his commission, that ' all power is 
 granted unto him, both in heaven and earth ;' and 
 that he is ordained ' the Judge of the quick and the 
 dead.' Therefore they ask, ' Why art thou come to 
 vex us before the time '?' Mat. viii. ; yea, ' they fall 
 down and ^Yorship him,' Mark v. ; they ' fear, and 
 tremble, and believe,' James ii. ; and they praj' unto 
 him ; for the legion iustantly besought him, Mark iv., 
 not to send them awaj' out of the coasts of the Gada- 
 renes. So there is in the devils, you see, 1, know- 
 ledge, and that very deep and profound ; 2, confes- 
 sion ; 3, worship; 4, fear; 5, belief; 6, prayer and 
 supplication. What want they ? That which, if Chris- 
 tians want, they have a name that they live, but in- 
 deed are dead. They want a particular confident faith, 
 the application of mercy, which is the life of Christians, 
 and the defect whereof maketh devils ; for not to be- 
 lieve assuredly that God is rich in mercy to all that 
 call upon him in faithfulness and truth, to have his 
 loving-kindness in jealousy, to distrust his promises, 
 which are yea and amen ; to falsify his word, more 
 stable than the pillars of the earth ; to make him a 
 liar what in us lieth, and to evacuate the testimony of 
 his Spirit speaking to our spirits that we are the sons 
 of God, and, as it were, to pull ofi' the seal whereby 
 we are sealed against the redemption of the just, is 
 that damnable and desperate infidelity which turneth 
 men into devils, and of the household of faith maketh 
 them a fanjily for the prince of darkness. And not to 
 
 * See Martin Luther upon the 5th of the Gahitiaus. — 
 Aliquid crcditur quod iion speratur, nihil speratur quod non 
 creditur, fides est malarum rerum et Lonarum, et pra:teri- 
 tarum, et pra;sentium et I'uturarum, et suarum rerum et alie- 
 narum. Spea est bouarum rerum tantum et futurarum et 
 uostrarum. t !• Psedag. vi. 
 
 speak more of this beautiful damsel, as highly favoured 
 of the King of kings, as ever was Esther of the king 
 of the Medes and Persians, Esther iv., not contenting 
 herself to stay without at the gate, but with an humble 
 presumption approaching into the inner court, and 
 finding the golden sceptre of fixvour ever ready to be 
 held out unto her ; be ye assured in your souls, and 
 write it in the tables of your hearts with the point of 
 a diamond, with the persuasion of God's Holy Spirit, 
 that the writings of adversaries may never raze it out 
 again ; that if you err not in the nature of a true faith, 
 if you take not shadows of mountains for men, a fancy 
 and shadow of faith for the body itself, if it be sound 
 and substantial, rightly informed, properly qualified, 
 you may say unto it. Go in peace ; it shall walk 
 through life and death without controlment. If it 
 find angels, principalities, powers, things jiresent, 
 things to come, any other creature in the world, stop- 
 ping her passage, and rebuking her forwardness, she 
 shall cle.ar her way notwithstanding, with the strength 
 of her hope, and climb into the presence of her God ;. 
 where, if she crave to sit at his right or left hand, in 
 his everlasting kingdom, her suit shall be granted. 
 
 5. He prayed vmto the Lord his God out of the 
 belli/ of thf Jhli, where he had as little comfort of life as 
 blind Tobias had : What joy can I have, said he, Tob. 5, 
 that sit in darkness, and behold not the light of heaven ? 
 Jonah might truly say in a double sense, Dr pio- 
 JkikUs chuiuiri, et ahi/ssns ahi/ssui/t iiivocal, ' Out of the 
 deep have I cried, and one depth calleth upon another,' 
 who lay both in the bottom of a monster, and in the 
 lowest gulf of afHiction that ever soul was plunged in. 
 Might he have had the liberty of the sons of God to 
 have entered into the house of the Lord, the house of 
 prayer, as the prophet calleth it, the place where his 
 honour- dwelt, there to have humbled himself, and 
 poured out his soul to him th.at made it, I would less 
 have marvelled to hear this duty performed. Anna, 
 the daughter of Phanuel, hath spent her days in the 
 temple of God, ' serving the Lord with fastings and 
 prayers night and da}-, and she departed not thence,' 
 Luke ii. David ' desired but one thing of the Lord, 
 and that he would require, that he might dwell in the 
 house of the Lord all the days of his life, to behold 
 the beauty of the Lord, and to visit his temple,' 
 Ps. xxvii. But in the belly of the fish there was no 
 beaut}' to invite unto devotion : in this darksome and 
 desert house, no company or fellowship to draw him 
 on, ihiinus in doinum doiiii)ii, ' Come, we will go into 
 the house of the Lord : our feet shall stand in thy 
 gates, Jerusalem,' Ps. cxxii. No, not so much as 
 swallows and sparrows, which David envied, because 
 they had leave to build their nests by the altars of 
 God ; yea, if vultures and screech-owls had but dwelt 
 thereby, it h.ad been some comfort. Yet in this de- 
 solate and solitary house, voider of haunt than the 
 ransacked sanctuary of Jerus.alem, the paths whereof 
 foses, for want of passengers, ran up and down upon, 
 
150 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IL 
 
 wherein he lay as forlorn, in a manner, as lie that 
 made his abode amongst the tombs of the dead, and 
 frequented the company neither of men nor beasts, 
 Mark v., even in this hateful cage of filth and un- 
 cleanness, he settcth himself on work, humbling his 
 soul in prayer lower than his body was humbled in 
 the water, talking with God on high, mourning and 
 lamenting his wretchedness, not in a cave of Horeb, 
 as Elias did, nor in a cave of AduUam, as David, but 
 in the ugliest uncomfortalilcst vault (setting hell apart) 
 that ever was entered. Lord, where shall thy spirit 
 forsake thy chosen ones ? If we climb into heaven, 
 there it is as apparent to the world as the sun in his 
 brightness ; if we be driven into the wilderness, there 
 it will attend on us ; if we lie down in the bottom of 
 the sea, if in the bowels of a whale within that bottom 
 of the sea, there will it also embrace us. 
 
 To conclude all in one for this time ; there was 
 never contemplation or study in the world so holy and 
 heavenly in the sight of God, so faithful and sociable 
 to him that useth it, as prayer is. It travelleth by 
 day, it awaketh by night with us ; jierefjiinattir, per- 
 voctat. It forsaketh us not by land, by water, in weal, 
 in woe, living nor dying. It is our last friend and 
 indissolublest companion ; therefore we must pray. 
 There was never name so worthy to be called upion, 
 in heaven or earth, so mighty for deliverance, so sure 
 for protection, so gainful for success, so compendious 
 to cut off unnecessary labours, as the name of Jeho- 
 vah, our merciful Father, and the image of his coun- 
 tenance, Jesus Christ. Therefore to the Lord. There 
 was never city of refuge so free for transgressors, 
 never holes in the rocks so open for doves, never lap 
 of the mother so open to her babes, as the bowels of 
 
 God's compassion are open to believers. Therefore 
 we must pray in that style of propriety which Thomas 
 used, when he looked upon Christ, ' my Lord and my 
 God.' Lastly, there was never afilietion so great, but 
 the hand of the Lord hath been able to master it ; 
 therefore, if w^e walk in the shadow of death (as where 
 was the shadow of death if these bowels of the whale 
 were not ?) we must not take discomfort at it. ' The 
 Lord sitteth above the water floods ;' the Lord com- 
 mandeth the sea, and all that therein is. He that 
 hath hidden Jonah in the belly of a fish, as a chosen 
 shaft in the quiver of his merciful providence, and 
 made destruction itself a tabernacle and hiding-place 
 to preserve him from destruction, blessed be his holy 
 name, and let the might of his majesty receive honour 
 for evermore ; he will never forsake his sons and 
 daughters, neither in health nor sickness, light nor 
 darkness, in the land of the living, nor in the land of 
 forgetfulness. And, therefore, as David cursed the 
 mountains of Gilboa, 2. Sam. i., ' that neither dew 
 nor rain might fall upon them, because the shield of 
 the mighty was there cast down,' so cursed be all 
 faithless and faint-hearted passions, that throw away 
 the shield of f'ailh, and open the way for the fiery darts 
 of the devil to work their purpose. But blessed be 
 the mountains of Armenia, for there the ark found 
 rest. Blessed be the power and mercj- of our God, 
 for these are the mountains whereupon the ark rest- 
 eth ; these are the holy hills whereon the Sion and 
 church of the Lord hath her everlasting foundations. 
 The Lord livetb, and blessed be our strength, even 
 the God of our salvation for ever and ever be exalted. 
 Amen. 
 
 LECTURE XXIV. 
 
 And said, 1 cried in mine iij/!icli»ii to the Lord, and he heard me; out oj the hcllij oj hell cried I, and thou 
 
 heardest mij voice.- — Jonah II. 2. 
 
 IN the words of the history, before we come to 
 Jonah speaking from his own person, I noted, 
 1, his action during the time of his imprisonment, 
 ■prayer ; 2, the object of his prayer, the Lord; 8, the 
 application, his God; 4, his house of prayer, the belly 
 of the fish; and, 5, the specification of it, he said; 
 which particle only remaincth to be adjoined to the 
 former, before we proceed to the prayer itself. 
 
 And said. It beareth one sense i-hus : I will not 
 only acquaint you that Jonah praj'ed, but I vvill also 
 express unto you what that prayer was. This was 
 the sum and substance of it ; the matter he framed 
 and compiled to his God was to this effect. ' He 
 prayed, and said ;' that is, these were the very words, 
 this was the tenor and text of his song indited. But 
 if the word be better looked into, it may yield a fur- 
 ther construction; for in the three principal tongues, 
 
 Hebrew, Greek, and Latin,* there hath ever been 
 held a difl'erence between speaking and saying ; the 
 former being the more general and imperfect, belong- 
 ing to as many as use the instruments of speech. 
 Thersites spake, though he spake like a jay ; and they 
 speak of whom the proverb is verified, Little wisdom, 
 much prating. I Eupolis noted them in the Greek verse, 
 
 K' iieriji AaXi/V, uh-j\ia.T'j)TaTOi Xiynv, 
 the}' are excellent to talk, but verj- unable to say. 
 The latter is more special, and noteth a wise and 
 deliberated speech, grave and sententious, weighed in 
 the balance, as it is in the words of Sirach,J and 
 uttered to good purpose. Tully in his rhetorics gives 
 the difference, in that he ascribeth saying to orators 
 alone, speaking to the common people, — soliits e.%1 ora- 
 
 * Aul Gel. i. noct. At. 15. Satis loqueuti.'c, sai>icutisB 
 ])arum. t Salust. | Ecchis. xxi. 
 
Ver. 2.] 
 
 LECTURE XXIV. 
 
 151 
 
 toris diccir, loijiii tiHtem couviniiils vuUji, — and that the 
 one Cometh from nature, the other from art. Such 
 was the handling of that argument in the 45th P.salm, 
 whereof the author witnesseth beforehand, ' My heart 
 is inditing a good matter; and his tongue was but 
 the pen of a ready writer.' It was sermo nalits in 
 jieciorr, a matter bred in the breast, not at the 
 tongue's end. And such was the song of Jonah in 
 this place. It was drawn as deep as the water from 
 the well of Jacob; the sentences whereof were ad- 
 visedly penned, and the words themselves set upon 
 feet, and placed in equal proportions. A skilful and 
 artiticial sotig, as if it should have fitted an instru- 
 ment, composed in number and measure, to the 
 honour of his name who ' giveth the argument of a 
 song in the night season,' Job x.xsv., who in the 
 heaviest and solitariest times, when nature calleth for 
 rest, quickeneth up the spirit of a man, and giveth 
 him wisdom and grace to meditate within himself his 
 unspeakable mercies. I do not think that the prayer 
 of Jonah was thus metrically digested within the 
 belly of the fish as now it slaudcth. But such were 
 the thoughts and cogitations wherein his soul was 
 occupied, which after his landing again perhaps he 
 repolished, and brought into order and fashion, as a 
 memorial and monument of the goodness of God that 
 had enlarged him. It ministereth this instruction 
 unto us all, that when we sing or say anything unto 
 the Lord, we keep the rule of the psalm, ' Sing ye 
 praises with understanding,' Ps. xlvii. ; that as John 
 Baptist went before Christ to prepare his ways, so 
 our hearts maj- ever go before our tongues to prepare 
 their speeches; that first we speak within ourselves, as 
 the woman with the bloody issue did. Mat. ix. (eJte 
 ya^ h iauT-fl, for ' she said within herself, If I may 
 but touch the hem of his garment"), afterwards to 
 others ; first in our henrts, with David in the psalm, 
 Di.ri, cnstodiam, &c., 'I said, I will keep my ways,' 
 Ps. xxsix., then with our lips ; that first we hew the 
 stones and make them fit for the building of the 
 temple before we j^lace them in the walls, lest by our 
 hammering and confusion at the present time we dis- 
 order all things ; finally, that whether we pray or 
 preach, wo come not wildly and uuadvisedlj' to those 
 sacred works, beating the air with empt}' words, and 
 seeking our matter up and down, as Saul his father's 
 asses, but furnished and prepared to our business with 
 sufficient meditation. I never shall persuade myself 
 that the exactest industry which either tongue or pen 
 can take in the handling of his works can displease 
 God. And they that think the contrarj', seek but a 
 cloak for themselves (the greater part) to cover their 
 ignorance withal, as was noted of Honorius the Third, 
 when he forbade the clergy the study of both laws, the 
 fox dispraiseth the grapes which himself cannot reach. 
 When the tabernacle should be made with the ark of 
 testimony, Exod. xxxi., and the mercy-seat, and all 
 other instruments belonging thereunto, ' God called 
 
 P.ezalcel by name, and filled him with his Spirit, in 
 wisdom and in understanding, in knowledge and in 
 all workmanship, and joined Aholiab with him; and 
 as many as were wise of heart besides, God put cun- 
 ning into them.' As Bezaleel and his fellows were 
 fitter for these works than others unfurnished, so had 
 they been very unworthy of these graces of God, if 
 being bestowed to such an end, they had not used 
 them to the uttermost. I ask in the like manner. 
 Who made the mouth and the heart of man ? Whoso 
 are learning and arts, invention and eloquence ? What 
 womb hath engendered them ? Are they not God's 
 blessings? Shall we dissemble the author; shall we 
 obscure the gifts; shall we wrap them up in a napkin, 
 and hide them in the ground, and not express them 
 to the honour of his name by whom they were given? 
 Erasmus in his preface upon the works of Cypdan, 
 giveth this testimony and applause to that glorious 
 martyr of Christ, Talcin cccleda: doctoyem, &c. : Such 
 a doctor of the church, such a champion of Christian 
 religion, did the school of rhetoricians bring forth unto 
 us, lest any man foolishly should flatter himself that 
 he never meddled with rhetoric* It is not unknown 
 to all that peruse the Holy Writ, that Moses was 
 ' learned in all the wisdom of Egypt,' Daniel of 
 Chaldee, Job not unespert in astronomy, Jeremiah in 
 the common laws of his time, David in music, Paul 
 in poetry and in all the knowledge both of Jews and 
 Gentiles ; and those that delight in the histories of 
 the church shall find Cyprian, Optatus, Hilary, Lac- 
 tantius, and others, laden out of Egypt with the trea- 
 sures and spoils of the Egyptians, instructed for the 
 better service of God with the helps of profane writers. 
 They require but their own, for these other were but 
 thieves (^saith Clemens Alexandrinusf), and robbed 
 Moses and the prophets. And likewise in the judg- 
 ment of Tertnlliaii,! harping upon the same stiing, 
 what poet or sophister hath there ever been that 
 drank not at the well of the prophets ? Or if there 
 be anything in them besides, let them be enforced to 
 confess with Julian, Pivpriis pt'iiiiis con/i:/imiir . We 
 are stricken through with our own quills ; that is, 
 wounded and disadvantaged by our own learning. 
 And therefore I end with the saying of Pious Miran- 
 dula. Si tiirjie est hoiias literas colcre, vidlleiii iii/iwscere 
 culpain qiiam deprccari : If it be an opprobrious thing 
 to embrace good letters, I had rather acknowletige my 
 fault than ask pardon for it. 
 
 Hitherto went the words of the history, now let us 
 see what Jonah himself saith : ' I cried in mine aftiic- 
 tion unto the Lord,' &c. I remember what ^schines 
 spake of Demosthenes at Rhodes, when he read the 
 defence that Demosthenes had framed to his accusa- 
 tion, the people wondering at the strength and validity 
 of it, Quid si ipsuni aiulissctis ? Wbat would ye have 
 thought if you had heard him pronouncing with his 
 
 * Ne quis sibi stolide placeat, quod nihil rlietorices atti- 
 gerit. t Stro. i. et v. X Apolog. c. xlv. 
 
152 
 
 KING OX JONAU. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 own moutb ? I thiuk no less between Jonah anJ 
 Jonah, ^Yhcn I find what odds there is betwixt him 
 and himself, as he speaketh in the name of the his- 
 tory which he writelh, and as iu his own person. His 
 pen wrote nothing so ellectuall.v as his heart felt; and 
 being the scribe and orator only, he is not so fluent 
 and copious as -n-hen he is the patient. Job de- 
 mandeth in the sixth of his book, ' Will ye gire the 
 words of him that is atHicted to the wind ? ' as if he 
 had said, "When affliction itself, and the inmost sor- 
 rows of my heart, tell my tale, will you not regard it? 
 ' Oh that your souls were in my soul's stead !' Job xvi. : 
 that you felt as much as I am grieved with ; I could 
 then keep your company, and could shake mine head 
 at you. Loquor in aiKjuaUa inea, queror in aniaritu- 
 dinc aniinie mviv : 'I speak that that I speak from a 
 world of trouble ; I make my complaint in the bitter- 
 ness of my soul,' Job vii. So Jerusalem crieth iu the 
 Lamentations of the prophet : chap, i., ' all ye that 
 pass by, stay and consider if ever there were sorrow 
 like unto that wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me ;' 
 for they that passed by considered it not, but Jeru- 
 salem felt it at the heart. The style of the history 
 before, if you observed it, was simple and plain, in as 
 usual, naked and vulgar terms as might be: 'Jonah 
 prayed unto the Lord his God out of the belly of the 
 fish.' What one word therein lofty and magnificent, 
 and lifted above the common course of speech ! But 
 the style of Jonah himself, speaking from a sense and 
 impression of his woes, is full of ornament and majesty ; 
 full of translated and varied phrases, as if a sentence 
 of ordinary terms were not sufficient to express his 
 miseries. It is not now said that he prayed, but that 
 ' he cried ;' praying is turned into crying, not from 
 the belly of the fish, but ' from the belly of hell,' — 
 a marvellous transformation. And the trouble he 
 speaketh of is uot properly trouble, but ' narrows and 
 straits ;' and the hearing of the Lord is not naturally 
 hearing, but ' answering,' — a degree beyond. Agam, 
 the style of the history was single and brief, and not 
 a word bestowed therein more than was needful to ex- 
 plain the matter intended, but the style of Jonah him- 
 self iu every part is doubled and iterated ; for where 
 it was said before at once, Jonah prayed, now, he cried 
 and cried; and the Lord heard and heard. And the 
 belly of the fish there mentioned is now both pressure 
 and tribulation, and the belly of hell too.* Euripides 
 charged Eschylus in the comedy f for unnecessary re- 
 petition of words : 
 
 A/'s T aurh r,iJ.Tv iJinv 6 aoflg A'iay^uXo; 
 'IIjcoi ya^ frici xai y.o.Tioyjifj.ai, 
 "llxw hi T uurov ieri tui y.ariiyjij.ui : 
 
 Wise Kschylua lialh one tiling twice repeated, 
 
 In tliat I come, und come, again is nscil, 
 
 Wlicn coming there, and coming, is uot clmngLd.J 
 
 * Clamavi, vocifeiatus sum, exauilivisli, angustia, venter 
 jnferni. 
 t Aul. Gel. lo, 23. X Ibid., /J-dxr^a et xajo/ocro;. 
 
 But in the two members of this present verse, though 
 there be near ailinily, and they seem to import but the 
 same meaning, yet we may not lake them for an idle 
 repetition ; the latter of the two rising in degree in 
 some sort, and giving elucidation to that which went 
 before it. And as nature in the body of man hath 
 doubled his eyes, his ears, and other parts, that if the 
 one should fail in his office and charge, the other might 
 supply the defect, so in the body of this sentence the 
 wisdom of the prophet hath doubled every word, that 
 if those of the former rank fail in their office and mes- 
 sage whereunto they are sent, the other iu the latter 
 might help them out; for thus methinketh they sound. 
 Is any man desirous to understand my case '? I was 
 in affliction, and that allliction so great, as if I had 
 been pinched and thronged in some narrow room, ex 
 aiujnslid ; as if the Lord had hedged about me that I 
 should not get forth, and mured me up within hewn 
 stone. They are the words of Jeremiah, Lam. iii., 
 to shew the nature of extreme tribulation. If you 
 will know my refuge, I went unto the Lord, not with 
 a cold and careless devotion, nor with a dumb spirit, 
 but with as earnest and impatient a voice as the afiec- 
 tions of my heart could send forth, dainavi. If you 
 will also learn the success, what comfort and speed 
 my crying had, the Lord gave ear and answer unto it, 
 c.aindiril. Kow, in the second clause of my test, 
 though neither the order of the parts nor the bub- 
 stance of the words disagrecth, yet their virtue and 
 power is much more significant. For that which he 
 called before tribulation and anguish, is now the belly 
 of hell, (■ venire iiiftrni; and the cry that he used before 
 is now vociferation, another kind of cry, locijcrclus 
 sum. And whereas he said before, the Lord hath 
 heard me, as one that were farther removed from 
 him, now by changing the person he comcth nearer 
 to his throne of grace, and delivereth his tale us it 
 were in the cars and under the eyes of the author of 
 his deliverance : ' Thou, Lord, hast answered me,' 
 t)i, Duinine. 
 
 From this diflereuce of styles, that when he speak- 
 eth from himself, he useth greater force of words than 
 when the history speaketh of him, I make this brief 
 collection, that Jonah interpreted arigbt the afflictions 
 sent of God, and mistook not the end why he was 
 chastened. For what was the cause of them, but to 
 put a sensible and lively feeling into the soul of Jonah, 
 that he might see and say in himself, I am sick indeed; 
 and that his soul refusing all other comfort, he might 
 run to the succours of God, there to be refreshed. 
 God did justly complain against Israel in the second 
 of Jeremiah, 'I have smitten their children in vain; 
 they received no correction.' The prophet in the 
 fifth chapter lindeth the same fault : ' Thou hast 
 stricken them, but they have not sorrowed : thou hast 
 consumed them, but they refuse to be corrected: they 
 have made their fact s harder than a stone, and refuse 
 to return.' But what will be the cud of this stupidity 
 
Vei;. 2.j 
 
 LECTURE XXIV. 
 
 153 
 
 and blockishucss iu apprehending the chastisements 
 of God ? The same which is spoken of Ezokiel svi., 
 ivcessil zeliis mens a te : ' My wrath is departed ti'om 
 thee, and I will cease, and bo no more angry.' 
 Whereupon sweet St Bernard :* I tremble at the very 
 hearing of it; now thou pereeivest that God is then 
 more angry when he is not angrj-. God keep mo 
 from such mercy ; this pity is beyond all wrath. Let 
 them consider this well that take the aillictiuns of God 
 brought upon them as an horse or mule taketh the 
 branding of an hot iron, which they presently forget ; 
 who, when they are smitten with sorrows, sickness, 
 infamy, losses, or such like temptations, are no more 
 moved therewith than when they see the weather or 
 wind in the air changed : ' Lord, they will not 
 behold thine high hand ; but they shall see it.' If 
 they will not apply it to amendment of life, they shall 
 receive it to their further judgment. 
 
 The parts severally to be handled iu the present 
 words are these : 1, the gravity of his aiHictions, declared 
 by two uieta|ihors, straitness and the bell}' of hell, 
 and what ell'ect those afflictions drew from him, praj'er; 
 2, the vehemcucy of that prayer expressed both by 
 the ingeminatiou and increment of two words, crying 
 and vociferation or outcrying ; 3, the success of his 
 prayer, in two other words laid down and amplified 
 by changing the person, he heard and thou heardest. 
 
 1. The first metaphor or translation bewraying his 
 misery irnto us, is aiitjiislin, ' narrowness, strictness 
 of room,' and as it were a little-case, whence, I sup- 
 pose, we ^derive om- Enghsh name aiujuish. The 
 reason of this metaphor iu afflictions, is because the 
 heart and countenance at such times endui'e a kind of 
 compression and coartation, a shrinking together, and 
 are cbawn, as it were, into a lesser room, the spirits 
 not diftusing themselves so freely as when there is 
 occasion of mirth and cheerfulness. For it is not 
 unknown in common experience, that laughter dilateth 
 and spreadeth the face abroad, which sorrow cou- 
 tracteth ; therefore God promiseth, in the 60th of 
 Isaiah, that ' the heart of the church shall be enlarged, 
 diltilahuw cor ccdaiu', that is, filled with joy. Or this 
 may be another cause, that in a narrow and close room 
 (say, for example, the prison of John Baptist, or the 
 gate wherein Tamerlane kept the great Turk), there 
 is not that scope and Ireedoni of passage, there is not 
 that plenty and variety of necessary helps, as in a 
 larger place. Therefore Da^id giveth thanks in the 
 psalm at his first coming to the kingdom, that after he 
 had been chased like a tiy from country to country, 
 first to Hamuel iu Ramah, then to Abimelech in Nob, 
 afterwards to Achish in Gath, sometimes into a cave, 
 sometimes into a wilderness, at leng4h the Lord had 
 delivered him and ' set his feet in a large room,' Ps. 
 xvili. The afflictions of Job, you all know how vehe- 
 
 * Solo auditu contremisco. Vides quia tunc magis iras- 
 citur l)eus cum non irascitur. Misericordiam banc ego uolo. 
 Super omntm iiani miseiutio ista. — Ser. xlii. sujter Cant. 
 
 ment thev' were, and he never more kindly expressed 
 them than by this translation, iu the 7th of his book, 
 ' Am I a sea, or a whale fish, that thou keepest me iu 
 waj'd ■?' Afterwards he expoundeth his meaning, that 
 ' God did try him everj- moment, that he would never 
 depart from him, nor let him alone till he might swal- 
 low his spittle down,' such were the straits he was 
 hemmed iu. The like manner of speech he used in 
 the 11th, • He hath put my feet in the stocks, and 
 looketh narrowly to all my ways.' 
 
 There were enough in this former borrowed term to 
 shew the affliction of Jonah, which, by the grace that 
 is used in the words, seemeth to have sitten as close 
 to his soul as a garment to his skin, or as the entrails 
 of the fish lay to his bodj', wherein as the spaces of 
 ground which he used to walk were stinted and abridged 
 him, so the pleasure and freedom of his mind, solaco 
 of his friends, and comfort of the light of heaven, were 
 taken from him ; but the other, without comparison, 
 let the world be sought through from the utmost circle 
 to the centre of it, is the absolutest pattern of misery 
 thai ever sank into human invention. For as nothing 
 is more direful and unsuil'erable thau hell, so nothing 
 more fit in the nature of thiugs, whereunto the hugest 
 tribulation may be compared. The word iu the He- 
 brew carrieth itself iudiflerently either for hell or the 
 grave, for thej' are both always craving, Briny in ; 
 and thence they have their name, the grave is never 
 satisfied with the corpses of the dead, nor hell with 
 the souls of the damned that descend into it. I rather 
 take it to signify hell in this place, one saith because 
 of the horror, another for the darkness, some for the 
 depth, some for the hugeness of the belly of the fish. 
 Vi'iilcr inferni alruii cati, taiitn iinii/iiitudinis nl iiixtar 
 obtiiical iiifcnii:* The belly of hell is .the belly of the 
 fish, so large and capable that it may go instead of 
 hell. The belly of the fish, saith another, f "'''''■ ""/'t 
 iiifcnuis ercit, was another hell unto me. David useth 
 the same phrase with Jonah, ' The pains of hell com- 
 passed me about, and the snares of death overtook 
 me ;' but in another psalm more distinctly, ' Thou 
 hast delivered my soul fi-om the nethermost hell.' 
 What ! Did Jonah or David ever descend into that 
 fiery lake, to know the torments thereof? Or as Py- 
 thagoras guessed at the statm'e and pitch of Hercules 
 by the length of his foot, which was but one part of 
 his bod}', so by a taste of bitterness incident to this 
 present life, have these conceived what sorrow and 
 vexation is reserved to the wicked for times to come ? 
 Undoubtedly the grief of heart hath been infinito, and 
 as much as mortality could ever admit ; the mourn- 
 ings of Hannah, Job, David, Jeremiah, Jerusalem, such 
 as his heart must needs be harder than the stithy 
 which the smith beateth upon, that readeth the cata- 
 logues of their woes and is not moved at them. But 
 if all those foresaid agonies, and as many besides as 
 ever wrung and wrested the spirit of man, since the 
 * llieron. t Mercer. 
 
154 
 
 KINO OX JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 breath of life was breathed into him, were put together 
 to part the torments of hell among them, part after 
 part, as if they would empty the store-houses, and 
 break the stream of it ; yet hath the hand of hell an 
 unmeasurable portion behind to distribute to her chil- 
 dren, an endless patrimony of howling, wringing, and 
 gnashing which all the fore-passed mischiefs and maims 
 in this life ha\'e scarce been shadows and counterfeits 
 of. The belly of hell, you hear, but in a type or 
 figure, where the word is mistaken and abused, and 
 brought from his proper sense, though it be fearful 
 enough, and the extremity of pain hath so beguiled and 
 besotted some (I speak it with sobriety) in the judg- 
 ments of their minds, that they have thought it very 
 hell indeed ; yet woe be to them ten thousand times 
 more, and more than can be imagined, by any heart 
 as deep as a flood, whom the belly of very he'll hath 
 swallowed and closed up. It is not possible to be 
 spoken, it is more unpossible to be endured (yet it 
 must be endured) what the terrors and tortures of hell 
 are. ' Take him,' saith the Gospel, Mat. ssii., &c., 
 ' bind him hand and foot,' is it no more but so ? / 
 lictor lii/a manna : go, Serjeant, bind his hands ? Yes, 
 'cast him into utter darkness!' Outward to those 
 inward whei-eiu they delighted before, blindness of 
 mind and uuder.standing ; outward, because the whole 
 man, body and soul, shall be folded and comprehended 
 therein; outward, because in extremity, without the 
 limits and borders of any favour of God to be extended, 
 where neither the light of the sun, moon, and stars, 
 and much less the sight of God's glorious face shall 
 ever shine. ' There shall bo weeping and gnashbg of 
 teeth ;' there is, there shall be, no time set. It standeth 
 for all eternity, no myriad of years shall ever determine 
 it. There the eyes shall distil like fountains, and 
 the teeth clatter like armed men, and all the parts of 
 the body relinquish their natural uses, and spend 
 their cursed time in wretchedness and confusion. 
 These are the straits indeed, not like to those which 
 before I mentioned, when hands and feet are so bound, 
 body and soul so hampered and snared, not with cords 
 and withes as Samson's were, but with the unexpli- 
 cable bands of long night, that not a part of either of 
 the two shall have any power or activity left to gratify 
 their owiier with ; neither the mind to contemplate 
 more than endless inlV'licity, nor the memory to recount 
 more than ancient, and thrice most hatefid sins, nor 
 the fantasy to present mor<' than fearful visions, nor 
 the eyes to behold more than legions of unclean spirits, 
 nor the cars to hear more than the roarings of fiends, 
 nor the nostrils to smell more tlian the smoke of brim- 
 stone, nor the hands to catch hold of more than flames 
 of fire, nor the feet to walk further than their gyves 
 and chains will give them leave. Torments invented 
 and inflicted by tyrants have been most hideous : the 
 teeth of wild beasts, hot glowing ovens and furnaces, 
 cauldrons of boiling oil, fiery branen buDs, pounding 
 to death in mortars, rolling in barrels of nails, roasting 
 
 upon spits, boring with augm-s, parting the nails and 
 fingers' ends with needles, nipping the flesh with pin- 
 cers, racking and rending asunder the joints with wild 
 horses ; no pity, no remorse taken, whilst there was 
 either flesh, or blood, or sinew, or bone, or I say not 
 member, but wound iu the body to work upon.* But 
 the torments of hell are in greater variety : 
 
 I ' ad I an hundred tonguesf and mouths to hold them, 
 A voice of iron, yet could I not unfold them. 
 
 And in another kind, or rather indeed without kind, 
 ibi ordo nulli(s, horror srwjiiterniis, where there is no 
 order but everlasting horror. For who can define, 
 either by speech or understanding, a thing so infinite, 
 so monstrously compact of natures most desperate and 
 repugnant ; an end not ending, a death not dying, 
 unquenchable fire ; yet a darkness withal to accom- 
 pany it more palpable than the fogs of Egypt, and 
 blacker than blackness itself; everlastingly burning, 
 yet not consuming; so much more unsufl'erable than 
 any torments of tortures upon earth, as the inventions 
 of devils can better devise than man, and the malice 
 of devils better put in execution ? This is the cup of 
 the deadliest wine, Ps. Ix., that ever was tasted of; 
 those are those ' deep graves,' in the psalm, from whence 
 there is no rising again, Ps. si. This is ' the firo 
 that goeth not out, the worm that never leaveth gnaw- 
 ing, in the last of Isaiah. These are those ' waters 
 of gall ' in Jeremiah, chap, nil., ' those fearful things 
 wherewith the Lord shall plead ' against the unright- 
 eous of the earth, as he* pleadcth sometimes against 
 Gog and Magog in Ezekiel, chap, xxxviii., ' pestilence 
 and blood, and sore rain, and huge hailstones, and fire 
 and brimstone ;' not such as fell vipon the sisters 
 Sodom and Gomorrah, the witnesses whereof for many 
 succeeding ages were heaps of ashes and clouds of 
 pitch, but fire and brimstone from a bottomless mine, 
 which burneth in the lake of death, and shall never 
 cease from burning. Lastly, this is that ' great wine- 
 press of the wrath of God, where the smoke of torment 
 ascendeth for evermore, and there is no rest day nor 
 night,' Eev. xiv. ; those endless and unmerciful plagues 
 which the angels pour out of then- vials, when men 
 ' have given them blood to drink, and boil in heat, and 
 gnaw their tongues for sorrow. Rev. xvi. And yet are 
 these but shadows and semblances which the Scripture 
 hath used, therein to exemplify, in some sort, the 
 calamities to come ; fearful enough, if there were no 
 more, to make the heart of the strongest melt and fall 
 asunder within him, as the ice against the summer's 
 sun ; but that as the joys of heaven are unmeasurablc 
 for their part, so concerning the pains of hell, the eye 
 hath never seen, the ear not heard, the tongue not 
 uttered, the heart not conceived them sufiiciently in 
 their nature and perfection. That accursed glutton in 
 the Gospel, who could speak by experience of his un- 
 
 * Ci/prian. Saivitum est in vulnera. 
 t Noil milii si centum, &c. — Bern. 
 
Vee. 
 
 LECTURE XXIV. 
 
 100 
 
 estimable disoruciations, as ^neas did of the troubles 
 of Troy, et quorum pdis una fid, what I_ have felt 
 and borne a part of, he giveth a warning to all his 
 brethren in the flesh, not to account so lightly as they 
 do of the torments of that place, the flames and 
 fervour whereof were so importunate to exact their due 
 of him, that he craved with more streams of tears than 
 ever Esau sought his blessing, but one drop of water 
 to cool his tongue with, and could not obtain it. And 
 what if all the rivers in the south, if all the waters in 
 the ocean sea had been granted him ; his tongue, not- 
 \yithstanding, would have smarted and withered with 
 heat still, and he would have cried, in the language of 
 hell, ' It is not enough.' Or what if his tongue had 
 been eased ; his heart, his liver, his lungs, his bowels, 
 his arms, his legs would have fried still. bitter 
 day, when not the least finger, I saj* not of God, whoso 
 hand is wholly medicinal, but not of the poorest saint 
 in heaven, nor the scantest drop, I say not from the 
 waters of life, but not of the waters of the brook, shall 
 be spared to a soul to give it comfort ; which, if the 
 latest day of all the running generations of men, if the 
 great year which Plato dreamed of, might over end, 
 the ease were somewhat for hope's sake ! But it is 
 appointed for a time and times, and no time, even 
 when ' time shall be no more,' then shall it continue, 
 Eev. s. The gates are kej)t from egress, as the gates 
 of paradise were warded from entrance, not by the 
 cherubim with the blade of a sword, but by the angels 
 of Satan with all the instruments of death ; and the 
 seal of God's eternal decree set thereunto, as the seal 
 of the high priests and rulers wore set upon the tomb- 
 stone of Christ. The covenant of day and night shall 
 one day be changed. The stars shall finish their race, 
 the elements melt with heat, heaven and earth be 
 renewed, summer and winter have an end ; but the 
 plagues of the prisoners in hell shall never be re- 
 leased. 
 
 If you ask the cause why I enter so large and un- 
 grateful a discourse of hell upon so small an ofl'or in 
 my test, as some may conceive, I will not dissemble 
 it. Some may be deceived bj' the translation, im- 
 propriety, and abuse of words. For because they 
 hear the name of hell alleged and applied to the pre- 
 sent tribulations of this life, they arc induced thereby 
 to think that there is no other hell, nor sorer vexations 
 elsewhere to be sustained ; as some on the other side, 
 hearing the rest of God to be called by name of ' Jeru- 
 salem that is above,' the walls and foundations whereof 
 iire sapphires and carbuncles, &c., take it to be no 
 more than Jerusalem in Palestine, or Venice in Italy, 
 or any the like glorious and sumptuous city upon the 
 face of the earth, and therefore dispose themselves 
 with so much the colder afl'ection to the attainment of 
 it. Some have taught f^nd commanded their tongues 
 to speak a lie, and to say that there is no hell (for I 
 ■cannot think that ever they shall command their hearts 
 to deny it) ; and as Tully spake of Metrodoras, an 
 
 atheist of his time,* I never saw any man that more 
 feared those things which he said were not to be feared, 
 I mean death and the gods ; so I will never persuade 
 myself but the atheists of our times heartily fear that 
 which they arc content to sayt they fear not. Now, 
 lest these sleepy adders should pass their time in a 
 dream, or rather m a lethargy, no man awaking them 
 up from their careless and supine opinions wherewith 
 tliey enchant their souls, and infect others, let not 
 the watchman hold his peace, lest they die in their 
 sins for want of warning; let the trumpet of judg- 
 ment often be blown unto them ; let it be jiublished 
 in their ears seven times, as the ram's horns seven 
 times sounded about the walls of Jericho, that their 
 ruin and downfall is at hand, that hell gapeth for 
 them, and that God hath ordained long since their 
 impious and blasphemous spirits to immortal maledic- 
 tion. Of others that is true which God complaineth 
 in Isaiah, chap, sxvi., ' Let mercy be shewed to the 
 wicked, j'et he will not learn righteousness. Preach 
 honour, and glory, and peace, a garland of righteous- 
 ness, an uncorruptible cro^\'n, fruit of the tree of life, 
 sight of the f;ice of God, following the Lamb, fellowship 
 with angels and saints, and the congregation of first- 
 born, new names, and white garments, pleasures at 
 the right hand of God, and fulness of joy in his pre- 
 sence for evermore ; they are as obstinately bent and 
 unmoveably settled against these blessings of God as 
 Daniel against the hire of Belshazzar, Dan. v., ' Keep 
 thy rewards to thyself, and give thy gifts to another.' 
 They are not won nor enamoured with the expectation 
 of good things ; and the revelation of the sons of God, 
 which the whole creature lougeth and groanoth for, 
 savoureth no more unto them than a box of putrefied 
 ointment. What, is there no way to quicken and put 
 life into them ? Yes. If the blessings of sis Levites 
 upon mount Gerizim will not move them. Dent, xxvii., 
 let them hear the cursing of six others upon mount 
 Ebal ; if they take no pleasure in the beauty of Sion, 
 let the thundering and lightning of Sinai, and fire to 
 the midst of heaven, and mists, and clouds, and smoke 
 ascending hke the smoke of a furnace, and the exceed- 
 ing loud sound of a trumpet, put them in fear, and 
 make them believe that there is a God of judgment ; 
 if the spirit of gentleness take no place, shake the rod 
 over them, as the apostle speaketh. Give them mourn- 
 ing for joy, ashes for beauty, the spirit of heaviness 
 for the oil of gladness, a rent instead of a girdle ; 
 and tear, I say, not their garments, but their hearts, 
 asunder, pull their bodies, souls, and spirits one from 
 the other; lastly, if the ofl'er of peace be refused, 
 sound wars and rumours of wars at their gates, and 
 such tribulations besides, as the like hath never been 
 since the beginning of the creation which God created 
 unto that time, neither shall bo again. Who knoweth 
 
 * Nee (jucnqiiam vidi qui magis ea timeret qua; timciula 
 esse uegaret, niortera dico et Deos. 
 
 t Afiirmaut tibi non sibi. Int.jrdiu nou noctu. 
 
15G 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 if tbey will be softeneJ, if not for the love of virtue, 
 nor for the recompense that springeth therehence, yet 
 for the other cause, for fear of the wTath of God, 
 formidiiic pcour, which they hear denounced ? It may 
 be, feeding a while upon the food of judgment, as 
 Ezekiel calleth it, will breed good blood in them, and 
 the consideration of such misery will work the same 
 effect in them, that the sense of adversity wrought in 
 Jonah, I mean to shake off then- burden of sin, and 
 to tiu-n unto the Lord then- God with unfeigned con- 
 version, which was the second thing that I propounded 
 unto you in the afflictions of the prophet, what effect 
 they produced from him. 
 
 2. I cried in mine iirfliclioii. Eind Manasseh with 
 chains, load him with irons, bow down his neck and 
 his back with bonds, and ho will know himself. PuU 
 the king of Babylon from his throne, lay his houom- 
 and insolency in the dust, hunt him fi'om the company 
 of men, banish him from his palace, wherein he jetted 
 Hke a monarch indeed, tui'n him into the field to eat 
 gi'ass hke an ox, to be wet with the dew of heaven, 
 and you shall find a miracle quickly done, an ox to 
 have more understanding than a man ; he will then 
 learn to ' praise the King of heaven, whose power is 
 an everlasting power, and his Idugdom from genera- 
 tion to generation.' The idolatrous Jews in Jer. ii., 
 that being called to the true God, spake desperately 
 and stiffly, ' No, but we have loved strangers, and 
 those will we follow ; in their trouble, notwithstanding, 
 they will cry to the right God, ' Ai'ise thou, and help 
 us,' Hosea v. ' In their affliction they will seek him 
 diligently,' and will take sound words into theh' hps : 
 ' Come, and let us return to the Lord, for he hath 
 spoiled, and he will heal us ; he hath wounded, and 
 he will bind us up,' chap. vi. Let Moab ' settle itself 
 upon her lees, and not be emptied from vessel to 
 vessel, and her scent will remain in her,' Jer. xlviii. 
 ' Doth the wild ass bray when he hath gi-ass, or the 
 ox low when he hath fodder?' Job vi. But take away 
 the gi-ass from the wild ass, and he will be tamer, and 
 fodder from the ox, and you shall hear him roar. There 
 must be a whirlwind raised, and a iiery chariot pre- 
 pared to carry Elijah into heaven ; there must be 
 heresies to try the approved ; there must be a furnace 
 to purge the silver and gold ; there must be a tire to 
 fine the sons of Levi ; there must be an angel of Satan 
 to keep Paul from pride.* A pilot must bo tried by 
 a tempest, saith Basil, f a runner by a race, a captain 
 by a battle, a Christian by a calamity, tentation, pro- 
 vocation, and misery. Wherein, if poisons become 
 prescrvati\'es, and from the \enom of serpents the 
 wisdom of God can extract an antidote against the 
 venom of serpents; if all things shall work together to 
 the best for those that are Christ's ; if evil by nature 
 shall be made good by his powerful art ; if the waters 
 of a flood overspreading the whole globe of the earth be 
 so far from drowning the ark, that they shidl lift it 
 * Pctr. Chrysolog. f Sor. iii. iu divit. avaro3. 
 
 higher, and bring it nearer to the presence of God ; if 
 afflictions, I mean by the good handling of oui- gracious 
 God, be not afflictions but medicines, and the more they 
 increase upon us, the nearer they land us to the haven 
 of his blessings : how truly may we say and acknowledge 
 with Bernard,* 'Totus mundiis jideli divitiarum est, the 
 whole world is riches to a faithful man (even when it 
 scemeth to be poverty) ; and with Augustine, f that 
 nothing happeneth to man from the Lord our God but 
 Cometh in the nature of mercy, when tribulation itself 
 is such a benefit ; for both prosperity is his gift com- 
 forting, and adversity his gift admonishing, us. A 
 very unlikely seed to yield such fruit, as bitter as 
 mustard seed, but give it leave to grow, and the 
 fruit shall be veiy pleasant. Insipidmn amariim 
 ijiainim sina/iis, scd inc/eiis fnichis, the wicked under- 
 stand not this, and the iinwise have not luaow- 
 ledge of his ways. She crictli in the comedy, and 
 she presentoth the person of them all that are her 
 companions : 
 
 Hanccine ego partem cajiio ob pietatem prfccipuam ? 
 Turn hoc mihi indicore, iiiique, immoileste datis dii ; 
 Nam quid habebunt sibi ijjitur iuipii postbac ? &c. 
 
 Is this my portion and guerdon for my especial piety ? 
 Then do the gods reward me very unseemly, unjustly, 
 and unreasonably ; for how shall the wicked hereafter 
 be dealt with, if the godly be thus honoured amongst 
 you ? Augustine, iu his preface upon the 2.5th 
 Psalm, layeth down the like complaints of some, 
 Deux, Veils, IJticciiie est JKstitia tua ' God, God^ 
 is this thy justice ? and the Lord answercth them 
 again, llactiiie estjides tua' Is this thy faith '? Hast 
 thou so learned Christ ? Is this the best instruction 
 thou hast found in my law, to murmur against my 
 discipline '? Possess thy soul, therefore, in pati> ::ce, 
 whosoever thou art; leave the ordering of these things 
 to the wisdom of God, with whom it is alike to sweeten 
 the pot of the prophets with meal, and the waters of 
 Jericho with salt, to cure the ej'cs of Tobias with a 
 gall, and to strengthen the sight of Jonathan with au 
 honeycomb. Some he healeth by honey, some by 
 gall, some by salt, some by meal, some by sour, some 
 by sw'cct, some by piping, some by dancing, some_ by 
 prosperity, some by attliction, but all by some means 
 or other that have a longing and desire to the ways of 
 happiness. Now then, again I say, if it be a good 
 thing sometimes to be humbled of the Tjord, for till wc 
 are humbled, commonly we go astray, if it be an happy 
 pricking of the body tliat maketh a pricking in the 
 heart, J if expedient for all sorts of men that the hand 
 of the Lord should now and then take hold on them, 
 because a sinner is amended, the righteous is instructed 
 thereby,? because gold is proved, iron is scoured by 
 
 *■ Ser. XV. super Qui habitat. t Kpist. 87. 
 
 X lieno puugeris, si compuugeria.— lieni. 
 5 Si iicccator, ut corrigatur, si vcro Justus, ut crudiatur — 
 Ilu(/o Card. 
 
Vek. 2.] 
 
 LECTURE XXV. 
 
 157 
 
 this moans ;* if, when the oiitwarcl man is corrupted, 
 the inward is renewed daily, 2 Cor. iv., and there is 
 honour in dishonour, riches in poverty, Hfe in death, 
 possessing all things in having nothing, 2 Cor. ^^. ; if 
 when the fathers [of our flesh chasten us for their plea- 
 sures, the Father of our spirits correcteth us for our 
 profit, that we may bo partakers of his holiness, and 
 though no chastisement seem joyous for the time, yet 
 it bringeth the quiet fruit of righteousness to those 
 that are exercised thereby, Heb. xii. ; if when the 
 body of Jonah was in thrall beneath, the soul of Jonah 
 triumphed aloft, and when the tongue of his flesh 
 
 * Si aunim, ut probetur. Si ferrum, ut nibiginem amittat, 
 — Gram. 
 
 could not speak perhaps a word, scarce mutter to 
 itself, the tongue of his spirit cried, and cried aloud ; 
 if when he lay in the belly of hell, even then he 
 climbed above the stars of the firmament, and though 
 he saw nothing with his bodily eyes, he saw heaven 
 opened unto him with the eyes of his understanding : 
 then let us not be dismayed, my brethren ; if tribula- 
 tion come, let us not think it any strange thing ; yea 
 rather, if tribulation come, let us not think it an 
 unprofitable and unwelcome thing, let us receive it 
 with thanks, keep it with patience, digest it in hope, 
 apply it with wisdom, bury it in meditation, and it 
 shall end unto us, no doubt, in glory and peace more 
 than can be spoken. 
 
 LECTURE XXV. 
 
 I cried in mine alfUction tinto the Lord, and lie Iieeird me; out of llie lielhj of lie!! cried 7, dc. — JoxAli II. 2. 
 
 IN the two members of this second verse, signify'ing 
 almost the same thing, I observed first, the mea- 
 sure of his atflictions, explicated by two metaphors, 
 together with the eftect they lirought forth ; secondly, 
 the force and zealousness of his prayers, declared like- 
 wise by two words ; and thirdly, the audience which 
 ensued upon his praving. 
 
 The force of his prayer, wherein I am to proceed, 
 is interpreted by two phrases, though not distinguished 
 in our Enghsh translations, yet in the Hebrew, Greek, 
 and Latin of Tremellius, somewhat v.aried, Clamavi, 
 roeiferatns S7(m ; as if he had said, I called and cried, 
 or I cried and outcried. "Which Jerome expoundeth, 
 vel aqitis cedentibiis, either the waters yielding him 
 a way, and making passage, vel toto cordis affcctu, or 
 with the whole mtention of his heart. The former is 
 not likely ; I rather take it to have been the vehe- 
 moncy of spirit such as is usually meant in the Scrip- 
 tures under these or the like words, as in the 119th 
 Psalm expressly, ' I have cried with my whole heart ; ' 
 Gal. iv. : ' God hath sent the spirit of his Son into 
 our hearts, crying, Abba, that is, Father;' though it 
 lie in the heart alone, yet it is calli'd crying. It ever 
 notetli, whether in propriety or liy translation, an 
 earnest, loud, importunate desire, loath to lose audi- 
 ence for want of speaking out, and impatient of repulse 
 when it hath spoken. Therefore Elijah bade the 
 priests of Baal ' cry with a loud voice,' 1 Kings xviii. ; 
 and he in the comedy marvelling at over much patience, 
 sheweth what should be done : Eho, non chimas? non 
 irasceris ? What ! dost thou not ci-y ? art thou not 
 au'-^ry ? Hannah, in a part of her song, 1 Sam. ii., 
 telieth us what the manner of the wicked sometimes is, 
 iinpii in tenebris tciceiit : when they are afflicted, they 
 lay their hands upon their mouths, and hearts too, 
 they fret with indignation, and repine to themselves, 
 letting neither voice nor gi'oan come forth, nor any 
 other token of submission to him that hath cast them 
 
 down. Of whom I may say with Gregory,* To sufl'er 
 so dcspitefully and maliciously is not the true vu-tue 
 of patience, biU a covei'cd or concealed madness. 
 Now Jonah is many degrees beyond these. 1. He is 
 not silent, which, as you heard, is sometimes a mark 
 of impiety. 2. He doth not mutter to himself, as the 
 philosophers in the poet, humminr; within themselves, 
 and uttering a kind of insensilde and inarticulate 
 silence, f 3. He doth more than speak, for that 
 might argue the heart of a man but indiiTerontly dis- 
 posed to obtain. 4. He speakcth with most endea- 
 voured contention ; he crieth unto the Lord, and when 
 he hath once cried, crieth again, and with another 
 kind of crying. For as if the former word were not 
 enough, a latter is added, to signify either a dift'erent 
 kind, or if the same, in a more intensive and forcible 
 affection. This ingemination, either of one and the 
 same word again repeated, or of sundry bearing the 
 same sense, giveth, as it were, a double strength to 
 the declaration of that which is delivered. As Phavo- 
 rinua gave his judgment of the verse in Homer,J 
 wherein Idous laboureth by persuasion to pacify the 
 contention betwixt Ajax and Hector: 
 
 War not any longer, beloved young men, neither 
 fight together ; that the addition of the second word 
 (though adding nothing in signification to the former) 
 is not to make up the verse ; but as they continued in 
 their strife, so duplex cadem compellatio admo)iitionem 
 facit intentiorem , his twice speaking unto them in the 
 same manner of speech, maketh his advice the more 
 earnest. And if they were the same words, j'ot one 
 might very well think them to be others, quia aures et 
 animum sirpiiiK fcriunt ,1 because they boat the ears and 
 
 * Tolerare et odisse, non est virtus mansuctudiiiis, sed 
 volnmentum furoris.— //om;/. ii. in Ezech. 
 
 t irurmura dura sceum et rabiosa silentia roduut. — rersitis. 
 i Au. Ge. noct. At. xiii. 23. § Ibid. 
 
158 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 the mind of a man often. These often and fierce 
 inclamations within the spirit of Jonah, speaking to 
 the Lord, as it were, with a douhled and cloven 
 tongue, and sending up his prayers into heaven, as 
 incense castelh up smoke without intennission, con- 
 demn the dissolute and perfunctory prayings of oiu- days 
 both in churches and chambers, who utter a foi-m of 
 words, as the manner of hypocrites or the Gentiles 
 was, or as the parrot of Ascanius recited the creed, 
 rather of custom than zeal, ' flattering God with om- 
 mouths, and dissembling with him with om- tongues,' 
 Ps. lsx\-iii., leaving our spii-its as it were iu a slumber 
 the mean time, or if we call them up to prayer, leaving 
 them again, as Christ his disciples, before we have 
 thoroughly awaked them ; as if the offering of the halt 
 and the lame, body without soul, or soul without de- 
 votion, voice without spirit, or spirit without clamoui' 
 and vociferation, could please. The prayers of David 
 (I am sm-e) had another edge upon them. In the 
 55th psalm, ' I moiu-n in my prayer and make a noise.' 
 Plaiii/o, perstrepo, tnmultiior. ' Evening, and morning, 
 and at noon will I pray, and make a noise, and he will 
 hear my voice.' In the 38th before, ' I roar for the 
 very grief of mine heart, myio pns fremitK. Lord, 
 mine whole desii'e is before thee, and my sighing is 
 not hid from thee.' Cor mcum palplUit, my heart 
 panteth, or runneth to and fro, I have no rest, no 
 quietness within me.' Such was the pang and palpi- 
 tation of Job's heart, chap, iii., 'Mygi'oaning cometh 
 befure I eat, li efl'tiiuhttitiir velul aqiur nigitus mei, and 
 my roarings are poui-ed forth and wave like waters;' not 
 gi-oanings, nor ciyiugs, but plain roarings, \vith a con- 
 tinual inundation, velut unda impelUtnr niichi, as one 
 water driveth on another. These are wonderful pas- 
 sions. The lion in the forest never roared so much 
 for his prey, nor the hart after the water-brooks, as 
 the souls of the faithful after God's goodness. Yea, 
 ' the Uon indeed hath roared, who will not fear ? the 
 Lord God hath spoken, who can but prophesy ?' 
 Amos iii. Tlie mighty lion of the tribe of Judah hath 
 roared in his supplications, and his righteous spii-it 
 been vexed and disquieted within him ; and shall not 
 we be moved '? Of him it is witnessed in the 11th of 
 John, that at the raising of Lazarus, he not only wept, 
 but groaned or yearned in his spmt, and ' troubled 
 himself, Erasagsi' iaurov, about it. It was trouble in- 
 deed ; 'Tartarus hath his name from such trouliles. He 
 roared then for Lazams whom ho loved, and for 
 Martha's sake, and for other of the Jews that were 
 thereabouts. But afterwards in his own cause, when 
 not only his ' soul was vexed unto death,' and vexa- 
 tion held it in ' on every side,' IIsj/Xli'toj, but when 
 he ' cried with a great voice, My God, my God, why 
 hast thou forsaken me ?' and ' crying again with a 
 gi-eat voice, gave up the ghost,' Mat. xxviii. Therefore 
 the apostle, speaking of the days of his flesh, Ileb. v., 
 and tliat fruit of bis Hps and spirit which we are now 
 in hand with, thought it not sufficient to make mention 
 
 of his ' prayers and supplications,' nor of his tears, 
 Aay.sli'jiv, which watered his blessed plants, nor of a 
 cry alone weakly sent forth, but of a strong ciy, KiavyTJi 
 k'^rj^ai, which if heaven were brass, were able to break 
 through it. So it is said of the Spirit of God, who 
 helpeth oiu' infinnities, Rom viii., that because ' we 
 know not oui'selves what to ask as we ought to do, he 
 ■ maketh request in our names, with groans not to 
 be expressed.' Ipsa buhicitur ijeniens qui gei/wntes 
 facil,* he that putteth gi'oaning into us, is brought in 
 gi'oaning himself. ' The voice of the turtle is heai'd 
 in om- land,' Cant, ii., the gi-oaning of this turtle dovo 
 is heard within oui' bosom. Vox qiddem gementi, non 
 canenti siiniUs, a voice in^truth, as of one that moimieth 
 and that singeth not. Thus the example of the 
 glorious Lord of life, who mom'ned unspeakably, not 
 for the sins of his own person, but of the sons and 
 daughters of Jenrsalem, who led the way before us iu 
 water and blood, not in water alone, but in water and 
 blood both, who with his bleeding tears shewed us 
 the right form of faithful supplications, this very ex- 
 ample biddeth us cry in our prayers. The help and 
 assistance of the blessed Spirit of God gi-oaniug as 
 unmeasm-ably on the other side, not for his own 
 necessities, but for curs, his wretched creatures and 
 clients, not of infirmity in himself, but of compassion 
 towards us, whom we continually grieve, and no w^ay 
 so much as for want of our grief and repentance, bid- 
 deth us cry. The dreadful majesty of the sacred Lord 
 of hosts whom we stand before, the royalty of his 
 nature, sublimity of his place, dominion over men and 
 angels, who with the spirit of his mouth is able to 
 consume oui' bodies and spirits, biddeth us cry. The 
 view of our wretched mortality (as Adam and Eve 
 when they saw their nakedness fled, Miriam when her 
 leprosj", she was ashamed) after mortality exceedingly 
 mortal, the view of our sin exceedingly sinful, that we 
 are not worthy to cast up our eyes towards the seat 
 of God, and after our sin, our misery exceedingly 
 miserable, that the prophet was amazed in himself to 
 see either man or the son of man so kindly visited, 
 biddeth us cry. Lastl_y, the hope and expectation of 
 success (unless we will sow and not reap, plant vines 
 and not drink the wine thereof, pour out many prayers 
 and not be heard) ; the delicacy and tenderness of tho 
 ears of God, which must be wisely entreated, and tho 
 precious favour of his countenance, which must be 
 carefully sought, bid us cry. Let us not think, that 
 the soimd and noise of our lips, as the ringing of 
 basons, or vocal modulation, without cordial and in- 
 ward meditation, can procure us audience, ialcntioies 
 voces apiul secret issimas Dei anres noii fiiciunt verba, sed 
 desiileria ;* tho most eft'ectual speech in the secret 
 ears of God, cometh not from words, but from desires. 
 He that heareth without cars, can interpret our prayers 
 without our tongues. lie that saw and fancied 
 Nathanael under the fig-tree before he was called, saw, 
 * Born sor. lix. in Cant. t Greg. 
 
Ver. 2.] 
 
 LECTURE XXV. 
 
 159 
 
 and sanctified John Baptist in his mother's womb, 
 before he cameforth. He seeth andblessethourpra_ycrs 
 ferventlj' conceived in the bosom of our conscience, 
 before they be uttered ; but if they want devotion, 
 they shall be answered by God, as the prayers of 
 those idolaters in Ezekiel, chap, viii., ' Though they 
 cr^' in mine ears with a loud voice, yet will I not hear 
 them.' 
 
 3. Atid he heard mc. The Hebrew saith, he an- 
 swered me ; which doth better express the mercy of 
 God towards Jonah, than if it had been barely pi-o- 
 nouneed that he heard Jonah. For a man may hear 
 when he doth not answer, as Christ heard the false 
 witnesses, and when the jn-icsts asked him, ' Answcrest 
 thou nothing '?' laciiit, ' he held his peace,' Mark xiv. 
 And likewise he heard Pilate, when upon the accusa- 
 tion of the priests ho asked him, ' Answercst thou 
 nothing?' j-et ' he answered not, so as Pilate marvelled 
 at his silence,' Mark sv. David in the 18th Psalm 
 confesseth of his enemies, that ' they cried, but there 
 was none to save them, even unto the Lord, but he 
 answered them not.' Now this answer of God whereof 
 he speaketh, is not a verbal answer shaped of words, 
 but a real substantial satisfaction and grant, directly 
 and fitly applied, as answers should be to questions, 
 so this to fidfil the mind and desire of Jonah. For 
 as he ' heard the heavens,' Hosea ii. (not that the 
 heavens spake, or he listened), ' and the heavens the 
 earth ; the earth the corn, oil, and wine ; and the corn, 
 oil, and wine, Israel ;' not by speech, but by actual 
 performance of something which they wanted ; he the 
 heavens by giving virtuous disposition unto them, they 
 the earth by their happy influence, the earth her fruits 
 by yielding the juice, and these Israel by ministering 
 their abundance : so doth he answer Jonah here by 
 granting his petition. For as to answer a question is 
 not to render speech for speech alone, but if there bo 
 scruple or uncertainty in the matter proposed, to re- 
 solve it, so to answer a suit is to ease the heart, and 
 satisfy the expectation of him that tendered it. In 
 this case. Pub. Piso, a rhetorician in Rome, was 
 abused by his seiwant, who, to avoid molestation, had 
 given his servants a chai'ge to answer his demands 
 briefly and directly, without any further additions.* 
 It fell out that he l^ro^'ided a supper for Clodius the 
 general, whom he long looked and often sent for at the 
 hour, and yet Clodius came not. At length he asked 
 his man. Didst thou bid Clodius ? I bade him. Why 
 cometh he not ? He refused. How chanceth tliou 
 toldest me not so much ? Because you demanded it 
 not. Plutarch, in the same book where he reporteth 
 that tale, maketh three sorts of answers. For some 
 give an answer of necessity, some of humanity, others 
 of superfluity. The fh-st, if you ask whether Socrates 
 be within, telleth you faintly and miwillingly. He is 
 not within ; perhaps he answereth by a laconism, oi, 
 Not. The second with more courtesy, and to the suf- 
 * Plutarc de garrul. 
 
 ficient measure of the demand, willing to instruct the 
 ignorant. He is not within, but in such a place, at the 
 exchange. The third, running over with loquacity, 
 knoweth no end of speaking, He is not within, but iit 
 the exchange, waiting for strangers out of lona, in 
 whose behalf Alcibiades hath written from Miletum, &c. 
 The answers of God are neither so sparing and 
 restrict as the first, leaving the soul in manner as 
 doubtful and perplexed as he found it, by granting too 
 little ; nor so idle and superfluous as the last, to brino- 
 a loathing to men by surcharge of his benefits, but 
 the}' are in the middle sort, tempered with good mode- 
 ration, full of humanity, kindness, and grace, giving 
 enough, and haply more than was asked, and sending 
 away the heart joyful for that which it hath obtained ; 
 according to the phrase of the psalm, diliita os tiiiiiii 
 et iiiiplth) illiiil, Ps. Ixxxi., ask largely, boldly, bounti- 
 fully, I will not deny thee. Our Saviour promiseth 
 as frankly in the Gospel : ' Ask, and it shall be given 
 you ; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be 
 opened unto you.' Perhaps he neaneth of disciples 
 alone. No ; but ' whosoever asketh, receiveth ; and 
 he that seeketh, findeth ; and to him that knocketh, 
 it shall be opened.' Give but thy prayer a voice to 
 ask with, for it must not be tongue-tied; give it an 
 eye to seek, for it must not be careless ; give it an 
 hand to knock with, for it must not fear to molest and 
 disquiet ; and not only the doors, but all the treasures 
 and jewels of the kingdom of heaven shall be opened 
 unto it. You know what labour is made to the princes 
 and states of the earth by travel of body, expense of 
 purse, mediation of friends, suppliancy of gesture and 
 speech, intervention of time, to obtain but temporary 
 and frivolous suits. A widow of Macedon had a long 
 suit to Philip the king, wherein she was persuaded 
 the equity of her cause called for judgment. At 
 length he answered her, iSfnn est mihi otiiuii (which is 
 the manner of most magistrates), I am not at leisure; 
 she boldly replieth unto him, Erijo iie sis re.r, then be 
 not king any longer. No marvel if such an answer bo 
 given by a king or a judge, when a private and familiar 
 friend in a small request for three loaves shall answer 
 his friend, ' Trouble me not, my doors arc shut, my 
 children in bed,' &c. Bathsheba cometh to Solomon 
 her son in behalf of Adonijah, 1 Kings ii., about a 
 matter of no great moment, as she interpreted it. 
 Tlie king encourageth her, ' Ask on, my mother, for 
 I will not say thee nay.' A son to his owa mother, 
 and one whom he bowed unto, and set her at his right 
 hand. (1.) She requested it; (2.) a small thing; 
 (3.) desired him not to say her nay. Yet when she 
 opened it, ' Then, go, ask the kingdom too,' said he, 
 and he sware in her presence that Adonijah had asked 
 it against his life,' and forthwith gave order that he 
 miglit be executed. How fearful was Nehemiah, 
 though ho held the cup to the king, to make a request 
 unto him ? chap. ii. At last, with some invitation 
 from his lord, ' Why is thy countenance sad ? this is 
 
160 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IL 
 
 biTt sorrow of heart ; ' not without lowly salutation, 
 ' God save the king for ever,' and prayers to the God 
 of heaven, he disclosed it; the gladdest man alive that 
 his suit was heard. It was the danger of Esther's 
 life to come before the king unless she were called 
 for, Esther iv. For it was their law, that ' whosoever, 
 man or woman, came into the inner court, which was 
 not called, should die, unless the king held forth his 
 golden rod.' But the sceptre of the Lord our God, — I 
 mean not that iron sceptre of his justice, but the 
 golden of his grace,- — is ever held forth to man, woman, 
 child, bond and free, stranger or citizen; whether they 
 be called or not called, they may safely approach, I 
 name neither outward nor inward court, but even to 
 the thrcne where the king himself sitteth, and if they 
 shall crave of him, I say not to the half of his kingdom, 
 as the Persian monarch said, but to the whole, to 
 divide the inheritance with the principal heir Christ 
 Jesus, to eat and drink at his table, to sit upon a 
 throne and judge the angels of heaven, it shall not be 
 denied them. Zcdekiah spake it in folly, and in a 
 servile, popular affection that ho bare to the princes 
 of his land, when they required the life of Jeremiah, 
 but God speaketh it of the abundance of his heart and 
 riches of mercies, ' The king can deny you nothing,' 
 Jer. xxxviii. 
 
 Surely they do injury to his grace, who talk of 
 warders, and porters, and masters of request, angels 
 and saints, to admit us into presence, and to bring 
 us to speech with God : services not unmeet for the 
 governors of the earth, whoso life is the life of the 
 country and their people with whom they live, as 
 Jeremiah in Lam. iv. calleth their king ' the breath 
 of their nostrils ; ' and therefore it is very necessary 
 that their persons should be carefully guarded and 
 attended upon. Cassar thought that to be an emperor 
 was safeguard enough against danger, when a little 
 boat, and a great tempest being committed together 
 (a very unequal match), and the master himself doubt- 
 ing the worst. Fear not, saith he, thou carriest Cfesar, 
 Cicmrem irhh. He might have been deceived, and 
 afterwards was, in a safer place. Maximilian had 
 some like conceit, when he told his soldiers dropping 
 away at his heels with the shot of their enemies, You 
 must not adventure as far as I do, hahciit eniiii prin- 
 ripes pecuUarcm tjnandainfurtunamsnam,ior princes 
 have a luck of their own. I am sure they must have 
 a peculiar regard and guard to their bodies, or they 
 must fall into dangers. Again, it is true of the princes 
 of this world, which Jethro told j\[oses, when ho sat 
 fnmi morning to evening to hoar the causes of the 
 people: Exod. xviii., ' Thou both weariest thyself and 
 the people that is with thee, the thing is too heavy 
 for thee, thou art not able to do it thyself alone ;' and 
 therefore infinite suits, besides the distraction of 
 many other businesses, requiring larger audience tlian 
 the ears of any one mortal man can afford, drive 
 them of necessity to the deputation of subordinate 
 
 officers, both to receive and commence the requests 
 of their inferiors. But is there either danger in the 
 person of God, who ' rideth upon the cherubims, and 
 makoth his enemies his footstool ; ' or defect in hia 
 hearing, whose ' ears are open to the prayers of the 
 poor destitute, and his eyelids soundly try and exa- 
 mine the children of men' '? He that ' boweth the 
 heavens, and himself cometh down' with his omnis- 
 cient knowledge, hath he need of intelligencers and 
 informers^to give him knowledge of earthly things ? ' He 
 that planteth the ear, doth he not hear ? ' He that 
 standeth and knocketh at our doors, and calleth for 
 entrance, when we stand and knock at his, will he not 
 grant an entrance ? Is he not near and next of all to all 
 such as call upon him with faithfulness ? We dream 
 of outward and inward courts, doors and gates, porters 
 and mediators, impediments and stops, I grant, in 
 earthly courts. But the Lord is porter himself at 
 these heavenly gates. For when the friend knocked 
 in the parable of Luke, chap, xi., at midnight, the 
 deadest hour of the night, who was nearest the 
 gate, first awoke, if yet he slept at all, and first 
 answered ? (> qiiam dare ridl* etc. Oh how willing 
 is ho to grant, that is so willing to be disquieted ! 
 How glad to hear thy knock, that hath placed his bed 
 so near the gate ! (> ijiiani non tiil januain tantiun, scd 
 ipsa janua do)iii)iiif: fiiit ! &c. And how truly may we 
 say, that he was not only near the gate, but the Lord 
 himself the very gate, who, when his children were 
 asleep, the ears of angels and saints shut up, first, and 
 and at the first call, nay, only amongst the rest, 
 prhiiKs et solus, made answer unto it ! The Lord is 
 always nearer to us thau we to him ; he heareth the 
 desires of the poor in the 10th Psalm ; he first pre- 
 parcth the heart, and setteth it on work to pray, and 
 when ho hath so done, bcndeth his ear unto them. 
 If now they can otherwise demonstrate that as Pallas 
 the emperor's libertine would never speak to any 
 servant about him (forgetting his own late servile 
 estate), but either by pointing and signifying with the 
 fingers, as the wise man calleth it, or becking, or if 
 the business were long, by writing ; because forsooth 
 he was loath to bestow the honour of speaking upon 
 them ; t and as the rulers of the earth, in a kind of 
 majesty not unfitting to their place, answer by media- 
 tion of others, so the Lord above heareth not suitors 
 but by the preferment and procurement of angels and 
 other glorified spirits, then it cannot be hindered, but 
 other advocates and spokesmen must be allowed of. 
 But this is likewise clear in the 102d Psalui, where it 
 is said, that ho ' hath looked down from the height of 
 his sanctuary, out of the heaven did the Lord behold 
 the earth ;' to what other end, but ' that be might hear 
 the mourning of the prisoner, and deliver the children 
 appointed unto death ' ? And this, moreover, I am 
 
 * Pctr. Riivcn. 
 
 t Olaudii Cojsarisli bnrtus. Aut maiiu aiit nutu, ant si res 
 longior, scripto ; scilicet ue vocis dignitatem lis impertirct. 
 
Ver. 2.j 
 
 LECTURE XXV. 
 
 161 
 
 sure of, that the Lord hath often and expressly en- 
 joined us, ' Call upon me ; ' and if the book were 
 searched throughout with cresset light, never would it 
 be proved, that he gave any charge to call upon others. 
 Neither was ever the shadow of anything so faithful 
 to the body, to follow and wait upon it, as the success 
 of good speed hath been consequent to a prayer faith- 
 full}' made. For as if their souls were knit together, 
 like the souls of David and Jonathan, you shall ever 
 see them joined. So in the fourth Psalm, ' I called 
 upon the Lord, and he heard me at large ;' and an 
 hundred the like might be alleged for confirmation. 
 And therefore if we err in this point of doctrine, we 
 may say truly with Jeremiah, ' Thou hast deceived us. 
 Lord, when we were deceived ; ' that is, when we were 
 willing to call upon thee alone, thine was the blame if 
 we do amiss, and we may comfort ourselves that we 
 err by warrant and authority from him that must 
 pardon errors. Therefore I conclude from the two 
 and twentieth Psalm : ' Praise the Lord, ye that fear 
 him ; magnify him, all the seed of Jacob, and fear him, 
 all }'e the seed of Israel. For he hath not despised the 
 low estate of the poor, nor hid himself from him, but 
 when he called, he hearkened uuto him.' Let the 
 house of Esau use the liberty of the wide world, and 
 the seed of Babylon call upon other helps as they 
 have done, and those that fear not the Lord use their 
 discretion. Our example loadeth us otherwise. Jonah 
 was this poor man, and his low estate the belly of the 
 fish; he called upon his God, and he hearkened unto 
 him. 
 
 The varying of the person, in that before he spake 
 of God, now to God, giveth us varietj- of instruction, 
 and helpeth to confirm the doctrine before delivered. 
 For since we have immediate access to the Lord, to 
 speak to his majest}', as it were, face to face, and 
 mouth to mouth, it were too shamefaced and senseless 
 a part in us to make other means. And it is besides a 
 singular testification of his thankful mind, who re- 
 ceiveth not the favour of God as the nine lepers in the 
 Gospel received their cleansing, not returning again to 
 give thanks to him that cured them, but first reporteth 
 to himself, and as many as shall read or hear this song, 
 what God hath done for him : ' I called upon the 
 Lord, and he heard me,' which is somewhat further 
 off, and then with a nearer approach, joining his soul 
 as closelj" to the ears of God as Philip joined himself 
 to the chariot of the eunuch, relateth the blessing of 
 his prayer to the Author himself of all blessings, 'And 
 thou. Lord, heardest my voice,' thus rendering unto 
 him grace for grace, a kind and dutiful rememoration 
 for the mercies bestowed upon him. Some take 
 the comforts of God as the beasts in the field take 
 their meat, not looking up to heaven, from whence 
 they come. Nay, ' the ox will know his owner,' and 
 cast an eye to his band, 'and the ass his master's crib, 
 but my people know not me, saith the Lord.' Some 
 acknowledge the Author, and forget him presently. 
 
 ' even whilst the meat is between their teeth,' as Israel 
 did. Some remember sufficiently, but accept them as 
 due debt, as if they had God in bands to perform them. 
 They ' serve not God for nought,' which was the objec- 
 tion of Satan. Some arc ready to ' kiss their own 
 hands' for every blessing that cometh upon them, and 
 to ascribe them to their strength or wit, whereof Ber- 
 nard spake, Uti dat'nt tanqiiam innatis, maxima siijicr- 
 hia: it is the greatest pride to use God's gifts as if they 
 were bred in us. Others there are that give thanks 
 e.v imi mai/is qiiinii scnsit, rather of custom than devo- 
 tion, as cymbals sound from their emptiness; for even 
 Saul will be a prophet as amongst prophets, and an 
 hypocrite take good words into his mouth amongst 
 hearty professors. Jonah, I nothing doubt, from the 
 ground of his heart telleth forth the deliverance of the 
 Lord, which in the spirit of a prophet he foreseeth 
 and presumeth before it cometh, not only to himself 
 and us, but as the rivers of the land send back their 
 waters to the sea, in a tbaidd'ul reruembrance and 
 remuneration that they took them thence, so Jonah 
 returneth this mercy to the Lord himself, that was the 
 giver of the mercy: 'And thou. Lord, heardest my 
 voice,' as if he had concluded and agreed to himself 
 that neither God, nor man, nor his own conscience, 
 should ever be able to accuse him of unthankfulness. 
 I will both preach it to myself privately, and publicly 
 to the world, that the Lord hath heard me. And 
 thou, Lord, shalt also understand fi-om mine own lips 
 that I make acknowledgment and profession to have 
 received my safety from thine only goodness : ' Thou, 
 Lord, hast heard my voice.' I will so meditate upon 
 thy benignities within mine own heart, and leave a 
 chronicle of them to all posterity to come, that I will 
 not meanwhile foi'get to ' look up to the mountains, 
 from whence my help was.' It is the part of an 
 honest and ingenious mind to confess who they are by 
 whom thou hast profited ; but on the other side, the 
 mark of a most ungracious and unhappy nature, rather 
 to be taken in the theft, than to return like for like ; 
 Deprehendi iiifuiio wnllc qinim miititum reddere. And 
 what do they else but steal and embezzle the graces 
 of God, which either dissembling their author, assume 
 them to themselves, or confessing the author, ex- 
 tenuate their worth, as if they were not meet to be 
 accounted for ? These are the thieves and robbers 
 indeed, capital malefactors, sure to be cut ofl" on the 
 right hand and on the left, Zech. v., and not to in- 
 herit the kingdom of God, as the apostle threateneth, 
 1 Cor. vi. 'The stealing of temporal things may bo 
 acquitted again either with single or double, fourfold 
 or sevenfold resolution, Prov. vi. But the filching and 
 purloining of the glory of God can never be answered. 
 Others ' steal of necessity, to satisfy their souls, be- 
 cause they are hungry,' and but equal from equal, 
 man from man. But these of pleasure and pride 
 break through heaven, which, though it be free from 
 violent thieves, yet these by a wile and iusidiation 
 
 L 
 
1G2 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 enter into it and steal away the lionour of God, which 
 is most precious unto him. When John Baptist was 
 born, Luke i., the neighbours and cousins, upon the 
 eighth daj', at the circumcising of the child, called 
 him Zacharias, after the name of his father. Elizabeth 
 answered them, ' Not so ; but be shall be called John,' 
 though it were a marvel to them all, and none of his 
 kindred were so named ; and Zacharias wrote in his 
 tables that John should be his name. They knew 
 that he was the gift of God, which his mother in her 
 old age, and in the state of her barrenness, had con- 
 ceived, and therefore called him John, that is, the 
 gift of God, in remembrance of nature's unfruitfulness, 
 and their undeserved son, whom neither father, nor 
 mother, nor kindred — I mean not ordinary and carnal 
 generation — could have given unto them ; such are 
 the children of our wombs, ' a gift that cometh from 
 the Lord.' And such are our children and fruit ; 
 otherwise, whatsoever we possess, outward or inward, 
 we hold it in ccqnte, even in the Lord of hosts, who is 
 ' the giver of every good perfect gift,' as James writ- 
 eth. Scipio Africanus the elder had made the city of 
 Rome,* being in a consumption, and ready to give up 
 the ghost, exangjieiii et vwrituirnn, Lady of Africa. 
 At length, being banished into a base country town, 
 his will was that his tomb should have this inscrip- 
 tion, upon it, Inijrnta patiia, ve ussa qiiidem mea 
 habcs: unthankful country, thou hast not so much as 
 my bones. Many and mighty deliverances have risen 
 from the Lord to this land of ours to make provoca- 
 tion of our thankfulness. For not to go by a calendar, 
 but to speak in two words, we have lain in ignorance, 
 as in the belly of the whale, or rather the belly of 
 hell (for blindness of heart is the very brim and intro- 
 duction into the hell of the damned), the Lord hath 
 pulled us thence. We have also lain in the heart of 
 our enemies, as in the belly of the fish ; Gebal, and 
 Ammon, and Amalek, and the Philistines, with those 
 of Tyre, have comliined themselves, and cried, A con- 
 federacy, a confederacy against us ; the Lord bath 
 also delivered us to make some proof of our grateful 
 spirits. For this is a rule in beneficence, t Iiii/nitus est 
 adversiis unum hcneficium ? is a man thankful for one 
 benefit ? for a second he will not. Hath he forgotten 
 two ? the third will reduce to his memory those that 
 are slipped thence. God hath liberally tried us with 
 one, and another, and a third, and }'et ceaseth not. 
 But what bocometh of our gratitude ? It hath been 
 our manner for the time to have pamphlets and forms 
 of thanksgiving in our churches, our hearts have 
 burned within us fur the present, as of the two dis- 
 ciples that went to Emmaus, to assemble ourselves at 
 prayers, preachings, breaking of bread, and to give an 
 hour or two more than usual from our worldly affairs 
 as a recompense of God's goodness. ' Our mouths 
 have been filled with laughter, and our tongues with 
 joy ; ' and we have been content to say, ' The Lord 
 * Val. Max. lib. v. cap. 8. f Senec. 
 
 hath done great things for us, whereof we rejoice.' 
 But how quickly forget we all again ? Infjrata Aiir/Ua, 
 ne ossa qiiidam habes : ungrateful England, thou hast 
 not so much as the bones of thy patron and deliverer ; 
 thou hast exiled him from thy thoughts, buried him 
 in oblivion ; there is not one remnant or footprint left 
 to witness to the world that thou hast been protected. 
 What others have testified in former times by building 
 of altars, pitching of huge stones, raising of pillars, 
 dedication of feasts, writing of books, that their chil- 
 dren's children might ask a reason, and be instructed 
 in God's ancient mercies, thou hast not left to thy 
 race to come by one stone, one turf, one post, one 
 paper or scroll of continuance in remembrance unto 
 them of thy ampler benefits. It deserveth the protes- 
 tation of God : Isa. i.. Hear, men ; and hearken, O 
 angels ? No. A greater authority is required. 
 'Hear, heavens, and hearken, earth: 1 have 
 brought up, preferred, and exalted sons, and they 
 have despised me.' If servants and bondmen, the 
 sons of Agar, of whom it was said, ' Cast out the bond- 
 man,' it might less have been marvelled at ; but sons 
 of mine own education, adopted by special grace, 
 these have despised me. They had an action in 
 Athens against unthankful persons.* The more their 
 blame, qui ciim aqnissiiiia jura, sed iniquissbna liahc- 
 rent ingenia, moribus siiis qudiii legibus uti malucrunt : 
 who having good laws, ill natures, had rather use 
 their manners than their laws. For if some of those 
 excellent men which Athens despitefully and basely 
 requited, — Theseus, who was buried in a rock ; Mil- 
 tiades, who died in prison ; and the son of Miltiades, 
 who inherited nothing amongst them but his father's 
 bands; Solon, Aristides, Phocion, who lived in banish- 
 ment, — should bring then- action against Athens in the 
 court of some other city, were it able to answer their 
 just exprobations ? Athens ! thy walls, thy people, 
 thy trophies, and triumphs far and near, by land and 
 sea, are thus and thus multiplied. Horum autlions 
 ubi rixerint, iibi jaccuiit, resjioiide : but put in thine 
 answer, and shew where the authors of those things 
 lived, and where they are buried. God hath an action 
 of ingi-atitude against his sons, and bringeth them into 
 law, not before city or nation, but (to note the horror 
 of the vice) before heaven and earth, that all the 
 corners and creatures of the world may both know and 
 detest it. And surely it was well marked by a learned 
 man. No man wondereth at dogs, or wolves, because 
 they are common ; but centaurs, and satyrs, and 
 such monsters of nature, all gaze upon. It may bo 
 drunkenness, and adultery, and other faults, having 
 either nature or custom on their side, are less odious 
 to men, though not less heinous in theu- kinds. But 
 name an ungrateful person, huiraluin si dixcrvi, and 
 without naming any more, we all detest him as a pro- 
 digious unnatural novelty, violating the communion 
 and nature of mankind. I conclude : ' It is a good 
 * Val. Max. 
 
Ver. 3, 4] 
 
 LECTURE XXVI. 
 
 I(i3 
 
 thing to praise the Lord, and to sing unto the name 
 of the Most High : to deoLare his loving-kinduess in 
 the morning, and his truth in the night season,' 
 Ps. xcii. (1.) It is good touching the action itself; 
 for it is better to bless than to curse, and to give 
 thanks than to give out a voice of grudgings. (2.) It 
 is good in respect of the matter and object, that so 
 glorious and renowned a God vouchsafeth to be mag- 
 nified by our polluted lips, the honour roturneth 
 upon ourselves. (3.) It is good because of the retri- 
 bution ; for cessiit Jecursus f/ratiiinim, ubi nun fueiit 
 n'CHfsiis ; the course and descent of the graces of God 
 ceaselh, and the spring is dried up, where there is not 
 a recourse and tide of owe thankfulness. Wherefore 
 let not so good an exercise be a burden and grief to 
 good souls. Let the unrighteous vanish away in their 
 graceless ingratitude, and become as the dung of the 
 earth. Let them forget the God of heaven, that the 
 God of heaven may also forget them. But let the 
 righteous always rejoice in the Lord, for ' it becometh 
 well the just to be thankful.' Early and late let us 
 bless his holy name, though not with lutes, and harps, 
 and instruments of ten strings, yet with the best 
 members and instruments we have, bodies and spirits, 
 which the fingers of God have harmonically composed 
 
 and joined together, and the joy of the Holy Ghost 
 hath melodiously tuned for this purpose. Let us 
 never turn our backs to the temple of the Lord, nor 
 our faces from the mercy-seat, Ezek. viii. Let us not 
 take without giving, as unprofitable ground drinketh 
 and devoureth seed without restoring. Let us neither 
 eat nor drink, nay, I will more say, let us neither 
 hunger nor thirst without this condiment to it, ' The 
 Lord be praised.' Let the frontlets between our eyes, 
 the bracelets upon our arms, the guards upon our 
 garments, be thanks. Whatsoever we receive to use 
 or enjoy, let us write that posio and epiphonema of 
 Zechariah upon it, 'Grace, grace unto it,' for all is 
 grace, Zecli. iv. Let us learn the song of the blessed 
 beforehand, that hereafter we may be able to sing it 
 with more perfection : ' Praise, honour, and glory he 
 unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and to the 
 Lamb.' Paul is ours, ApoUos is ours, Cephas is ours, 
 the world ours ; children, friends, fields, vineyards, 
 health, wealth, all things ours, but we are Christ's, 
 and Christ God's ; there is the fountain, thence they 
 come all, thither they all return. He is Alpha and 
 Omefia, first and last, author and finisher, giver and 
 receiver, his holy name be blessed for ever and ever. 
 Amen. 
 
 LECTUEE XXVI. 
 
 For thou hadst cast me into the bottom in the midst of the sea; and the floods compassed me ahovt : all tin/ surges 
 and all tliij waves passed over me. Then I said, I am cast away out of thy siijht, lOc. — Jonah II. 3, 4. 
 
 TMAGINE the song of Jonah to consist of three 
 parts, a proposition, a narration, and a conclu- 
 sion ; and the proposition already to be passed in the 
 second verse, summarily abridging the beginning, 
 proceeding and ending of the matter in hand, that is 
 the peril, praj'er, and deliverance of Jonah. The 
 narration now followeth to the eighth and ninth, 
 wherein he concludeth ; so that all that lieth between 
 the second and those, maketh but for exornation ; for 
 both his danger is more amply described, and his 
 prayers often mentioned, and a frequent hope of his 
 deliverance ingested. And it is well worthy your 
 considering, that as music consisteth of acutum and 
 /pave, high and low, sharp and flat, so this song of 
 Sion, which Jonah singeth in a strange laud, with a 
 far heavier heart than ever Israel sang by the rivers 
 of Babylon, is mixed and compounded of two kinds 
 of sounds. For on the one side are dangers, terrors, 
 desperations and dejections of mind often heard ; but 
 on the other the sweetest comforts and joys of the 
 Holy Ghost that could be conceived. First, in the 
 third verse : ' Thou hadst cast me into the bottom of 
 the sea,' with many exaggerations to declare his fear. 
 But in the fourth : ' Yet will I look again to thy holy 
 temple.' Again, in the fifth : ' The waters compassed 
 me about, unto the soul,' &c. But in the sixth: 'Yet 
 
 hast thou brought up my life from the pit, Lord 
 my God.' Lastly, in the seventh : ' My soul fainted 
 within me, yet I remembered the Lord, and my 
 prayer came unto thee into thine holy temple.' Invicem 
 cedunt dolor et vuliijitas : sour and sweet, mourning 
 and joy, trouble and peace, come by courses and suc- 
 cessions. There is no weeding up of these fares, no 
 removing of these griefs and annoyances from the life 
 of man. This is the state and condition of our pre- 
 sent pilgrimage, as of a field wherein there is wheat 
 and darnel, they must of necessity grow together till 
 the harvest, when it shall be said, priora transienint, 
 the former things are passed, sorrow and sickness, 
 dread and death, have now their end ; the evening 
 and the morning are but one day. Bernard's allu- 
 sion to that place of Genesis is the interpretation of 
 the psalm, ' heaviness may be in the evening, but joy 
 cometh in the morning.' We ' bear forth our seed 
 with tears, we shall bring home the sheaves in our 
 bosom with joy.' The Son of God hath been enter- 
 tained in this life, at one time with Bencdictus, 
 ' Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Loi-d ;' 
 at another, with Crucijicjc, ' Crucify him.' John Bap- 
 tist at one, time is 'reverenced and heard gladly,' at 
 another beheaded. Not to speak of the head or 
 members apart, the whole body crieth in the Can- 
 
164 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 iChai'. II. 
 
 tides, cbap, i., ' I am black, ye daughters of Jeru- 
 salem, but comely.' Nij/ra ve'slro, formosa diiiiio 
 anijeUcoque judicio, black in the juilgment of men, 
 fair in the sight of God and angels;* iiii/m foiis, sed 
 inHis formosa, black without, by reason of the miseries 
 and deformities of this life, but inwardly beautiful, 
 with a godly (presumption and hope of my bliss to 
 come. ' One generation passtth and another suc- 
 ceedeth,' saith Ecclesiastes chap, i., ' the sun goeth 
 down, and the sun draweth to the place of his rising 
 again ; the wind goeth to the south, and compasseth 
 towards the north, and returneth by the same circuit:' 
 and though all times difl'er, yet they differ not in this, 
 that they are all subject to variations. f And as a 
 discord in music giveth a grace and commendation to 
 the song, so these discords and jars in our life keep- 
 ing their alternation, make our pleasures more wel- 
 come when they come. That Christians should well 
 digest them, there is some better cause, by reason of 
 their faith : for they think not how bitter the potion 
 is in taste, but what health cometh after it. Nor are 
 they ignorant that these crosses and disturbances, are 
 as it were the first fruits of the Spirit, the earnest- 
 penny of our Father's inheritance, a prelibation of 
 glory to come ;J that if we bestow all that we have, as 
 the poor widow did, our two mites, body and soul, as 
 one compareth them,§ upon the service and at the 
 pleasure of our God, we leave but si)njila pro cenliipUs, 
 one for an hundredfold, which shall afterwards be 
 restored. But you shall find tbat the Gentiles them- 
 selves, who were without the covenant of God, and 
 consequently the hope of better things, were loath to 
 surfeit of pleasure, and took it as an introduction to 
 worse to come, if ever thej' received too much even of 
 good fortune. When tidings was brought to Philip of 
 Macedon that Parmenio got the victory over his ene- 
 mies, Alexander bis son was born, and his chariots 
 won the prize at Olympus, all in one day, he called 
 upon fortune, reputed a goddess in those days, to do 
 him seme little hurt,|| and to spice, as it were, his 
 joys with bitterness, that they made him not forget 
 himself. It was the reason that the king of Egypt 
 blessed himself from having anything to do with Poly- 
 crates king of Samos, because he was over fortunate. 
 For having thrown a massy and rich ring into the sea 
 to try an experiment, in despite of fortune he found it 
 again at bis table in the belly of a fish, wliich was 
 brought for a present unto liim. They many times 
 wished good luck and pleasurable days to the veriest 
 enemies they had ; lii:stiiiui /iliiis i-ontiiujal in dcliciifi 
 vivere. In the books of Job and the Psalms, the 
 
 * Bern. Ser. 25 in Cantic. 
 
 t Hoc unum scqusile liiilict (minium temporiim inapqualitas 
 qund vicissitudo in omnibus rcperitur. — Naztan. 
 
 X Primitia: Spiritus, urrlia paternse hsereditutis, priclibatio 
 glorias. 
 
 § Corpus ot aninia minuta duo. 
 
 II Fortuna oninipdtcnsi t:t ineluctabile fatuni, 
 Levi nie aflicc infortunio. 
 
 thriving of the wicked wanteth not a learned orator to 
 
 set it forth at large. ' Their bullock gendereth and 
 
 faileth not; their cow calveth and casteth not her calf. 
 
 They send forth their children like sheep, and their 
 
 sons dance. They take the tabret and harp, and 
 
 rejoice in the sound of the organs,' Job xxi. Thus 
 
 far it were good, you would think, to be no good man, 
 
 for ' they cume unto no misforlune like other men,' Ps. 
 
 Ixxiii. What, no misfortune? Even the greatest in this, 
 
 that they have so large an indulgence. Surely it were 
 
 good for us not to be acquainted with such engrossers 
 
 of prosperit}-, and much less to have to do with their 
 
 unhappy happiness; for as, in the burning of a candle 
 
 when it hath long given light, cxtremum occuptit funiiis 
 
 el caUijo, the end is in smoke and caliginousness, so 
 
 fareth it when the candle of the wicked is put out, 
 
 for so Job compareth their felicity. ' Their end is 
 
 worse than theii- beginning,' as the beginning of 
 
 saints worse than their end. In puncto descendnnt in 
 
 infcrniim ; in the stirring of an eye tbey go down into 
 
 hell, where, if there be uoi Jniinis ct calif/o, and much 
 
 worse, there is no hell. He that ' saw the wicked 
 
 flourishing like a green bay tree,' which winter de- 
 
 faceth not, and it never withereth till it be plucked 
 
 from the earth, ' looked at another time for their 
 
 place ' (I say not the trees but their place), ' and they 
 
 were no more found,' Ps. xxxvii. ' Oh how suddenly 
 
 are they destroyed, perish, and come to a fearful end, 
 
 as a di'eam when one awaketh ! Lord, when thou 
 
 raisest us up, thou shalt make their image despised,' 
 
 Ps. Ixxiii. ; suddenly, and fearfully, and contemptibly, 
 
 measure enough, themselves vanishing, perishing, 
 
 consumed, while others arise whom they thought not 
 
 of. He tbat at one time said of himself, 'I have 
 
 cleansed my he.irt in vain,' Ps. Ixxiii., because he 
 
 could not judge aright of the prosperity of the wicked, 
 
 at anollier time said to the foolish, Ps. Ixsv., ' Be 
 
 not so foolish : and to the wicked. Lift not up the liorn : 
 
 lift not up your horn on high : neither speak with a 
 
 stiff neck. For in the hand of the Lord there is a 
 
 cup, and the wine is of the colour of blood ; it is fully 
 
 tempered, and he pourelh out the same : and all the 
 
 wicked of the earth shall surely wring out and drink 
 
 the dregs thereof.' What pleasure is there now in tho 
 
 cups of Belshnzzar and liis concubines, the cups of tho 
 
 wh(n-o of Babylon, golden and sugared cups, and wine 
 
 in bowls, as the prophet speaketh, when at the end of 
 
 the banquet, to close up the stomach, they must take 
 
 this cup fr(.m the hand of the Lord and drink their 
 
 fatal draught. Thus, of the one side, yon shall ever 
 
 find the happiness of the wicked in jiriini.t, it cometh 
 
 at the first, and fallelh like a dry thistle flower. 
 
 ' Son, thou hadst tliy pleasure,' it is now jiassed; but 
 
 if you will learn what beconieth of the righteous, ;')• 
 
 nunissiwis inlfllif/ilix, you shall understand it in the 
 
 last days, Jcr. xxx. ' Mark the upright man, and 
 
 behold tho just, for the end of that man is peace,' 
 
 Ps. xxxvii. Seneca writeth, that as tho same chain 
 
Vek. 3, 4.] 
 
 LECTURE XXVI. 
 
 1G5 
 
 coupleth the koepor and prisoner fofjether, so liope 
 and fear are over conjoined, and fear followeth hope.* 
 For where our wishes and desires are bent, we cannot 
 choose but doubt of our good speed. These two are 
 coupled together in the song of Jonah, but their order 
 inverted: for fear goeth. before, like the keeper and 
 jailer of Jonah, and hope cometh ever behind to give 
 him comfort of enlargement. Fear soemeth to have 
 the greater scope and to triumph over hope, as may 
 appear in that so many words, even four whole mem- 
 bers of the two next verses are spent in the amplifica- 
 lion of it, whenas but a short clause and a snatching 
 look of the eye is added in the end to express his 
 hope. But how little leaven of hope seasoneth the 
 whole lump of the danger before mentioned ! 
 
 The parts are according to the number of verses, 
 two : first, his danger ; secondly, the hope of re- 
 covery. The danger enlarged, first by the author, 
 Thoti hadst cast me, which noteth not only a violence, 
 but a neglect, as if the Lord had thrown him aside 
 never to be remembered more. Secondly, by the 
 place, unto the bottom in the midst of the sea ; thirdly, 
 by the accessaries to the place, the floods compassed, 
 me; all thij sunjes and all thy waves passed over me. 
 Fourthly, by the infirmity and distrust of his own 
 heart, the effect of the rest, and his conehision upon the 
 precedent proofs. Then I said, I am cast awaij out of thij 
 si;i':l. But in the second place, one cast and motion of 
 his eye towards the temple of the Lord niaketh satis- 
 faction and amends for all those former discomforts. 
 
 1. Thou hadst cast me. The author is not his 
 equal ; a briar contending with a thorn, an earthen 
 vessel with an earthen vessel, wherein there is some 
 proportionate comparison. The children of Israel 
 an] sons of Anak, David and Goliath, were not equally 
 matched, j'et man to man, wherein if either part be 
 the weaker, it may be redressed in time, either by 
 themselves or by their abettors. Or if never redressed, 
 the body alone beareth the smart, the soul no whit 
 endangered. But the worker of this woe is the most 
 mighty Lord, whose face is burning and his lips full 
 of indignation, whose wrath he liveth not upon the 
 eai'th that can abide, ' when the foundations of the 
 mountains move and shake because be is angry,' 
 Ps. xviii., whose anger hath a further extent, not upon 
 the body alone, but upon the soul too, not only to 
 kill, but to cast them both away for ever into hell fire. 
 Behold, ' he breakcth down and it cannot be built, 
 he shutteth up a man and he cannot be loosed,' 
 Job xii. ' Woe, woe be unto us,' cried the uncircum- 
 cisod Philistines, 1 Sam. iv., though they stood in 
 battle array, ' who shall deliver us out of the hands of 
 these mighty Gods ? ' erring in the number, but not 
 in the power of the glorious Deity. The men of 
 Betbshemesh, being afterwards smitten because they 
 had pried into the ark of [the] covenant, accounted 
 
 * Ut eadem catena custodem et militem copulat, sic spes 
 ei metus coDJuncta. — 1. ep. 6. 
 
 themselves but dead men before bim : ' Who is able 
 to stand before this holy Lord God ? ' 1 Sam. vi. 
 ' The very pillars of heaven,' saith Job, chap, xxvi., 
 ' tremble and quake at his reproof. At his rebuke he 
 drieth up the sea, and maketh the floods desert ; 
 their fish rot for want of water, and die for thirst.' 
 ' He clotheth the heavens with darkness, and maketh 
 a sack their covering,' in the prophecy of Isaiah, 
 chap. 1. How fearful a thing shall it then be to a 
 sinful man, ' whose foundation is but dust,' and not 
 like those of the mountains, and the pillars of his 
 body but flesh and blood, far inferior to the pillars of 
 heaven, all the moisture of whose substance shall 
 sooner be exacted than that of the floods and rivers, 
 to ' fall into the hands of the living God,' who liveth 
 for all eternity beyond the days of heaven, and there- 
 fore is more able to avenge any injury done unto him '? 
 The anger of a prince, though it seemeth as dreadful 
 as the messengers of death unto us, may be pacified ; 
 if not, his anger is mortal like himself, his breath is 
 in his nostrils, and promiseth, to those that fear, an 
 end of his life and wrath together. The hostility of 
 a deadly foe may be resisted by hostility again, though 
 ' his quiver be an open sepulchre, and they all very 
 strong,' Jer. v. ; if not, he can but ' eat up our 
 harvest and bread, eat up our sons and daughters, 
 our sheep and our bullocks, our vinos and fig-trees, 
 and destroy our cities.' But if the anger of the Lord 
 of hosts be kindled, who can put it out ? If he be an 
 enemy, let heaven and earth join hand in hand to 
 work our safety, it should not help. ' If he begin he 
 will make an end,' in the First of Samuel, chap, iii., 
 or rather ' not an end,' in the fourth of Jeremiah. 
 Consider the vision. ' I have looked upon the earth,' 
 saith the prophet, ' and lo, it was without form and void ; 
 and to the heavens, and they had no light. I beheld 
 the mountains, and lo, they trembled, and all the hills 
 shook. I beheld, and lo, there was no man, and all the 
 birds of the air were departed. I beheld, and lo, the 
 fruitful place was a wilderness, and all the cities thereof 
 were broken down at the presence of the Lord, and by 
 his fierce wrath. For thus hath the Lord said, the whole 
 land shall be desolate, yet will I not make a full end.' 
 Behold, now, an end and no end. Now, if the Lord 
 had so cast Jonah as he cast the angels out of heaven, 
 without repentance and revocation of his fact, Jonah 
 must have lain below, as the gravel and slime of the 
 sea, never to have risen up. But he cast him in 
 mercy, not in fury ; as he cast Adam out of paradise 
 to till the gi'ound, Nebuchadnezzar from his kingdom 
 to eat with the beasts of the field. Job from his house 
 and home to he upon the dunghill, to do them greater 
 honour and favour in time to come. 
 
 (2.) The place hath three amplifications. 
 
 [1.] He was cast into the bottom of the sea, where- 
 hence, in likelihood, there was no recovery. Else, what 
 meant Micah by the phrase in the seventh of his book, 
 that God will ' cast our sins into the bottom of the sea,' 
 
166 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 but that lie will lay them so low, ami heap such a 
 bui'den and weight upon then:, that they shall never 
 rise up again ? And our Saviour by the same in the 
 Gospel, Mat. xviii., that 'he who should offend one of 
 his little ones, it were better for him that a mill-stone 
 ■were hanged about his neck, and he thrown into the 
 bottom of the sea,' implying therein so desperate 
 a danger to the body as would never be restored. So 
 they sing of Pharaoh and his host in the fifteenth of 
 Exodus, Ahijui 0])eruerunt cos, et descendenint in jno- 
 fundum vdiU lapis, and afterwards, profiinda petienmt 
 ut plumbum. ' The bottomless depths covered them, 
 and they sunk to the bottom as a stone ; and as lead 
 they were swallowed in the waters.' Some write that 
 the sea at the deepest is forty furlongs. I cannot 
 censure their estimation. But this I am sure of, it 
 is very deep ; and our Saviour meant to signify no 
 less when he called it, not mair, the sea, by itself, 
 but pdagus maris, the bottom of the sea. So Job 
 speaketh of leviathan, chap, sli., 'He maketh the 
 deep to boil like a pot of ointment ; yea, thou would- 
 est think that the bottomless depth had an hoary head,' 
 where it is compared for depth with that which the 
 legion of devils, in the eighth of Luke, desired they 
 might not be thrown into, ahijssus. Now, one furlong 
 or fathom of waters had been deep enough to have 
 taken away the life of Jonah, much more was he in 
 jeopardy when he was cast into the bottom of the sea. 
 
 [2.] He was not only in the sea, but in the midst, 
 the heart, in corde, the inwardest secrets and cells of 
 it, as the heart of a living thing is mid-most and in- 
 wardest unto it. Whereupon Christ is said to have 
 Iain in corde terra, ' in the heart of the earfli,' Mat. 
 xii., and ' the depths to have stood up together in 
 corde maris, in the heart of the sea,' Exodus the fif- 
 teenth. This was the next augmentation of the 
 danger, that the whale bare him farthest from the 
 shore, and kept his way in the deepest channel or 
 trade, so that all hope of ever coming to land again 
 seemed to have forsaken him. 
 
 [3.J He was not only in the heart of the sea, but 
 of the seas, mariiim. There is but one universal and 
 main sea, which is the girdle to the dry land, but 
 many particulars which take their several names from 
 the places they lie next unto. Now, the vovago of 
 Jonah was not limited and bounded within the com- 
 pass of the Syriac sea, whercinto ho was first received. 
 But if it be true which Josephus hath, that he was 
 cast up to land u]ion the shore of the Euxine Sea, 
 then must he needs lie carried through diverse seas, 
 before his arrival to that place. He had a purpose 
 at first perhaps to go no further than to Tarsus in 
 Silicia, which was hard at hand, and the Silician sea 
 the first he passed by. Hut Jonah is borne from the 
 Silician to the .^jgean, from thence to Propontis, and 
 so to the road where his landing was. A just judg- 
 ment of God upon him, that because he would fly 
 from the presence of the Lord, be should bo made to 
 
 fly indeed. God tbreateneth Sebna the treasurer, 
 Isaiah xxii., that he would ' carry him into captivity, 
 and toss him as a ball in a large country, that he 
 would drive him from bis station, and destroy him 
 from out his dwelling-place.' So is Jonah carried 
 into captivity, a prisoner to a whale, and tossed as a 
 ball in a large country, from sea to sea, driven from 
 his station where he meant to have settled himself, 
 and destroyed from out his dwelling place, and from 
 the land of the living ; and as Cain was a runagate 
 upon the land, so is Jonah upon the waters, and till 
 the Lord give a charge for his discharge and manu- 
 mission, no land dareth receive him. 
 
 (8.) The floods compass me about, &c. His third 
 peril is from the accidents of the sea. For being in 
 the bottom, and in the midst of the bottom, not of the 
 sea, but of the seas, is he at rest there ? No. There 
 is no agony nor passion of the sea but Jonah feeleth 
 it. The disquietments of that element are either the 
 meeting of the fresh and salt waters together, or the 
 ebbing and flowing of it, or the waves and surges that 
 arise, either by winds in the air, or by flows and ex- 
 pirations from the caverns of the earth ; with all these 
 is Jonah acquainted. There is no question but ' all 
 rivers run into the sea,' Eccles. i., according to the 
 proverb. Qui riescit viam ad mare, rjucerat sibi amnem 
 coniiteiii, he that knoweth not the way to the sea, let 
 him get some river to be his guide. Now it must 
 needs breed a vexation and tumult when these con- 
 trarj' waters meet, there is a fight and contention 
 held betwixt them for the time. It is another dis- 
 turbance which the cnuiiuual agitation, the flux and 
 reflux, of the waters maketh. For when the course of 
 that mighty bodj* of waters is turned back again, 
 whether by the moon, as they hold in philosophy, or 
 by other disposition, which all the instruments and 
 engines in the world cannot bring to pass, we cannot 
 imagine that so reciprocal a motion is done in peace, 
 but that the whole heap of the sea is molested thereby. 
 There be the ' floods which encircle him and compass 
 him about,' Uora'/.o! r/.y.{j-/.>.(/iadv //,?, which either the 
 confluence of the waters diversely qualified, or the 
 ebbing and flowing of the sea procured unto him. 
 As who should say, I lay not in a calm, but look 
 where the waters were most unpeaceable and unquiet, 
 even there was I compassed about and had no way to 
 pass forth. The sea is otherw^ise disquieted when 
 either the winds in the air, or flows from the vaults 
 and breaches of the ground, raise up the waves thereof. 
 For the earth hath air oftentimes imprisoned in the 
 hollowness of it, which being inwardly choked and 
 labouring to get out, sometimes shaketh the joints of 
 the land with earthquakes, sometimes setteth • the 
 people of the sea in a rage, and bringeth a furious 
 commotion upon the face of the waters. Wherefore 
 Jonah, being carried through the midland sea, having 
 the land on holli sides of it, must needs be troubled 
 the more, by reason the waters have not so free a 
 
Ver. 3, -i.J 
 
 LECTURE XXVI. 
 
 167 
 
 passage as in the patent ocean, and therefore make a 
 way with sorer impatience. Give them stream at vrill, 
 and there is less danger of travail; but straiten their 
 course, and they break a passage by force, and shew 
 what indignation they can against the bars that hinder 
 them. By common experience at home in locks and 
 mill-dams, we see what cataracts and downfalls there 
 are by the rage of the water, what baste it maketh to 
 pass, how unpatieutly it roareth because her liberty is 
 denied her. But those that ever passed the Magellan 
 Straits, or entered the moulh of the Gaditan Sea, 
 betwixt Europe and Africa, where Spain and Barbary 
 is ^divided, to make a voj'age into Barbnay, or any 
 other coast within the midland sea, know it to be 
 most true, not by easy experience alone, but by the 
 adventure both of their vessels and their lives also. 
 So as, you see, the very nature of these seas, where 
 the propinquity and enclosure of the continent did so 
 much annoy them on every side, partly by breathing 
 upon them out of many holes and ruptures thereof, 
 partly by lessening their channel, besides the ordinary 
 winds which raised up their billows, and the extra- 
 ordinary providence of God, which dealt more strongly 
 than all these, did the more afflict Jonah. 
 
 The words are very significant, (hniies jiiictiis et 
 ffiin/itm tiii, ' All thy surges and all thy waves passed 
 over me.' 1. They are not simply waves (as all con- 
 fess), but waves with eruption and violent assault. Our 
 English well interpreteth them snrr/es, which is the 
 meeting and breaking of waters in such sort that the 
 one encountereth the other as if they were at war. 
 The poet * notably exprcsseth them in the shipwreck 
 of CiBix, that they played upon the ship, as engines 
 and brakes of war play upon castles, and as a lion 
 runneth with all his might upon the weapons of man, 
 or as in the siege and scaling of a wall, though many 
 Lave assailed it before, yet one of a thousand at length 
 surpriseth it ; so when many volumes of waves had 
 before beaten and tried themselves upon the sides of 
 the ship, }-et the tenth wave comoth furtlier and fiercer 
 than all the rest, f They were not inferior to those 
 that shook and battered the ship of Jonah, when the 
 sides thereof groaned, and it thought to be rent in 
 pieces. 2. They are not the surges of the dead and 
 senseless sea, such as the wind and weather only 
 might excite, but they are the waves of God, chosen 
 and appointed by him to be his ministers to execute 
 wrath against disobedient Jonah : tin/ waves. 3. 
 Then- number is so infinite and past comprehension 
 that he speaketh in the largest number, nil tJnj ifaves, 
 as if they had been levied from the ends of the sea, 
 and had assembled their forces in one place. 4. 
 They lay not about him as the floods before men- 
 tioned, but they pass quite over him, and are a burden 
 to his head to keep him under still ; they are on his 
 
 * Ovid, Mefani. xi 
 
 t luter millfi viros murura tanien occiipat unus. 
 Vastius insurgeiis deciniae ruit impetus uiidje. 
 
 right hand and on his left, upwards and downwards, 
 forwards and backwards, and leave him no hope of 
 evasion. The severing of the particulars weakeneth 
 the force of the words ; but take a summary view of 
 all in one, and make a single sentence of the whole 
 together, and you shall find them beyond exception. 
 1. He is in the liotlom, the lowest and basest part, 
 far from the top of the waters. 2. In the heart and 
 entrails, far from the shore. 3. Not of one singular 
 sea which had some limits, but of a continual tract 
 and course of seas. 4. Not where the waters were 
 placid and still, but where the floods were ever fight- 
 ing together. 5. Those floods lie as a circle about 
 him, and keep him in like armed men. C. Not only 
 the floods annoy him, the tides of the sea, and the 
 course of land rivers, but he is also troubled with 
 waves. 7. They are not simply waves, but siirr/es, 
 waves of the vehementest collision and insultation. 
 
 8. And not simply surges, but such as are streng- 
 thened by the arm and animation of God, his leaves. 
 
 9. As if there were no more in the world, but they 
 had all forsaken their proper'placcs (as they came to 
 the siege of Troy) to turmoil this one sea, he termeth 
 them in generality all tin/ waves. Lastly, they were 
 not about him as before, but lie like a pressure upon 
 his body to keep it down. There is yet a sting in the 
 tail of the scorpion, a danger behind worse than the 
 former, which, as it is reserved to the last place, so 
 hath it more venom in it than all the rest. 
 
 (4.) TIlcii I said, I am cast out of thy siijltt, which 
 containeth the weakness and distrust of his fearful 
 conscience. See what a dangerous conclusion he 
 maketh against his soul, not rashly apprehended, but 
 with leisure and deliberation conceived. I said ; that 
 because the Lord had cast him unto the bottom of 
 the sea from the sight of men, and the floods and 
 siu'ges were over and about him, therefore he should 
 think he is cast from the sight of God, that is, that 
 the light of his face, brightness of his countenance, 
 aspect of his mercy and compassion, had everlastingly 
 forsaken him. Jonah, thou art deceived. Thou 
 speakest more to thyself than ever the Lord said. 
 He that cast thee into the sea, or caused the mariners 
 to do it, never said that he cast thee out of his sight ; 
 and if thou hadst asked the seas and the floods where- 
 in thou wort overwhelmed, they would never have said 
 it. Tbey know that the Lord can ' say unto the earth, 
 Give, and to the sea, Restore,' keep not those my sons 
 and daughters back whom I call for. It is the voice 
 of the serpent that speaketh this damnable sentence 
 within thee. Beware of his sophistry, admit it not ; 
 his reasoning is not good, that because thou art per- 
 secuted and driven to the bottom of the sea, therefore 
 thou art wholly cast out. It is the pestilentest bait 
 that ever Satan laid to infect souls with, who being 
 himself the ' sou of perdition,' compasseth sea and 
 land to make others his proselytes, the childrenof 
 hell, as deeply as himself is ; and the cords wherewith 
 
168 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 he (Irawcth them into his own inheritnnce of destruc- 
 tion, are to make the grievousness of their sins, and 
 the sense of their present and but momentary afflic- 
 tions, marks of their sinful dereliction, and that the 
 favour of God is utterly departed from them. This 
 was the snare that he set for the soul of Job in the 
 mouths of his three friends, pronouncing him a repro- 
 bate and hypocrite because ho was afflicted by God. 
 The like for the soul of David, in the lips of his in- 
 solent enemies, when they upbraided him, ' Where is 
 now thy God ? he trusted in God, let God deliver him, 
 if he will have him.' Behold, I shew you a sea in- 
 deed of a bottomless depth, the ground whereof can 
 no more be sounded than the lowest hell. He that is 
 thrown into this sea is always falling and descending, 
 and never findeth an end. It hath no midst in it as 
 the sea hath, because it is immeasurable and infinite, 
 I mean a desperate conscience, distrusting the mercies 
 of God, relinquished of itself, the floods and surges 
 whereof, restless, turbulent, unplacable cogitations, 
 can never be quieted, and the fightings therein, as 
 betwixt waters and waters in the sea, between affirma- 
 tions and negations (it is and it is not), cannot be re- 
 conciled. Let all the rivers and streams of fresh 
 ■water which glad the city of God and comfort the 
 souls of the faithful run into it, they are resisted and 
 driven back. There is no entrance, I mean, for any 
 persuasion of the graciousness and kindness of the 
 Lord, though it bo preached a thousand times. The 
 salt, unsavoury, bitter quality in the soul, wherewith it 
 is baned before, hath no communion with so sweet a 
 nature. Which sin of desperation, as the nature of 
 man hath just cause to detest, because it breaketh 
 that league of kindness which we owe to our own 
 flesh, and many a bloody instrument hath it put into 
 the hands of man to destroy himself (which execution 
 being done against the laws of nature, a worse ever 
 ensueth from the judgment-seat of God), so for that 
 injury and indignity which it off"ereth to the Lord of 
 heaven, sooner shall he forgive the apostasy of his 
 reprobate angels than this damned sin. Jerome ob- 
 serveth upon the Psalms,* that Judas offended more 
 in despairing of pardon and hanging himself, than in 
 betraying his innocent master to death. Isiodoro 
 giveth a kind of reason for it. Because to commit an 
 offence is the death of the soul, but to cast oft" hope 
 of forgiveness is to descend into hell.-j- AVhat can 
 ever be done more derogatory and injurious to that 
 righteous nature of his than to change his truth into a 
 lie, and the lies of Satan into truth, and to justify 
 Satan more than God ? that whenas the Lord shall 
 sjicak on the one side, and bind by promise, confirm 
 by oath, and seal with the blood of his only begotten 
 Son, touching his goodness towards all true penitent 
 sinners, that although he have made a wound, he will 
 
 * In Pa. cviii. 
 
 t Pcrpetrnrc flagifium est mors anim!c. Scil veniam des- 
 ddjare est ad infernum dcsceudero. — 2 de turn. lo. 
 
 heal it ; though broken, he will bind up ; though killed, 
 he will give life, yet ho is not believed ? But when 
 the devil contrariwise shall suggest for his part that 
 the justice of God will never bo satisfied, the heinous- 
 ness of our sins never pardoned, as if he had left his 
 name of being the father of lies an}- longer, he is 
 hearkened^unto. What else is this, but to turn false- 
 hood into truth, darkness into light, and God for ever 
 to be magnified into the devil himself? Jonah went 
 not so far as I now speak of. For though it were a 
 dangerous pang which he was fallen into, and there 
 wanted but age and strength to make it up, yet he 
 persisted not therein ; ' his feet had well nigh slipped,' 
 but he recovered them, and he ' spake unadvisedly 
 with his lips,' but he recalled it again. 
 
 2. Yet Kill I look towards thine hohj tewple. I will 
 not so much explicate the words at large as urge their 
 consequence. This was the difference between Judas 
 and Jonah.' 'Judas »v'/i/^ o»/, and never looked back 
 more. The Lord east him forth, and the devil bare 
 him away to a tree, whence he returned not till he 
 had hung himself. Jonah is cast out, with a hope and 
 mind to return. He forgetteth not the temple of the 
 Lord, and the place where his honour dwelt, though 
 he w^ere far removed from it. Judas hath nothing but 
 millstones about his neck (the neck of his guilty con- 
 science) to weigh him down ; Jonah had wings and 
 cork to bear him up. Judas, like a carcase wherein 
 there is no life, falleth down ; as the Lacedemonian 
 said of a dead man whom he could not set upright 
 upon his feet, Oportcl aliqiiiil iittiis esse, there must be 
 somewhat within ; Jonah hath that within, a spirit of 
 comfort to quicken and support him. He hath an 
 eye in his head, discovering those hidden ways which 
 the eye of the eagle and kite never found out, to look 
 to the temple of the Lord. Whether he meant the 
 temple at Jerusalem, or whether his temple in heaven, 
 whereof the Psalm speaketh, ' the Lord is in his holy 
 palace, the Lord's throne is in the heavens,' Ps. xi., 
 ] inquire not, but thrice blessed were those ej'cs that did 
 him this service. If his sentence and resolution had 
 ended in those former words, / am cast out, and there 
 had been the period and full point, all his jovs had 
 ended. When the Jews said in the prophet, pci-iit 
 spi's nostril, our hope is gone, they might as well have 
 added, jicriit saliis nnstrii, our salvation is gone ; a man 
 without hope is without his best advocate. Good 
 success may often forsake the innocent, but never 
 good hope.* And therefore he changed his style in 
 good time, reruntamen, yet notwithstanding, I have 
 anointed mine eyes with the eye-salve of hope, and 
 through all those obstacles of sea and seas, floods and 
 surges, I am able to look to the place of thy rest. It 
 standeth as the rudder in the sentence, and turneth 
 it quite another way. It was running apace upon 
 dangerous shelves, and had set up the full sails of 
 
 * Fortuiia innoco 
 — Scnec. 
 
 es, and had set up the full sails of 
 ontem deserit srcpe, at spes bona nunquam. 
 
Ver. S, 4.] 
 
 LECTURE XXVI. 
 
 169 
 
 deadliest discomforts, but a breath of faith cometh in 
 and stoppeth that wretched course. 
 
 XotuithstancUiuj. Now doth Jonah begin to sneeze 
 with the child that the prophet called to life ; now is 
 his first uprising from the dead ; he had utterly 
 fainted when he was in the bell}', whether of the whale 
 or of hell, bnt that he believed verily to see the good- 
 ness of the Lord in his holj' temple. Epaminondas 
 being stricken through with a spear, and his blood 
 failing him, asked if his target were safe, and whether 
 the enemy were put to flight ; and understanding all 
 to be answerable to his heart's desire, said. My fellows 
 in arms, it is not an end of my life that is now come, 
 but a better beginning.* The loss of the body is not 
 gi-eat. We sow it in dishonour, we shall reap it in 
 honour. And conscience maj- be wounded and 
 daunted sometimes in the best that liveth. But if 
 Jonah had lost his shield of faith and his helmet of 
 hope, the principal armour of defence, the one for the 
 head wherein the brain, the other for the breast 
 wherein the heart, lieth, and if the enemies of his soul, 
 these desperate agonies, had gotten the upper hand, 
 and not been vanquished bj- him, where had his glory, 
 where had his safety, been '? But bis shield, you hear, 
 is whole, ' Notwithstanding I will look towards thine 
 holy temple.' With a little difference, you have the 
 same speeches in the Psalms which Jonah here useth. 
 As in Ps. sxsi., ' I said in mine haste, I am cast out 
 of thy sight.' Likewise in Ps. xlii., 'All lliy waves 
 and thy floods are gone over me.' 1 repeat no more. 
 But they make it an argument that Jonah had dili- 
 geulh' read the Psalms, and kept them by heart, and 
 applied them as need served to his particular occasions. 
 Z'.'st certe tion inarjnus, verum aureolus, el ad verhwn 
 ciUsccndus libcUiis ; as hef spake of Grantor's book. 
 Surely the book of the Psalms is not great, but golden, 
 and thoroughly to be learned. Jerome advised Eus- 
 ticus that the book of the Psalms should never depart 
 from his handling and reading. Let every word of 
 the psalter be conned without book. Xuiiijiiam de 
 iiianihus reccdat. Discatur psalterium ad rcrhum. I 
 will say shortly, saith he, it is a common treasure of 
 all good learning. It appeareth in the gospel that 
 Christ and his disciples were very conversant in that 
 book ; because in their sayings and writings not fewer 
 than threescore authorities are j^rocurcd from above 
 forty of those several psalms. But my meaning is 
 not so much to commend the book at this time as 
 your use of it. For it is never so well read or heard, 
 as when the harp of David and the ditty of our heart, 
 the scripture of the psalm and the sense of our present 
 occasion, go together. Quid prosunt lecta et intellecta, 
 nisi teipsum lajas ct intellUjas ? I reading and under- 
 standing without application is nothing. Neither is 
 it to purpose to sing psalms, unless we make them 
 accord to our present miseries, wlien we are in misery ; 
 
 * Valer. Max. lib. iii. cap. ii. f Tul. J Eerii. 
 
 when we are delivered, to our deliverances ; and other 
 the like variations. Thus did Jonah. 
 
 But to come back to David himself ; though he 
 spake so dangerously as you have heard, ' 1 am cast 
 off,' yet he confesseth he spake it ' in his haste ;' and 
 he correcteth that hasty speech with a veruiitainoi (a 
 particle of better grace, as Jonah did), ' yet thou 
 heard st the voice of my pra3'er, when I cried unto 
 thee.' And he exhorteth ' all those that trast in the 
 Lord to be strong, and he will establish their hearts.' 
 Likewise in former words, these amongst the rest jar- 
 ring very unpleasantly, and striking out of tune, ' I 
 am forgotten as a dead man out of mind, I am like a 
 broken vessel. But I trusted in thee, O Lord ; I 
 said, thou art my God.' But for nisi and venmtamcn, 
 hut and nolwithstaitdiiir/, notes as it were of a better 
 sound, our hearts might quake to see such passions 
 in the saints of God. The beloved Son of God was 
 not without this convulsion of spirit : ' My God, my 
 God, why hast thou forsaken me ? ' not feared and 
 suspected, but felt and presently endured ; whj' hast 
 thou done it ? yet he commendeth his spirit into the 
 hands of that Lord who seemed to have forsaken him. 
 Thus ever ' the Lord sendeth a gracious rain upon 
 his inheritance, to refresh it when it is weary,' Ps. 
 Ixviii. ; and it is true which Hosea saith, though we 
 look for a day or two as if we were dead and forlorn, 
 yet ' after those two days he will revive us : and the 
 third he will raise us up, and we shall live in his 
 sight,' Hosca vi. I will now proclaim from another 
 psalm. ' Hear this, all ye people ; give ear, all that 
 dwell in the world : low and high, rich and poor, one 
 with another. My mouth shall speak of wisdom ; and 
 the meditation of m\- heart is of knowledge. I will 
 incline mine ear to a parable ; and utter a grave mat- 
 ter upon mine harp,' Ps. slix. Surely it is wisdom, 
 and knowledge, and a grave matter indeed, and blessed 
 are they that conceive it. If it be hid, it is hid to 
 those that perish ;,it is a parable to Cain, and Saul, 
 and Judas, and such like castaways. If I had the 
 doubled spirit of Elias, and wisdom like the angels of 
 God, I would spend it wholly in the commendation of 
 this grave and serious sentence : ' Wherefore should 
 I fear in the evil days, when iniquity shall compass 
 me about as at mine heels '?' when it shall press and 
 urge me so closely with the judgments of God, that I 
 am always in danger to be supplanted ? Now what 
 are the pillars of this heavenly security ? Can riches, 
 or wisdom, or houses and lands after our names, or 
 honour, sustain us ? These are but rotten foundations 
 to build eternity upon. But ' God shall deliver my 
 soul from the power of the grave ; for he will receive 
 me.' 
 
 I draw to an end. ' God is faithful that hath pro- 
 mised ;' ' heaven and earth shall pass away, but not 
 a jot of his blessed word.' ' As the hills were about 
 Jerusalem,' and as these floods were about Jonah, 
 ' so is the Lord about all those that fear him.' He 
 
170 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 hath made a decree in heaven ; it belongeth to the 
 New Testament, confirmod b}' the death of the testa- 
 tor, witnessed by three in heaven and as many in 
 earth, and never shall it be altered, that at what time 
 soever a sinner whatsoever shall repent him of his 
 wickedness whatsoever, from the bottom of his heart 
 the Lord will forgive and forget it. heaven before 
 heaven ! And the contrary persuasions, hell before 
 hell, damnation before__the time ! I say again, if he 
 repent of his wickedness, it is not the misery- of this 
 ■wretched life, nor terror of conscience, nor malice of 
 foes, let them he men or devils ; let them be seven in 
 one, a legion in another, all the principalities and 
 powers of darkness in the third, that shall hinder 
 forgiveness. Behold the Lamb of God, you that are 
 lions in j'our house, as the proverb speaketh, worst 
 towards yourselves ; you that are ready to tear and 
 devour your own souls with grief and fear of heart, 
 ' behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins 
 of the world.' Hath his death put sense into rocks 
 and stones, and can it not persuade you ? Shall that 
 blood of the Lamb cleanse you from your guiltiness, 
 and will you in a mad and impatient mood throw j'our 
 blood into the air with Julian, or spill it upon the 
 ground with Saul, or sacrifice it upon an alder with 
 Judas, and not use the medicine that should ease their 
 maladies ? Shall he open heaven, and will you shut 
 
 it ? he nail the writings to his cross, and you renew 
 them ? he pull j-ou from the fire, and you run into it 
 again ? Is this his thanks ; this the recompense of 
 his labours ; this the wages ye give him for bearing 
 the heat and burden of the day in your persons ; this 
 the harvest for the seed he sowed in tears ; this the 
 wine he shall drink for treading the wine-press, instead 
 of ' a cup of salvation,' which you ought to ' take' in 
 your hands, and ' call upon the name of the Lord,' — 
 that is, as he hath drunk unto j"ou in a bitter cup of 
 passion, so you should pledge him in a pleasant 
 draught of thanksgiving, — will you take a cup of death 
 and desperation, blaspheme his name, evacuate his 
 cross, tread the blood of his testament under your 
 feet, and die past hope '? God forbid, and the earnest 
 prayers and sobs of j'our own souls heartily forbid it ! 
 Janiitis ccternu: fwlkitatis deaparatio claudit, sj>es aperil ; 
 desperation shutteth up, hope openeth, the doors of 
 eternal felicity. And therefore, he that hath least 
 and nothing at all to hope, yet let him despair of 
 nothing. Qui nil potest, spcnuc, dcxperet iiilul; it was 
 the advice of an heathen, let it be the practice of a 
 Christian. Let him ' hope against hope,' though the 
 baseness of his condition, horror of sin, weight of 
 tribulation, env^- of Satan, rigour of the law, justice 
 of the upright judge, seem to overthwart him. 
 
 LECTUKE XXVII. 
 
 2'he ivaterx aniipti^-^i'd vie ahout unto tite soul, rfV. Yet Itast thou iivtiijht up mij life /ruin the pit, Lord mir 
 
 God. — Jonah II. 5, 6. 
 
 IN the third and fourth verses before, I handled first 
 the danger or fear of Jonah, illustrated, 1, from 
 the person that cast him into it ; 2, from the place, 
 with the accessaries thereunto, the depth, the heart, 
 the multitude of seas ; 3, from the passions of the sea, 
 which were either floods compassing him about, or 
 weaves overwhelming him ; and those waves, in nature 
 s)Vf/es, louching'tho author, God's surges, touching 
 the number, all his surges ; 4, from the infirmity of 
 his own conscience, wherein, 1, advisedly he jiro- 
 nounceth and saith, 2, that as an unprofitable thing 
 he is cast out, 3, from the sight, that is, the favour 
 and grace of his merciful Lord. Secondly, I added 
 thereunto his hope and confidence, as a piece of sweet 
 wood cast into the waters of Marah to take away their 
 bitterness ; so this to relish and sweeten his soul 
 again, and to make some amends for all his former 
 discouragements. In these two contrary all'ections, 
 fear and hope, I told j'ou the whole song was consumed 
 to the end of the seventh verse. First you shall hear 
 his danger displayed in sundry and forcible members 
 (for his words swam not in his lips, but were drawn 
 from the deep well of a troubled conscience), and then 
 at the end some sentence of comfort added, as a 
 
 counter-verse to allay the rigour of the other parts, 
 and to uphold his fainting soul. This was the order 
 that David took with his soul iu the 42d and 43d 
 Psalms, ' Why art thou cast down, my soul ? Hope 
 in the Lord, for I will yet give him thanks for the 
 help of his presence.' Likewise in the 80lh psalm, 
 ' Turn us again, God of hosts, cause thy face to shine, 
 and we shall be safe.' They come, me seemeth, as 
 so many breathings to a man wearied with a tedious 
 race, or rather as so manj' lines and recollections of 
 spirits after swoouings. 
 
 Now, unless I will leave my text, as Jonah left the 
 way to Nineveh which God had appointed him to 
 walk in, I must again entertain your ears with the 
 same discourse which before I held, I hope without 
 otl'euce to any man. For the hearing of those admir- 
 able words and works of God is not, or should not be, 
 as the drinking of wine, wherein they say the first 
 draught is of nece.<^sity, the second for pleasure, the 
 third for sleep, and so evermore worse ; * but hero it 
 is true which the son of Sirach wrote of wisdom (for 
 this is the pure and holy wisdom). They that eat hor 
 
 * Primum poculum necessitatis, secundum vohiptatis, 
 tertium ebrictatis, &c. 
 
Ver. 0, 6.] 
 
 LECTURE XXVII. 
 
 171 
 
 shall have the more hunger, and they that drink her 
 shall thirst the more, chap. xxiv. ; ' The eye is not 
 satisfied with seeing, nor the ear with hearing,' such 
 things, Eccles. i. And albeit it be a fault in music 
 evermoi-e to strike upon the same string, yet Jonah 
 (I doubt not) shall easily be excused and lind favour 
 in your ears, in handling this soug of his, though he 
 bring nothing for a time but the repetition of the 
 same matters. For, first, he gave j'ou the ground and 
 plain song, which I called the proposition, in the 
 second verse; the rest to the end of the 7th, though 
 it be spent upon the same argument, j'et is it with 
 such descant and variety to grace the phxin song, the 
 phrase so delectably altered, and the sense of the 
 words so mightily augmented, as I cannot feign to 
 myself how the description of his troubles could have 
 been furnished with better lights of speech. I have 
 heard the descriptions, both of ancient poets and of 
 those in our latter days, Tassus, Ariostus, and the 
 like, so highly extolled, as if wisdom had lived and 
 died with them alone. And it may be the sin of 
 Samaria, the sin of this land and age of ours (perhaps 
 the mother of our atheism), to commit idolatry with 
 such books, that instead of the writings of I\Ioses and 
 the prophets, and evangelists, which were wont to lie 
 in our windows as the principal ornaments, and to sit 
 in the uppermost rooms as the best guests in our 
 houses, now we have Arcadia, and the Fairy Queen, 
 and Orlando Furioso, with such like frivolous stories, * 
 when if the wanton students of our time (for all are 
 students, both men and women, in this idle learning) 
 would as earefullj- read and as studiously observe the 
 eloquent narrations and discourses contained in the 
 Psalms of David and other sacred books, they would 
 find them to be such as best deserved the name and 
 commendation of the best poets. So rightly did 
 Jerome pronounce of David to Paulinus, that he is 
 cm- Simonides, Pindarus, Alceus, Flaccus, Catullus, 
 Serenus, and instead of all others. For the warrant 
 of my sayings, consider but this scripture now in 
 hand. The danger of Jonah (one might have 
 • thought) was so handled before, as if he had poured 
 forth his whole spirit at once. He told you of the 
 deepest, and of the midst, and of the number of the 
 seas, with as many perturbations (for aught I know) 
 as the sea is subject unto, the conflux of repugnant 
 waters, ebbing and flowing, and breaking of the 
 surges. Yet is he still as full as the moon, and as if 
 he were freshly to begin, entereth again, with another 
 style and|muchmore abundance, into the same narration. 
 Now he acquainteth you how far the waters came. 
 He was in the waters and waves before, but within 
 the bowels of the fish as it were in a crystal cage ; 
 here it is otherwise, for the waters compass him ad 
 aniiiiam vscjhc, ' even unto the soul ' ; he was now in 
 the presentest danger of his life, there was not an 
 
 * Angelus Politiuii preferred Pindarus liis odes before 
 the Psalms of David. 
 
 hair's breadth betwixt him and death, his soul lay 
 even at the gates of his body ready to pass forth. He 
 told you of a bottom before, but now of a depth with- 
 out a bottom ; there ]irofi(iithiiii, here ahijxans ; and he 
 addeth to his former incumbrances weeds about his 
 head, mountains, and promontories, and rocks, and 
 the bars of the earth wherewith he was imprisoned. 
 The son of Sirach, Ecclus. xxiv., speaketh of wisdom 
 that she is set up like a cedar in Libanus, and as a 
 cypress-tree upon the mountans of Hermon, exalted 
 like a palm-tree in Cades, and as a rose-plant in 
 Jericho, and as a fair olive-tree in a pleasant field, 
 and as a plane-tree by the waters ; as a terebinth so 
 she stretcheth out her branches, and her boughs arc 
 the boughs of honour and grace. Her root is so rich 
 and so full of sap, that an heart endued therewith 
 never lacketh matter or words whereby to persuade. 
 It is written of Solomon, one of the offspring of wis- 
 dom, that ' God gave him prudence and understand- 
 ing exceeding much, and a large heart, even as the 
 sand upon the sea-shore, and that his wisdom exceeded 
 the wisdom^of all the children of the east, and all the 
 wisdom of Egypt ;' that he was able to ' speak of 
 trees, from the cedar of Lebanon to the hyssop that 
 springeth out of the wall ; he also spake of boasts, 
 and fowls, and creeping things, and of fishes,' 1 Kings 
 iv. Compare the heart of Jonah a little with the 
 heart of Solomon. You see how large it is ; larger, 
 I am sure, if it be wisely weighed, than of all the 
 people of the east, and children of Egypt before men- 
 tioned. He speaketh of all his troubles by sea, from 
 the greatest to the least, even to the weed and bulrush 
 that lieth in the basest part of it. We say, where 
 the grief is, there commonly the finger. It is not an 
 easy matter for those that are pinched with grief in- 
 deed hastily to depart, either from the sense or re- 
 port of it. A man must speak sometimes to take 
 breath. Jeremiah wrote a whole book of Lamenta- 
 tions, and in the person of the people of the Jews, 
 as if all the afflictions under heaven had been stored 
 up for that one generation, proclaimed, Etjo vir illn 
 sum, 'I am that man that have had experience of in- 
 firmities,' that one and only singular man. This is 
 the manner of all that are aftiieted, etiiiin innocciitis 
 cor/it iiienliii dolor ; as Jonah before, ' all thy surges 
 and all thy waves passed over me' ; the}' think their 
 miseries to be alone, and that no other in the world 
 hath any part with them. Contrarj' to the judgment 
 of Solon, the wise Athenian, who thought that if men 
 were to lay their griefs upon one common heap, and 
 thence to take out an equal portion with their fellows, 
 they would rather carry their own home again, and 
 bear their burden apart, than divide at the stock, '■' 
 where they should find their wretchedness much 
 more increased. David in many psalms dcclaimetli 
 at large of his miseries. In the 69th, by the same 
 words which Jonah here useth, and haply borrowed 
 * Valer. Max. lib. vii. cap. ii. 
 
172 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 from that ancienter propliot, ' The waters are entered 
 in unto my soul, and I stick fast in the deep mire 
 where no stay is. I am come to deep waters, and 
 the streams run over me. I am weary of crying, my 
 throat is dry, and mine eyes fail whilst I wait for my 
 God.' It is thought that the 102d Psalm was a 
 prayer written by Daniel, or some other prophet, for 
 the children of Israel whilst they were at Babylon in 
 captivity. ' My days are consumed like smoke, my 
 bones are burned up like an hearth. Mine heart is 
 smitten and withered like grass, I forget to eat 
 my bread, for the voice of my groaning my bones do 
 cleave to my skin ; I have eaten ashes like bread, and 
 roingled my drink with weeping.' These were per- 
 suaded that the sun was nowhere overcast so much as 
 where they were, and that it would be happy for them 
 to exchange their woes with any other living crea- 
 tures. How often did our Saviour, the head corner- 
 stone of the building, tell his disciples before of his 
 perils to come at Jerusalem ! ^The emperor Otho 
 thought it a piece of dastardy to speak too much of 
 death;* the emperor over Otho thought otherwise. 
 If you search the evangelists, you shall find his 
 arraignment and death often repeated from his own 
 mouth. Mat. xvii., as they abode in Galilee. The 
 20th of that evangelist, ho took them apart in the 
 way as they were going to Jerusalem. Luke ix., he 
 biddeth them mark his words diligently, and put them 
 into their cars, for he would not theyj should be 
 committed to the waste air, which lay so deep in his 
 own heart, ' The Son of man shall be delivered into 
 the hands of men.' In the 18th, he reckonoth up all 
 the particulars, the delivering of him to Gentiles, 
 mocking, reviling, spitting, scourging, putting him to 
 death. That elect vessel of his, 2 Cor. xi., as if he 
 glorified in his infirmities, and made them his 
 triumphs, recapitulateth with a breath as many 
 dangers as ever he had endured, either at home or 
 abroad, his labours, his stripes, his stoniugs, his 
 deaths, his scourgings, his shipwrecks, by land, by 
 sea, by thieves, by false brethren, by his countrymen, 
 by strangers, his hunger, thirst, fasting, cold, naked- 
 ness, besides outward things. It was truly spoken 
 hy a learned man, Sapiens miser, plus miser est ijiiam 
 rn^ticiis miser. Scit enim exagi/erare caiisas dolendi, 
 giias rtisticus miser ir/norat : a wise man in misery is 
 more miserable than one that is simple, because ho 
 knowcth how to amplifj' the causes of his sorrow, 
 which the other doth not. I take it to have been no 
 small token of wisdom in Jonah, Jeremiah, David, 
 Paul, and in Wisdom himself, not only that they felt 
 (ho bitterness of the cup when they drank it, but 
 were able to discern what ingredients it had, and par- 
 ticularly to recount whereof it was tempered. The 
 Stoic philosophers, of whom we read. Acts xvii., that 
 they disputed with Paul, and called him a sower of 
 words, ^■Ti^fj.cj'koyov, and a setter out of strange gods 
 * Plura do estremi.s loqni pars ignavia?ost. — Tacil. 
 
 (and it shall not be impertinent a while to dispute 
 with them, and to confute their strange learning), they 
 held many opinions incredible to the world, amongst 
 the rest, that grief was a matter of nothing. TuUy 
 reciteth some of their paradoxes,* that their wise 
 man, whom they rather supposed than ever could 
 find in nature (as Xenophon imagined a king, TuUy 
 an orator, Aristotle felicity more perfect than ever 
 that world was so happy to attain unto), though he 
 were most deformed, was most and only beautiful, 
 rich though beggarly, a king though the servant of 
 servants, like cursed Canaan ; that all sins were alike, 
 and he offended as much that killed a cock when 
 there was no need, as if he had cut the throat of his 
 father ; that their wise man was never moved with 
 pity, never entreated, never went by guess or 
 opinion, never was deceived, never repented any- 
 thing, never changed his mind. Thence it was that 
 Chrysippus, who was said to prop up the gallery 
 of the Stoics, porticiim Stoiconim. siilfulcire dice- 
 biitiir, offered that strict and tetrical division to the 
 world, aut mentem aiit restiin comparandam, either 
 to get them minds (constant and unmoveable) or to 
 hang them selves, f Now all other men that were 
 not in the compass of this their fantastical and 
 Platonical notion of wisdom, they condemned for fools, 
 frantics, exiles, fugitives, and the like. Amongst the 
 rest of their admirable positions, one was, that their 
 wise man could not be enforced, and that sorrow, pain- 
 fulness, and grief, were neither good nor evil, but in- 
 different at least. And surely I must needs say, they 
 were very prodigal of their lives ; and little would they 
 seem to regard extremity of tortures. One told Theo- 
 doras that he would hang him. Threaten that, saith 
 he, to your carpet-knights. Minilare pmrpuratis tuis. 
 It is all one to me whether I rot in the air or in the 
 ground ; and when you have all done, cantharides, a 
 little kind of worms, can do as much as you. When 
 they were upon the rack, they would cry, O ijwim suave. 
 Oil what pleasure is there in racking ! Aulus Gellius J 
 writeth of a fencer at the games of Cesar, that when 
 his wounds were lanced by the surgeons, he used to 
 laugh at it. The Donatists and Circumcellions were 
 not much behind them in this madness. But the 
 reason of their insensibility is that (saith Bernard) 
 that the psalm giveth : 'Their heart is as fat as 
 grease,' Ps. cxix. And that which pictj' worketh in 
 others, hardness of heart worketh in them. Some 
 marvelled (he saith) that heretics did not only suffer 
 death, but they underwent it with joy. But they 
 little considered what power tlie devil hath, not only 
 upon the bodies, but upon the hearts also which he 
 possesscth. Is it not more for a man to lay violent 
 hands upon himself, than to endure it at the hands of 
 another ? Yet that the devil hath thus far prevailed 
 
 * Orat. pro L. Jrur.iena. ct in Paradox. 
 
 t Meutia iiuam mortis incta tenenda prior. — Tyrtccut. 
 
 X Noct. Attic, lib. xii. cap. v. 
 
Ver. 5, 6.] 
 
 LECTURE XXVII. 
 
 173 
 
 with many, we know by frequent experience. He 
 addeth, it is true that the true martyrs are very well 
 content to suffer death, which proceedeth not from 
 stupidity, but from love ; neither is there an omission 
 or lecsing, but a submission of sense in them ; not 
 that pain is away, but for the love of Christ they 
 vanquish and contemn it.* The apostle doth rightly 
 express the cause of their wonderful patience. ' In 
 all these ' (he doth not say, we are more than men), 
 but u7Ti^\iixu)/j.iv, ' we are more than conquerors.' I 
 return to the Stoics. It fell out that one of that 
 sect was sick at Lebadia. His disease was a fever, 
 wherewith he was so afflicted that he groaned deeply 
 and inwardly to himself, yet would scarcely seem to 
 do it. Taurus, willing to excuse him (a philosopher 
 of a diverse profession). You have seen a sight, saith 
 he, not pleasant, yet profitable to be known, a philo- 
 sopher and pain wrestling and combating together. 
 The force and nature of the sickness did her office, in 
 causing a distraction and vexation of the bodily parts. 
 On the other side, reason, and the nature of the mind, 
 did that to them appertained, in repressing the violence 
 of gi'ief, and sufi'ering no bowlings or unseemly out- 
 cries to be heard. One that was present rephed, why 
 groaneth he against his will, if pain have no compul- 
 sion in it ? Taurus answered, that the Stoic was best 
 able to defend himself; but withal, that it was one of 
 the principles in nature to rejoice in that which is good, 
 inter ea qua: to. Tgira Kara cphaiv, and to shun the con- 
 trary ; and that some of the Stoics themselves did 
 never allow their indolency, or lack of passion, 
 A'mXyrieiav ; and lastly, that fortitude was not a mon- 
 ster to strive against nature, and to delight in stupid- 
 ity and immanity, A.'^akiav, but a knowledge and 
 skill to discern what was meet to be suffered, what 
 not. And therefore because this opinion of the 
 Stoics is not only against nature, but the practice of 
 the Son, and all the sons, of God, I thought it labour 
 well bestowed to overthrow these sowers of words (as 
 they called Paul) by their own practice, and by the 
 judgment of other natural philosophers : of whom 
 we may truly say, as Plutarch's servant sometimes said 
 of his master, 'Non est ila iit riutuichus dicit ; it is not 
 as mj' master saith ; his opinion is, that it is a shame 
 for a philosopher to be angry, and he hath often 
 reasoned of the mischiefs that come thereby, and he 
 hath written a book of not being angry, Tli^l awylac, ; 
 et ipse milii irascitio-, and yet is he angry with me. So 
 these affirm in speech that sorrow is nothing, useth no 
 violence against a wise man, yet when it cometh upon 
 them, they are no more able to endure the gripings of 
 it than other fools. 
 
 As Taurus spake of the Stoic's ague, so may I of 
 
 * Bern. ser. C6. in Cant. Nonne phis est sibimet hominera 
 injicere manns, quam id libenter abalio sustinere? Verum 
 est veros martyres aequo animo snbiisse dolores. Neque boo 
 facit stupor sed amor. Submittitur enim sensus, non amit- 
 titur, nee de est dolor sed superatur, sed couteniuitur. 
 
 the misery of Jonah. The force and nature of his 
 misery did her part ; reason and the nature of faith, on 
 the other side, were not idle in their offices. Jonah 
 behaved not himself as the deaf rocks of the sea, which 
 the waves beating and breaking upon, yet they feel 
 nothing, dulere inter dolores nesciens, not knowing how 
 to be grieved amidst his griefs ; but according to the 
 measure and quality of his sorrows so was his sense, 
 and so was the purpose of God, by whom they were 
 inflicted. To descend now to particulars. The matter 
 of his fear, or the danger intended against him, arose 
 from two mighty adversaries, the sea and the land. His 
 danger from the sea is tripled in the fifth verse, ac- 
 cording to the number of the clauses therein. First, 
 ' the waters compassed him about unto the soul.' To 
 have been in the waters had not been so much ; nor 
 much to be compassed and entrenched, as those that 
 are held in siege. But that they ' come unto his soul,' 
 the meaning is, that his spirit, whereof the quickening 
 and life of his body consisted, was at hand to depart 
 from him, and to yield itself prisoner to the waters 
 that assaulted it, there was the danger. Secondly, 
 the dejith [abi/ssiis) closed him round (diout.' The depth, 
 or rather no depth. Some measure of water, where the 
 bottom might have been reached, would also have 
 kept his fear within a measure. But to be closed 
 about with a bottomless water maketh a bottomless 
 grief, whereof there is no end. 3. ' The weeds were 
 wrapt about his head,' the sedge, the flags, the bul- 
 rushes, and other the like trash, the very scorn and 
 contempt of the sea, dangerous impediments to those 
 that by swimming put themselves upon the mercy of 
 the merciless waters ; they were not now fluent and 
 loose, but tied and entangled, not about the arms or 
 legs alone, but about the head of Jonah, the principal 
 spire of his bodj', the highest tower and, as it were, 
 capitol, A/i^rWoXii, to the city, the leader and captain to 
 all his other parts. Now whether his head were bound 
 about with weeds, when he was first swallowed up, and 
 so they remained about it still, or whether the head 
 of the whale be here the head of Jonah, because he is 
 now incorporate into the whale, and liveth within him 
 as a part of the whale, I examine not ; but this was 
 the mind of Jonah, to omit no word, not so much as 
 of the excrements and superfluities Of the sea, whereby 
 his inextricable peril might be described. 
 
 His danger by land is likewise expressed in two 
 members of the 6th verse. First, he was descended 
 to the bottoms, or ends, "or roots, or cuttings ofl', of the 
 mountains, for where a thing is cut ofl' there it endeth. 
 Man by nature and stature was made to ascend, God 
 gave him his head upwards. But Jonah was de- 
 scended, which is the state of the dead, according to 
 the phrase of the Scripture, descendaiii lufiens, Ac, I 
 shall go down sorrowing to my grave. Neither was 
 he descended into the sides, or some shallow cave and 
 vault of the mountains, but as if he were numbered 
 with those forlorn souls, who call upon whole moun- 
 
174 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 tains, Fall on us, and upon whole bills, Cover us, 
 'Hosea x., so was he descended ad radices ct, pra-cisa 
 montium, to the roots and crags of them, lodged in so 
 low a cabin, that all those heaps and swellings of the 
 eai-th lay upon him. 2. ' The earth with her bars 
 was about him for ever.' What is the strength of a 
 city or house but the bars of it ? as we read in the 
 psalm : ' Praise the Lord, Jerusalem ; praise thy 
 God, Zion : for he hath made the bars of thy gates 
 strong; and blessed thy children within thee.' Ps. cxivii. 
 So then the bars of the earth, that is, the strongest 
 muniments and fences it hath, are the promontories 
 and rocks which God hath placed in the frontiers to 
 withstand the force of the waters. Those are the bars 
 and gates in Job, which God hath appointed to the 
 sea, saying unto it, Job xxsviii., ' Hitherto shalt thou 
 pass ; here will I staj- thy proud waves ;' and if you 
 will, these also are the pillars of the earth, which God 
 hath fixed in such sort that it cannot be moved. The 
 meaning of the prophet was, that he was locked and 
 warded within the strength of the earth, never looking 
 to be set at liberty again. I told you before, that the 
 nature of the sea, wherein Jonah travailed, besides the 
 over-natural workings of God, did add much more 
 trouble unto him than if he had passed through the 
 ocean, where he had gained more sea room, and the 
 continent being farther of, would have yielded a liberal 
 cuiTeut, and less have endangered him. Now he hath 
 land round about him, by reason whereof the sea is 
 more narrow, rocky, and hilly, apter to storms, scanter 
 of roads for safety, and subject to a number of other 
 incommodities. The course of the seas, through which 
 he passed, was this. First he took shipping at Joppa, and 
 was carried through the Syriac sea ; thence through 
 Ai'chipelago, or the TEgean ; thence through Helles- 
 pont, betwixt Sestus and Abydus, where Asia and 
 Europe are divided not b}' more than seven furlongs, 
 others say bj' five ; afterwards tljrough Propontis, 
 where the sea is patent again, and hath his forth ; 
 from thence through I'ospliorus Thracius, betwixt 
 Constantinople and Natolia, where the passage is so 
 narrow that an ox may swim over ; and lastly, to the 
 Euxine Sea, where, they hold, he was set to land. 
 Thus was he often encumbered with straits, and never 
 had cause to complain of over much liberty, where he 
 was most favoured, till he came to dry ground. 
 
 Thus far of the dangers both by sea and land. The 
 first extended his rage, not to the chin or lips of the 
 prophet, but to his soul; and threatened him with a 
 depth bottomless and nnmeasurable, and came not 
 against bis life with limpid and pure waters alone, bnt 
 with other impediments, the unprofitable pelf and cor- 
 ruption of the waters. The latter gave him not rest 
 upon a plain iloor of the earth, bnt clasped him under 
 the crags or rocks, and held him close prisoner under 
 the strongest bars and bounders it had. ]!nt as in 
 the former staff of the song, so also in this, there is a 
 touch of a distrustful conscienco ; but there it was 
 
 openly expressed, and here it is closely conveyed in. 
 ' The earth with her bars was about me for ever.' For 
 what meaneth in seciiliiui, for crer, but that he wa? 
 cast away from the saving health and help of the Lord, 
 without all hope of redemption ? Did he not know 
 that iilthough his life were taken from him for a time, 
 it should be restored unto him at the resurrection of 
 just men ? What then, if the waters were come up even 
 unto his soul ? Or could he persuade himself that 
 any depth of waters could overreach the judgments 
 and counsels of the Lord in preserving his saints ? 
 Are not they also ahijssiis marfiia, as great and a greater 
 deep than ever sea had ? What then, if the depth closed 
 him about, did he not know that weeds should rot 
 and fall away from his head, and instead of weeds the 
 head should be crowned with mercy and compassion, 
 and clothed with glorv as with the sunbeams ? What 
 then, though the weeds were bound about his head, 
 was he to learn that the Lord should one day, say to 
 all the 'prisoners of hope' (though Ossa and Pindus, 
 the graves of those giants had buried their bodies), 
 ' Stand up and shew yourselves ;' and that the ' gates 
 of hell,' much less the bars of the earth, are not of 
 force to resist his ordinances ? AVhat then, though he 
 were descended to the bottoms of the mountnins ? &c. 
 What if his head and heart also, .body and soul, the 
 whole composition and frame of Jonah, had sustained 
 a dissolution temporal, which the law of mortality, 
 and the common condition of all ilesh, had made him 
 subject unto, is there not a time of refi'cshing, when 
 both the substance and beauty of all these shall be 
 renewed again ? Then again, I say, what necdcth in 
 sccnlum ? so deep a suspicion of the goodness of the 
 Lord, as if it had /or ever relinquished him? It is 
 an cSaai which for the most part a vehement grief 
 worketh in all sorts of men, except some of a stoical 
 disposition, and others of a worse, that have seared 
 their hearts with hot irons, and can feel nothing. So 
 wo read in the Lamentations, chap, iii., ' My strength 
 and my hope is perished from the Lord.' And for a 
 space of time there is little difTerencc either in speech 
 or thought betwixt precious and reprobate spirits. But 
 whereas the nature of desperation is this, ohiif/atiir 
 conauetudinc, ohscnitiir imiralitudine, impcnihidine oh- 
 Jirmalur : custom bindeth, ingratitude locketh, im- 
 penitency barreth it up ; there is not that custom, 
 ingratitude, impenitency in God's chosen ones, but 
 though they lay down their hope, thej' take it up 
 again ; and though thej' give over the field to tho 
 enemy, and seem to fly away, yet they fly to return, 
 and to fight with more courage and upon better 
 advantage. 
 
 The hope of a Christian man is [veiy nicely and 
 fearfully jilaccd betwixt two extremities, as Susanna 
 in the midst of two adulterers. Ista duo occidunt 
 nnimas, axil desperatio ant perversa spes, desperation 
 and presumption are two infamous gulfs, and hear as 
 ill as ever Scylla and Charybdis did, for tho wi-eck and 
 
Ver. 5, 6.] 
 
 LECTURE XXVII. 
 
 175 
 
 OYcrtlu'ow of many poor souls. For as it is not good 
 on the one side to have too bold and headstrong an 
 hope, that howsoever "we live, whether swearing or 
 fearing an oath, we shall be saved {ed spe fivtl , xper- 
 ando percunt, thcj* that so hope perish by so hoping ; 
 it is the hope of the hvpoerite,* and shall come to 
 nought; it is as the house of a spider, .Job viii. and 
 si., that shall soon be overturned), so on the other it 
 is not safe to have our jealous God always in jealousy, 
 and still to diffide whether he be our merciful Father, 
 yea or not. For hope is ever accompanied with two 
 sisters, which never depart fi-om her sides and society, 
 faith and love : faith, the guide to keep us from des- 
 peration ; love, the rule to keep us from presumption. 
 For he that hath faith can never distrust of the 
 mercies of God, because he believeth the promises in 
 Jesus Christ: and he that hath charity will never pre- 
 sume of a sinful and licentious life, because he is 
 taught by love to keep the commandments of the 
 Most High. Jonah made some trial of both these 
 extremities ; for when he went first fi'om the face of 
 the Lord, and refused a plain injunction, what was it 
 else but presumption in him ? Now to distrust of the 
 mercies of God, and stifHy to affii-m that his miseries 
 shall never be released, is a spice of desperation. 
 But his wisdom was, that at their first invasion he 
 treadeth upon the heads of both these serpents ; as 
 soon as he feeleth them sting, he presently armeth 
 himself with the grace of God to escape from them. 
 Otherwise, if as the speech of Jonah was in scculnm, 
 so the thoughts of his heart had continued in seculum, 
 without revocation, then had he also taken up his 
 place amongst those whom God had set on his left 
 hand, and made the mirrors to the world of his irre- 
 vocable damnation. For this were iuRnnahilis plaija, 
 as Jeremiah speaketh, ' a wound that never can be 
 cured,' to despair of the aid of God ; as if a surgeon 
 should pi'omise help to a sore, and the patient shoiild 
 thrust his nails into it, and answer him, Nay, but it 
 shall not be healed. It is the just state of the 
 damned ; for when all the people upon the earth 
 besides live by hope (for he that soweth, soweth in 
 hope, and he that reapeth, rcapeth in hope, he that 
 liveth, liveth in hope, and he that dieth, dieth in hope, 
 yea, the whole creature groaneth under hope, and 
 ' waiteth for that time with a fervent desire when the 
 sons of God shall be revealed, and itself restored '), 
 these only are past hope. One compareth despera- 
 tion to the beast in Daniel that hath no name given 
 to it ; the first of the four was a lion, the second a 
 bear, the third a leopard, Dan. vii., but this, without 
 distinguishing the kind, was ' very fearful and terrible 
 and strong, and had great iron teeth, destroyed and 
 brake in pieces, and stamped under his feet, and had 
 horns,' enough to push at God with blasphemy, at his 
 brethren with iujui-y, and at the soul viithin his own 
 bosom with distrust of mercy. Other om' sins are 
 * Infidelis flducia. — Bern. 
 
 fearful enough, and have as it were the rage of lions 
 and leopards and bears, to spoil and make desolate 
 the soul of man ; but the final decay indeed, which 
 can never be recovered, whilst there standeth a seat of 
 justice in heaven, is desperation. The greatest sins 
 (they say), are these, which are opposed to the theologi- 
 cal virtues, faith, hope, and charity: infidelity to faith, 
 desperation to hope, hatred to charity ;* amongst the 
 which, infidelitj' and hatred, the one not believing, 
 the other hating God, are in themselves worse ; but in 
 regard of him that sinneth, desperation far esceedeth 
 them both in the danger annexed to it. For what 
 can be more miserable than a wretch not pitying him- 
 self ?f But to acquit the prophet of the Lord fi-om so 
 damned a sin, as in the former verses, after his deadly 
 downfall (one would have thought) when his judgment 
 came from his own mouth, ' I said I am cast out,' &c., 
 he arose again and set up a standard of comfort to all 
 the distressed of the world, ' Yet will I look again 
 towards thy holy temple ;' so in this second fight and 
 fit of his soul, when he is well-nigh spent, and it is a 
 question whether his faith be quick or dead, there 
 eometh another rcruntamen, like a shower of the later 
 rain in the drought of summer, to water his fainting 
 spirit, ' Yet hast thou brought up my life from the 
 pit, Lord my God.' The readings are diverse. The 
 Hebrews say, ' Thou hast brought up my life,' or 
 ' caused it to ascend ;' the Septuagint, ' My life hath 
 ascended;' Jerome, ' Thou shalt hft up.' Some say 
 from the pit, from the grave, some fi'om death, some 
 from corruption, fovea, interitus, scinilclinnn, (pHca. 
 There is no odds, for whether of the two times be put, 
 the matter is not gi-eat, Thou hast or Thou shalt. For 
 the nature of hope is this, fnturn facta (licit, \ things 
 that are to come, it pronounccth of as already accom- 
 plished. In the eighth to the Romans we are ' saved 
 by hope,' though we are not yet saved. And ' whom 
 God_hath justified, those he hath also glorified,' though 
 not yet glorified. Ephesians the second, we are 
 'raised £i-om the dead,' though our resuiTeetion here- 
 after to be fulfilled. But I stay not upon this. It is a 
 rule in Seneca, that by the benefit of nature, it is not 
 possible for any man to be gi-ieved much and long 
 together ; § for in her love she beareth unto us, she 
 hath so ordered our pains, as that she hath made 
 them either sufl'erable or short ; ant tolerahilem out 
 hrcvem ; that which Seneca imputed to nature, I to 
 hope, grounded on the promises of God, immutable 
 things, the safe and sm'c anchor of the soul of man, 
 Heb. \i. 
 
 The son-ow of Jonah was wonderfully vehement, 
 but soon allayed. Whence had he that speedy miti- 
 gation ? From nature ; nothing less. Hear what the 
 
 * Th. Aquin. ii. 2, qu. 20, art. iii. 
 
 t Quid miserius misero nou miseraute seipsum ? — 
 August. 
 
 X August, ad Dardau. In teternis idem est posse et esse. 
 § Nem6 potest yalde dolere et diu. — Epist. xcvii. 
 
176 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 voice of nature is. WTien the people of Israel crieth 
 upon Moses for flesh, Xum. xi., what is his cry to 
 God ? ' I am not able to bear this people ; if I have 
 found favour in thine e.yes, kill me that I behold not 
 this miserj-.' 'WTien Jezebel threateneth to make 
 Elijah like one of the dead prophets, 1 Kings xix., ho 
 hasteth into the wilderness, and breakoth out into im- 
 patience and irksomeness of hfe, ' Lord, it is sulR- 
 cient' (cither he had hved, or he had been plagued 
 long enough), ' take away my soul from me.' The 
 ■woman in the 2d of Esdras having lost her son (be it 
 a figure or othersvise, it is true in both), ariseth in the 
 night season, goeth into the field, decroeth with her- 
 self neither to eat nor drink, but there to remain fast- 
 ing and weeping till she were dead. Esdras counselleth 
 her. Foolish woman, do not so, return into the city, go 
 to thine husband, &c. She atiswereth, I will not, I 
 will not go into the city, but here will I die. You 
 hear how nature speaketh. Was Jonah thus relieved ? 
 No; the sense of his own strength, or rather his weak- 
 ness, would have sent him headlong, as the devils the 
 herd of swine, into the lake of desperation. It is ' the 
 Lord his God,' whose name is tempered according to 
 the riddle of Samson, both of ' strong and sweet,' 
 who is fortiter siiavis et suaviter Jortis, strong in sweet- 
 ness, and sweet in strength ; forth pro me, siinris miJii, 
 strong for me, and sweet to me, that hath done this 
 deed. Behold, my brethren, there is honey in the 
 lion ; there is mercy in the fearful God of heaven ; 
 be is not only a Lord over Jonah, to note his majesty 
 and fear, but the Lord his God, to shew the kindness 
 of a Father. It is the Lord his God to whom he 
 repaircth by particular application, and with the dis- 
 ciple of Christ leaneth as it were in his master's bosom, 
 that delivered his life from the pit, and his soul from 
 fainting ; before he lay in the depths, and was de- 
 scended to the ends of the mountains, &c. All that is 
 answered in one word, cduxisti, Thou hast brought me 
 up from the pit wherein I was buried, before the 
 waters were come even unto his soul, ready to drink 
 it in, and to turn him to corruption ; but now God 
 hath delivered that soul from the corruption it was 
 falling into. What shall we then say ? The sea hath 
 no mercy, the weeds no mercy, the earth with her 
 promontories and bars no mercy, the whale no mercy; 
 the Lord alone hath mercy. It fared with Jonah as 
 with a forerunner of his, Ps. cxlii., wlien ' his spirit 
 was confused and folden up within him, when he 
 looked upon his right hand, and behold there was 
 none that would know him (raudi less at his left), 
 when all i-efuge failed, and none cared for his soul ; 
 then cried ho unto the Lcu-d his God, and said. Thou 
 art my hope and my portion in the laud of the living ; 
 hearken unto my ciy, for I am brought very low ' 
 (even as low as the earth is founded), ' and bring my 
 Boul out of prison ' (this pit wherein I lie), ' that I may 
 praise thy name.' Oh let not life nor death (I name 
 no more, for death is the last and worst enemy that 
 
 shall be subdued), be able to take your hope from you. 
 'When your heart in thinking, or tongue in speaking, 
 hath gone too far, correct yourselves with this whole- 
 some and timely veruulamen, yet notuilhstandinij, I 
 will go to the Lord my God, and trust in his name. 
 The nails that were driven into the hands and feet of 
 our Saviour, were neither so grievous nor so con- 
 tumelious unto him, as that reproach that was offered 
 in speech, ' He trusted in the Lord, let him deliver 
 him.' This was the root that preserved Job, and Job 
 preserved it; Job siii., when his friends became foes, 
 and added affliction unto him, he willeth them to 
 hold their tongues, that he might speak, not caring 
 what came of it. ' Wherefore do I take my flesh in 
 my teeth,' saith he, ' and put my soul in my hand ?' 
 that is, why should I fret and consume myself with 
 impatience ? ' If he should kill me, would I not trust 
 in him ?' so far is it off, that I despair of the mercies 
 of God, that my life shall sooner leave me, than my 
 assurance of his graces. This was the deep and in- 
 ward matter he meant in the 19th of his book, from 
 the abundance whereof he made that prophetical and 
 heavenly protestation : ' Oh that my words were 
 wTitten, wTitten in a book, and graven with an iron 
 pen in lead or stone for ever : I know that my Re- 
 deemer liveth ;' worms and rottenness shall consume me 
 to nothing, but m}' Redeemer ' is alive, and behold he 
 liveth for evermore, and hath the keys of hell and of 
 death,' Rev. ii. The grave shall be my bouse, and I 
 shall make my bed in darkness, but I shall rise again 
 to behold the brightness of his countenance. These 
 eyes of nature shall sink into the holes of my head, 
 but I shall receive them again to behold that glorious 
 object. And though many ages of the world shall run 
 on betwixt the day of my falling, and his long expected 
 ■(asitatiou, yet be shall stand the last day upon the 
 earth, himself . I /;</i« and Oiiii'ija, the th'st and the last 
 of all the creatures of God, to recapitulate former 
 times, and to make full restitution of my ancient 
 losses. What needed writings in a book and gra^^ng 
 in lead or stone, but that he was careful of posterity, 
 that the scripture and sculpture of his own conscience 
 might bo a monument in time to come for other 
 afilictod souls ? The counsel which David giveth bis 
 troubled soul, again and again repeated, Ps. xlii. and 
 xliii., because his sorrows were again and often multi- 
 plied, shall be my last for this time : ' my soul, 
 why art thou cast down, and why art thou disquieted 
 within mo?' I will not forget to note unto you that 
 one of the gi'catcst temptations he then felt, and that 
 which fed him with his tears day and night instead of 
 meat, w'as the daily upbraiding of his persecutors, 
 ' Where is now thy God '?' If they could have bat- 
 tered the fortress of his hope, they had utterly spoiled 
 him ; yet he cncourageth that persecuted and down- 
 trodden soul with heart}' incitatious : ' Why art thou 
 cast down ? &c. ; trust in the Lord, for I wiU yet and 
 yet {fi(lliuc), give him thanks for the help of his 
 
Vee. 7.J 
 
 LECTURE XXVIIT. 
 
 177 
 
 presence.' Hope is never put to silence, never abash- 
 eth or shameth the man that joineth her unto him, 
 Kom. V. ; the sweetest and plesantest companion that 
 ever travelled with the sojourners upon earth. She 
 can'ieth them along through all the difficulties and 
 crosses of the way that lie to inteiTupt them ; though 
 they have passed through fire and water, she saith. Be 
 not discoraforted, ' we shall jet give him thanks for 
 the help of his presence ;' though through a life so 
 replenished with misery, that they bless the dead more 
 than the living, and count them happier than both 
 that have never been, she saith, Be of good cheer, we 
 shall yet give him thanks, and there is time and 
 matter enough wherein to shew his goodness ; yea 
 though they walk into the chamber of death, and 
 shut the doors after them, and see not the light of 
 heaven, still she biddeth them be bold, for they that 
 sleep in the dust shall arise and sing, the dew of their 
 dry bones shall be as fresh as the dew of the herbs, 
 
 and we shall yet give him thanks for the help of his 
 presence. I remember that valiant and thrice- 
 renowned Athenian * (when I speak of the tenure and 
 pertinaey of hope), who, when other means failed, 
 grasped the ships of the enemy with his hands, to 
 hold them to fight, and when his hands were stricken 
 off, stayed them with his teeth, till he lost his hfe. 
 Hope can never be put from her hold-fast ; her voice 
 is according to her nature, adlnw confilehor, T will yet 
 give thanks ; in the winter and deadest time of 
 calamities she springetb, and cannot die ; nay, she 
 crieth within herself. Whether I live or die, I will not 
 lose my patience, for I shall see the day when the 
 Lord shall know me by my name again, righteu my 
 wrongs, finish my soitows, wipe the tears from my 
 cheeks, tread down my enemies, fulfil me with the oil 
 of joy, and I shall yet and for ever give thanks for the 
 help of his presence. 
 
 * Cyn^gerus. 
 
 LECTUKE XXVIII. 
 
 When my so;il fnintcd u-ilhin me, I remi'mbcred the Lord: and mij prayer came unto thee, into t'line holy temple. 
 
 — Jonah II. 7. 
 
 THE two last verses, if you remember, were but a varied 
 repetition of that which two others had handled 
 before ; the general parts of all which wore the fear 
 and the hope, danger and comfort, of the prophet ; 
 which two afi'ections or conditions (you have often 
 heard) the whole song spendeth itself upon. His fear 
 and danger in the last place was, that neither water 
 nor earth spared him. The waters, touching their pride 
 and exaltation, ' came unto his soul ;' touching their 
 measure, promised him ' no bottom ;' touching their 
 train and confederates, ' bound their weeds about his 
 head.' The earth neither lodged him in a smooth 
 and easy floor, but under ' the roots and rags of moun- 
 tains ;' nor in an haven, or any the like accessible 
 place, but ' within her bars.' Notwithstanding, the 
 head of the serpent, with all his subtile devices against 
 the life of the prophet, is braised at the heel of the 
 speech, where one little particle of hope wipeth out 
 all the former discomforts : ' Yet hast thou brought 
 np,' &c. Once again, as heretofore I dissembled not 
 with you, I must enter into the self-same matter of 
 discourse and explication. The soul of Jonah may 
 faint'within him (as my text telleth us), the sun and 
 moon may fail in their motions, day and night may 
 fail in their courses, the earth may fail and totter 
 upon her props, the sea and rivers may fail and be 
 emptied of their waters, but the word of the Lord shall 
 never fail, neither in truth, nor in the riches and 
 plenty thereof, to minister an everlasting argument 
 to him that dispenseth it. Time, and speech, and 
 audience shall fail, but matter can never want, when 
 that abundant treasure cometh to be opened. It 
 
 was well said by Chrysostom, that in a thousand 
 talents of worldly words, a man shall hardly find an hun- 
 dred pence of spiritual and heavenly wisdom, scarcely 
 ten halfpence. But infinite are the talents of wisdom, 
 that are hid in the words of God, even when they 
 seem in the judgment of man to be most exhausted. 
 The apostle's exhortation to the Colossians, chap, iii., 
 is, that ' the word of the Lord should dwell plentifully 
 among them.' Surely the word of God, in one of the 
 deepest and weightiest points of knowledge, touching 
 our hope, how to be used and where to bo founded, 
 hath once and a second time already offered itself unto 
 you. Whether as yet it hath gotten house-room and 
 dwelling among you, I cannot tell : perhaps it did but 
 sojourn in your hearts, and was in nature of a pas- 
 senger to tarry for a night or an hour; or hapl}', as 
 the Lavite that came to Gibeah, in the nineteenth of 
 Judges, it hath sitten in the streets, and no man hath 
 received it into house ; or if it hath gotten entrance 
 and admission, it was per force, as those that let down 
 the sick man by the tiles of the house, the doors being 
 pestered and thronged with multitudes, that they could 
 not have entrance otherwise ; it may be the gates of 
 j'our hearts, being stopped with multitudes of popular 
 and worldly affairs, it took some little fastening against 
 your wills. But that it may dwell in your consciences, 
 never to depart from them, and not in a narrow cor- 
 ner thereof, spariugly, and with discontentment, but 
 in such plentiful manner as the apostle spake of, to 
 enjoy her full liberty, all other inmates and associates 
 put apart, all distrustful cogitations, either from the 
 wiles of Satan, or weakness of our flesh, removed, the 
 
 M 
 
178 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 proTidence of God bath so ordered it, that after twice 
 Davigation, as the proverb is, there should be a third 
 iteration of the same doctrine, that your hearts tor 
 ever might be estabb'shed. When the vis-ion of the 
 sheet was sent unto Peter, in the tenth of the Acts, 
 the voice was uttered unto him three times, ' Arise, 
 Peter, Lill and eat ;' and the first time he denied it 
 plainlj', ' Not so. Lord.' Afterwards he was better 
 advised, and hearkened to the voice of the Lord. 
 When the angel of Satan was sent to buffet Paul, lest 
 his visions should lift him up too high, he ' besought 
 the Lord thrice, that it might depart,' 2 Cor. xii., and 
 then the Lord answered him, ' My grace is sufficient 
 for thee.' It may be according to the sign which God 
 gave Hezekiah, Isa. xxxvii., that ' the first year he 
 should eat of such things as came up of themselves ; 
 the second, such as sprung again withont sowing; ihe 
 third, thev' should sow and reap, and plant vineyards,' 
 &c. So for the iirst and second time that we hear 
 the doctrine of salvation, we hear without profit, we 
 breed no cogitations within us but such as grow of 
 themselves, natural, worldly, corrupt, and such as 
 accompany flesh and blood, litter to cast us down than 
 to help us up ; but at the third time, when the W'ords 
 of God, with often calling, shall have pierced our 
 hearts, as rain the marble stones, we then apply our 
 minds to a more industrious and profitable meditation 
 of such heavenly comforts. Let it not grieve you, 
 then, if I speak unto you again the same things ; and 
 as Paul disputed at Tbessalcjuica, three Sabbath davs, 
 of the passion and resurrection of Christ, Acts xvii., 
 60 I, three Sabbath days amongst you, of our hope in 
 Christ. Let it be true of vanities and pleasures, that 
 the less they are used, the more commendable, ro- 
 hqitates commimdat rarior vsiin ; but in the most 
 accepted and blessed things that belong to our hap- 
 piest peace, be it far otherwise. Our daily bread, 
 though it be daily received, we are as ready to crave 
 still ; neither can the perpetual use of it ever ofl'end 
 us.V. The light of the sun would displease nobody but 
 some lover of darkness, if it never went down in our 
 coasts. The nature of .such things, for their necessary 
 use, must needs be welcome unto us, though they 
 never should forsake us ; and can the doctrine of 
 faith and alliance in (be mercies of God, the light 
 of our dim eyes, the staff of our infirmities, our souls' 
 restorative when it lieth sick to death, and as Chry- 
 sostom well comjiarcd it, a chain let down from 
 heaven, which be that taketh hold on, is presently 
 pulled up from the hand* of destruction, and set in a 
 large place to enjoy the peace of conscience, can it 
 ever displease us ? We were content to hear it once, 
 and I do not doulit but it will be as welcome being 
 repeated ten times. Et placnit stviel, &e. I make 
 no question, but as when Paul had preached at An- 
 tioch in the synagogue of the Ji ws one day, the Gen- 
 tiles besought him that he would preach ' the same 
 * Qa. ' land' ?— Ed. 
 
 words,' 7a. uora ^-/i/iartx, ' to them again the next Sab- 
 bath,' Acts xiii., so though it were the last work that 
 I did amongst you, to cut the throat of desperation, 
 which balh cut the throat of many a wretched man 
 and woman, to set the pillar of hope under all faint- 
 ing and declining consciences, yet because it is our 
 last refuge in adversity, and standeth unmoveable like 
 the northern pole, when our souls are most distracted 
 with doubts, and fullest of scruples, to give us aim 
 and direction whither to bend our course, if I shall 
 once again repeat unto you, tu dura IriiJ-aTa, the self- 
 same words that before, in substance and sense, though 
 not in syllables, I trust I shall find your acceptance 
 as good as when I first began it. 
 
 The words propounded are the last of the whole 
 narration, and draw into a narrower compass of speech 
 all that hath been said before ; for s\hatsoever yoa 
 have heard of the bottom of the sea, floods, and 
 surges, with all those other disturbances ah-eady 
 reckoned up, they are now concluded in a little room, 
 ' My soul fainted.' The parts the same which I have 
 observed before; fori need not to acquaint you again, 
 that be hangeth and divideth the whole song be- 
 tween fear and hope, spemipte metumque inter. And as 
 the feet to that image in Daniel were ' part of iron, 
 part of clay,' which the prophet expoundeth, ' partly 
 strong, partly broken,' so are the feet, if I may so 
 call them, which Jonah, through all this travel, goeth 
 upon : the one of clay, weak, impotent, always shiver- 
 ing, and sinking downward, I mean his fear and dis- 
 trust ; the other of iron, strong, stable, and firm, 
 keeping him upright, his hope and confidence in the 
 mercies of God. His fear is in the former member 
 of the sentence, ' when my soul fainted within me ;* 
 his hope in the next, ' I remembered the Lord,' &c. 
 Wherein, to shew that it was not in vain for him to 
 remember the Lord, and withal how he remembered 
 him, he tellcth us, that his ' prayer came unto him, 
 into his holy temple.' Concerning his fear, we have 
 to Tonsider, first, what person or part he uotifieth to 
 have been assaulted, his so»/ ; secoiid/i/, the plight or 
 perturbation of his soul, \\, fainted ; tliirdlij, the appli- 
 cation of the place, within hiiiisc/f. 
 
 1. (1.) The danger is much augmented, from that 
 which before it was. Then ' the waters but came to 
 his soul :' here, they had fought against him so long, 
 that ' his soul plainly fainted.' Then the peril but 
 imminent and hard at hand, here it had taken hand- 
 fast ; then was ho threatened or beaten by the waters, 
 here he seemeth to be vanquished. All that went before 
 might concern the body alone, and the loss of his 
 teujporal life, whereof he was yet in possession. As 
 when he pronounced against himself, ' I am cast away 
 out of thy sight,' it might be no more in ctlect than what 
 Ezekiel spake, Kzek. xxxviii., ' I said, I slmll not see 
 the Lord, even the Lord in the land of the living : I 
 shall see man no more amongst the inhabitants of the 
 world : mine habitation is departed and removed from 
 
Ver. 7.] 
 
 LECTURE XXVni. 
 
 179 
 
 me like a shepherd's tent, and as a weaver cutteth off 
 his thread, so is m}' life ended.' But hero he con- 
 fesseth in open terms, that his very soul, that inward, 
 iccmortal, heavenly suhstance, which, when the hody 
 fainteth, is sometimes most in health, and liveth when 
 the body dieth, that this part failoth him, and leaveth 
 no hope of better things. St Augustine very well 
 defineth the soul to be the whole inward man, where- 
 with this mass of clay is quickened, governed, and 
 held together, changing her names according to the 
 sundry oiBces which she boareth in the body ; for 
 when she quickeneth the body, she is called the soul ; 
 when she hath appetite or desire to anything, the will ; 
 for knowledge, the mind ; for recordation, memory ; 
 forjudging and discerning, reason ; for giving breath, 
 spirit ; lastly, fur apprehending or perceiving out- 
 wardly, sense ;* so as the fainting of the soul is the 
 decay of all these faculties. Now, if the light that is 
 in us be dark, how great is the darkness ; if tlie life 
 be death, how gi-eat is the death ; if the soul faint, 
 how great the defection ! The infirmities and dis- 
 ablements of his body, I know, were very great in the 
 whole service and ministry thereof. For what use 
 had ho either of his hands, to help himself withal, 
 more than Jeroboam had when his hand was withered ? 
 or of his eyes, to behold the light of heaven, more 
 than if the eagles of the valley had picked them out '? 
 or of his ears, to hear any sentence of comfort, more 
 than if they had never been planted ? The grinders 
 within his head, what did they for him, unless they 
 ground and whetted themselves ? His tongue, what 
 tasted it, except his own spittle '? He might truly say 
 ■with the prophet Isaiah, chap, i., that ' from the crown 
 of the head to the sole of his foot,' there was no part 
 that did the duties of it. But all those former defects 
 and impotencies are nothing to that he now speaketh 
 of: ' When my soul fainted within me.' For as the 
 soul is of more worth and excellence than the body, 
 so the languishments of the soul more grievous, and 
 the death of the soul more remediless, than those of 
 the body ; and therefore, as the hazard exceedeth, so 
 the health of the soul is more dearly to be tendered. 
 In the greatest distemperatures and disorders of the 
 body, when the bones are smitten asunder, and the 
 loins filled with a sore disease, when the wounds are 
 putrefied and stink, the marrow and moisture quite 
 dried up, yea, though it be brought and dissolved into 
 the dust of death, yet the soul may be safe and sound 
 notwithstanding, and in far better case than when she 
 lived in her house of clay. But if the soul be sick, 
 can the body have any comfort ? May wo not then 
 infer with him in the comedy. My heart is sick, my 
 reins sick, my spleen sick, my liver sick.f and all my 
 
 * Dum vivificat, anima ; tlum vult, animus; diim scit, 
 mens est; chirri recolit, memoria ; dum juiiicat, ratiii ; dum 
 spirat, spiritus ; dum sentit, sensus. — Aug. dc Ecclesiie Dog- 
 matib. cap. xxxvi. 
 
 t Cor dolet, renes dolent, &c. — Plant. 
 
 other parts are out of frame '? Out of this comparison 
 between the body and soul, let me make my persuasion 
 unto you. The men of the world were wont to say, 
 saith Bernard, that he that keepeth his body keepeth 
 a good castle.* A castle! how long to continue? 
 This is the error of worldly men, to call their taber- 
 nacle, which was made to be removed and pulled down 
 upon every light occasion, a castle. We say not so ; 
 but he that keepeth his body keepeth a base dunghill. 
 He that had seen the body of righteous Job ulcerated, 
 blotched, and blained, sitting upon the dunghill, would 
 he not have thought that a dunghill had sitten upon 
 a dunghill ? But he that keepeth his soul keepeth a 
 good castle indeed ;t born to eternity, he keepeth a 
 heaven in comparison, the sun, and moon, and stars 
 whereof are understanding, faith, and hope, with other 
 Christian graces, and the Lord of hosts himself hath 
 his dwelling therein.* There is no man so simple, 
 no man so vile, but taketh this to be a castle of honour 
 and strength, because they believe it to be immortal .§ 
 Our Saviour manifested this difference both by the 
 end of his coming in the flesh, which was principally 
 for our souls, after for our bodies ; first to take away 
 the sins of the world, which are spiritual diseases, then 
 to remove corporal infirmities ; and by the behaviour 
 of his own person amongst us, who, though he sufl'ored 
 his body to be tried with all kinds of ignominious and 
 accursed vexations, with spittings, whippings, buffet- 
 ings, and the bitterest death of the cross, yet was it 
 ever his care to preserve his soul free from stains and 
 corruptions. It is not thus with the sons of men now- 
 a-days.j] They neglect the care and culture of their 
 souls ; but the lusts of the flesh they make pro\ision 
 for with all possible diligence. They have learned 
 from the school of Hippocrates the physician, and 
 Epicurus the swine, to physic and diet their bodies ; 
 but the sickness and death of the soul, which are their 
 sins, they never account of till they see they must be 
 punished. ye sons of men, foolish and slow of 
 heart to conceive the rightest things, how long will ye 
 love such vanities, and seek after leasing ? These 
 times are allotted to the soul, not to the body. Now 
 is the time of salvation, not of pleasure and pastime. 
 Let the flesh alone a while, moi-e than nature and 
 necessity require ; let it not be favoured, either in food 
 or raiment, or any the like transitory and fading benefit. 
 And when it is weary walking upon the face of the 
 earth, let it go down in peace, and rest in hope till he 
 that came for your souls before shall also come to raise 
 and reform it. In the fointing of our souls, there is a 
 gross difi'erence betwixt Jonah and us. His soul 
 
 * Serm. parv. Bonum castellum custodit qui custodit 
 corpus suum. Nos autem iion sic, sed sterquilinium vile, &o. 
 
 t Qui autem animam custodit, &e. 
 
 X Quid aliud voces animum quam Deum in corpore humane 
 hospitantem '?— Sen. 
 
 % Nulhis extremus idiota, nulla ahjecta muliercula, non 
 credit anima; immoitalitatem. 
 
 II Non sic hodie filii hominum, non sic— i>eni. in declamat 
 
180 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 fainted within him through paiu ; onrs through plea- 
 sui-e, and that pleasure the mother and nurse of a 
 worser pain. Our flesh is too indolent against the 
 spirit, and keepeth it under with a strong hand. 
 Hagar despiseth Sarah ; the servant setteth her foot in 
 the neck of her mistress. The flesh is clothed like 
 the rainbow, with colours of all sorts ; we go into the 
 bowels of the earth, we go into the bowels of the sea, 
 as far and as low as ever Jonah went, to seek pearls 
 and the riches of the sea to adorn it. We forget our- 
 selves shamefully in such unnecessary travel. It is 
 the queen that should be clothed in a vesture of needle- 
 work, wrought with divers colours ; but the queen is 
 stripped of her jewels, the soul robbed of her ornaments 
 and rich attii'e, and the body is the thief that deceiveth 
 it. The flesh is daintily fed with the finest flour of 
 the v.heat, and the reddest blood of the grape, we care 
 not what it costeth, nunquam animo jiratiis ohstan- 
 tibiis ; the unworthiest member we have is deified and 
 made our god (a sin beyond the sin of the pagans, 
 shameful and beastly idolatrj-) ; they made them gods 
 of silver, and gold, and marble, we of our bellies. 
 What is done with the soul the mean time ? Behold, 
 she is pined and famished ; the bread of life is not 
 bought nor sought for to strengthen her withal ; she 
 is kept from the gospel of peace, and from the body 
 and blood (that inconsumptible moat*) of her holy 
 Redeemer. She that was born fi-om above, to eat the 
 hidden manna, the food of angels, and to be nourished 
 with the tree of life, whose beginnings call her home 
 again,! is less regarded than a lump of earth. Oh 
 consider, that he who loseth the life of a body may 
 find it again. The time shall come when ' thej' that 
 are in the graves shall hear the v(jice of the Son of 
 God.' But the loss of a soul is unrecoverable. If it 
 die in sin, it shall also die in perdition. Rather it 
 shall not die, for it is not as the soul of the beast, that 
 endeth with the body. Oh living and ever-living 
 death ! Let them take heed that have ears to hear 
 with. Their price hath been once paid, which, if the 
 riches of Solomon, treasures of Hezekiah, all the silver 
 and gold within the globe of the earth, could have 
 satisfied, God would willingly have spared ' his own 
 blood,' Acts XX. Let them not look for more Christs, 
 or more passions ; if they will go into capti^^ty again, 
 let them go, but they shall not return ; if they sell 
 themselves to the will of their enemy, let them never 
 hope for a second ransom. 
 
 (2.) When 1111/ xdul /(tinted. In the second circum- 
 stance of the first branch, wherein is noted the aflec- 
 tion of his soul, I will rather mark the efficacy of the word 
 here brought than make discourse upon it. The veiy 
 noting of the word is discourse enough. The words 
 that the Holy Ghost useth are not Ktvoi Xiiyoi, vain 
 words, Eph. v., such as are used by men to deceive 
 with, the examination and search whereof yicldcth no 
 
 {♦ Cihns aiiiniac iiiconsTimptiliilis. — Ci/prian. 
 t Sursuin aiiiiiuini vucaiit initia sua. — Senec. 
 
 profit ; but he that will weigh them aright, must not 
 only view the outward face of the whole sentence at 
 large, but suck out the juice and blood of every several 
 word therein contained. The extremity of the soul of 
 Jonah seemeth to bo very great, because there is no 
 little trouble and care how to express it. The Septua- 
 gint renders it an eclipse, or, if you wiU, a dereliction 
 and death of the soul ; Calvin, a convolution or fold- 
 ing up together; Tremellius, an overwhelming; Jerome, 
 a straitening or compacting into a close room ; 
 Pomeran, a despairing. Whatsoever it is. Rabbi 
 Kimchi afiirmeth that the word is never used but of 
 great misery, haply such as shall accompany the last 
 times, when men shall be at their wits' ends for fear, 
 and their hearts shall fail them because of trouble. 
 ' K'^o-^^vyJit'Tuv avrfowTwn, Luke sxi. Now whether j-ou 
 say that his soul forsook him, as it were, and there 
 was (leliijiiinm aiiiincc, AE/Tofo/i/'a, Asi~o^u^ia, a dis- 
 parition of it for a time, as if it were not, like the state 
 of Eutychus in the Acts, who was taken up for dead, 
 though his life remained in him ; or whether it were 
 wrapt and wound 'w-ithin itself, that her own house 
 was a prison unto her, and she had no power to go 
 forth, no list to think of heaven, no mind to ask the 
 counsel of God or man, as when a bird is snared, the 
 more it laboureth the harder it tieth itself, and though 
 it use the legs or the wings, it useth them to a further 
 hindrance, so all the thoughts that the soul of Jonah 
 thought, were not to ease the heart, but more to per- 
 plex it, and all fell back again upon himself ; or 
 whether the soul were overwhelmed within him with 
 her own weight, as one that should gather stones for 
 his own grave ; or that it was pinched and pressed 
 within a narrow place, that all those former impedi- 
 ments, promontories, and bars of the earth did not 
 imprison him so close as his own fear ; or whatsoever 
 it were besides, what was it else but either the mes- 
 senger and forerunner, or a near companion, to that 
 unnatural and ungracious sin, which we have often 
 already smitten at with the sword of God's Spirit, 
 accursed desperation ? How is the gold become 
 dross ? How is the soul of man turned into a carcase ? 
 The change is marvellous. That that was given to 
 quicken the body, and to put life into it, is most 
 dull and lifeless itself; that that was given to give 
 liberty, ex])Ucation, motion, agility, and art to every 
 part of the body, is now the greatest burden that the 
 body hath. If I shall give the reason hereof, it is 
 that which ]k>rnard allegeth in a sermon.* The rea- 
 sonable soul of man hath two places : an inferior, which 
 it governeth,'the body ; a superior, wherein it resteth, 
 God ; which is the same in substance that Augustine 
 had before delivered in his nineteenth treatise upon 
 Saint John,t it quickeneth, and itself is quickened. 
 
 * Scrm. xlviii. in parvis. — Anima; rationalia duo loca; 
 inferior queni regit, corpus, superior in quo requiescit, Deua. 
 
 t Vivifioat, vivificfttur. Melius ipsa quam corpus, melius 
 quiim ipsa est Ueus. 
 
Ver. 7.] 
 
 LECTURE XXVI II. 
 
 181 
 
 Wherefore if that bettor life which is from above 
 relinquish the soul, with the comforts and aids of 
 God's blessed Spirit, how is it possible but that the 
 soul should also relinquish her body, with the offices 
 of her life '? This is the reason, then, that the soul 
 fainteth: she first dieth upwards, then downwards, and 
 inwardlj' to herself. She forgetteth her Maker and 
 PreseiTer, and he Ukewise striketh her with amaze- 
 ment and confusion in all her powers, that she lioth 
 as it were in a trance, and knoweth not how to apply 
 them to their several and proper functions. 
 
 Now, therefore, if the floods and waves of the sea, 
 wherewith he was embraced on every side, had been 
 as kind unto him as ever were his mother's arms, and 
 those ragged ends of the mountains like pillows of 
 down under his bones ; if the promontories and bars 
 of the earth had unbarred themselves unto him of 
 their own accord, like those doors of the prison in the 
 Acts, to let him out ; yet, if the soul within him did 
 remain thus fettered and gv-ved with the chains of her 
 own confusion, and all the devices and counsels of her 
 heart were rather hindrances than helps unto her, and 
 her gi'eatest enmity, or at least her least friendship, 
 came from her own house, that either she thought 
 nothing, or all that she thought was but the imagina- 
 tion of a vain thing, I would not wish her greater 
 hann. He wanteth no other misery that is plagued 
 with a fainting soul. Ask not the malice of the sea, 
 the mahce of the land, the malice of hell, against him 
 whom the untowardness and distrust of his own soul 
 hath beaten down. 
 
 (3.) The third circumstance maketh mention of the 
 subject or place wherein his soul fainted, that j'ou may 
 know there is no power in man to undo such implicate 
 cords, and to loose the bands of sorrow and death, 
 unless some virtue from without set to an helping 
 hand. The sense is very plain, that in himself his 
 soul fainted, that is, there was no domestical, earthly, 
 natural help that could release him ; but when his 
 father, mother, friends, land, sea, his soul, all had 
 forsaken him, the Lord took him up, and gave him 
 better hope. For who should restore to libert}' a soul 
 confounded as this was, and re-deliver it to her former 
 abilities, teach her to understand aright, prudently to 
 deliberate, assuredly to hope '? who reconcile a man 
 fallen out with himself, and make peace within his 
 borders, or rather revive and recover a man fallen 
 from himself, but he who is said to order a good man's 
 going, and to be a God of order, not of confusion ? 
 When the earth was without form, and void, and 
 darkness upon the deep, and neither heaven nor earth, 
 land nor water, day nor night distinguished, who 
 fashioned the parts of that unshapen chaos, separated 
 light from darkness, and brought the creature into a 
 comely proportion, but even the same Lord who, 
 finding this wasteness and informity in the soul of 
 Jonah, made it perfect again ? It is evident in the 
 next words ; for mark the connection ; — ' When my 
 
 soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord.' 
 How is it possible ? for did his soul faint, and was it 
 in a manner no soul imto him (as it fareth with some 
 who seem for a space to be dead, and their spirits to 
 have forsaken them-:), was all the strength thereof 
 consumed, stifled, choked, given over within him, and 
 had he a memory left, the cofl'erer and treasm'er of 
 the soul, to remember the Lord with? How came 
 this gift of memory to a soul so taken and possessed, 
 that as Orbilius, a grammarian in Rome, forgot not 
 only the letters of the book, but his own name, so this 
 is even dead and bm'ied under itself, and hath forgot- 
 ten to think a thought, and laid aside all her accus- 
 tomed heavenly meditations. Jonah, without question, 
 had never remembered the Lord, unless the Lord had 
 fii'st remembered him. Bernard, upon the words of 
 the Canticles, ' I sought him in the night season,' 
 eveiy soul amongst you, saith he, that seeketh the 
 Lord, that_ it turn not a gi'eat blessing into a gi'eat 
 mischief, let her know that she is prevented by the 
 Lord, and that she is first sought before she can 
 seek.f For then are our greatest felicities changed 
 into our greatest woes, w^hen, being made glorious 
 bj' the graces of God, we use his gifts as if they 
 were not given, lUiinur donis tanquam non dcitis, 
 and ascribe not the glory of them to his holy name. 
 Who hath fii-st loved him ? Give me a man that ever 
 loved God, and was not first beloved, and enabled 
 thereunto, it shall be highly recompensed unto Lira. 
 But it is most certain that he loved us when we were 
 his enemies, and when we had not existence or being ; 
 I say more, when we made resistance to his kindness. 
 DiU'xit non diUrjentcs ipsum. Et non existenles, addo 
 etiam resistentes. We can promise no more, in this 
 heavenless race and exercise of Christianity, than the 
 prophet doeth in the psalm : ' I will run the ways of 
 th}' commandments, when thou hast set my heart at 
 liberty,' Ps. csix. Wilt thou run with thy feet before 
 thy heart be prepared '? Or canst thou run with thy 
 heart before God hath enlarged it ? Or canst thou run 
 the way without the way, which is Jesus Christ — a 
 way that thou canst not see till thine ej'es be opened 
 and enlightened ? Or wilt thou run the way of God's 
 commandments, when thou canst not discern the com- 
 mandments of God from the motions and fancies of 
 thine own mind '? Not so. But when the Lord shall 
 have set thine heart at liberty, then run ; when the 
 Lord hath quickened and rubbed up thy memory, then 
 remember him. Otherwise, without that help, we lie 
 lame and impotent, as the cripple at the pool of Beth- 
 esda ; all the days and years of our life are spent, like 
 his, without ease of our infirmities ; and the virtue of 
 the waters of life, as of those in the pool, are by others 
 caught from us. Jerome Iranslatoth the words with 
 
 * Sabellicus reporteth so of Joaunes Scotus. — Thesaurus, 
 Cuatos. 
 
 t Noverit se prseventam et ante qujesitam quam qusren- 
 tern. — Ser, 84 in CaiUic. 
 
182 
 
 KIXG OX JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 some little difference from otbcrs : ' I remembered the 
 Lord, that mj' prayer might come into his holy temple,' 
 rc'cordtitiis sum, ut perveniat. So his prayer came 
 unto the Lord, by means of his prayer ; for that re- 
 membering of the Lord was his jjrayer. But whence 
 came that former prayer, that made way for the latter? 
 Fulgentius, in an epistle* to Theodoriis, a senator, 
 laying a sure foundation and axiom to the rest of his 
 speech, would have all that we do, or enjoy, ascribed 
 to the grace of God ; next, that the help and assist- 
 ance of that grace must be craved of God ; thirdly, 
 that the craving of his grace is also itself the work of 
 grace ; for fu-st it beginneth to be poured into us, that 
 it may afterwards begin to be begged bj' us ;t as un- 
 less the light of the air first go into our eyes, our eyes, 
 though made to see, yet see nothing. Fourthly, we 
 cannot ask, he saith, unless we have a will to ask, and 
 what will is there if God work it not ? Lastly, he coun- 
 selleth all men diligently to converse in the Scriptm-es, 
 wherein they shall find the grace of God, both pre- 
 venting them in such sort that when they are down 
 they may rise up, and accompanying them, to 
 hold them in their right course, and foUowing them 
 till they come to these heavenly beatitudes. And as 
 he accounteth it a detestable pride of the heart of man 
 to do that which God in man condemneth (lie moancth 
 sinning), so much more detestable that, when a man 
 doth attribute to himself the gifts of God. 
 
 Thus much by the just occasion of my text, because 
 he said, when his soul fainted within him, yet he 
 remembered the Lord, which I say again he could 
 never have done, his reason, luiowledge, will, memory, 
 all being past, except the Lord had first remembered him. 
 
 2. After his fear, again his hope. ' I remembered 
 the Lord, and my prayer came unto thee into thine 
 holy temple.' The particulars are quickly had ; after 
 that fainting and fit of his soul, 1, what he did, he 
 remembered ; 2, whom he remembered, llie Lord. All 
 the rest scrveth for explication. As, namely, 3, how 
 he remembered him, by prtii/er. For it secmeth that 
 not only his memory, but all the faculties and affec- 
 tions of his soul were set on work by him. 4. How 
 his prayer sped ; it was not stopped by the way, but 
 awte unto the Lord, and did the part of a trusty 
 ambassador. 5. It is not amiss to know, that every 
 soul is the Lord's; the soul of the father and the soul 
 of the child are his, and the promises are made not 
 only to Abraham, but to his seed after him, and to all 
 that seed in particular, for ho is neither multiplied 
 with multitudes, nor scanted with paucities; so caring 
 for one, that ho omitteth not the care of many; so for 
 many, that he ceaseth not to care for one;; and thcre- 
 
 * Epist. vi. 
 
 t Ut desidcrcnnis adjutorium gratije, hoc ipsiim quoquo 
 opus est gratite. Ipsa incipit iiifmicli, ut incipiiit posci, &c. 
 
 I Nee ad niiiUos multus, nee ad pnucitatcm curus. Sic 
 uni intentu.s, ut non dctentus ; sic phiribus, ut iion distenlus. 
 — Jiern. Ser. G9 in Canl. 
 
 fore the prayer here sent was peculiarly his own, as 
 of a person accepted and chosen unto the Lord : nnj 
 prayer. 6. The faithful conjunction of his soul with 
 God, which the apostrophe, and sudden change of the 
 speech, causeth me to note. For now he speakelhnot 
 to us, or to his own spirit as before, I remembered the 
 Lord, but iTuto the Lord himself, laying his mouth to 
 those pure and undefiled ears : my prayer came unto 
 thee. 7. The place wherein it was presented unto 
 him, into thine hohj temple, which either he meaneth 
 of heaven, the palace and basilic of the great king, or 
 of the temple of Jerusalem, which all the children of 
 God in those days had respect unto. So Daniel, 
 though he prayed in Babylon, yet ' opened he the 
 windows of his chamber towards Jerusalem,' Dan. vi. 
 And Solomon made request at the dedication of the 
 temple, that if ever his people in the time of famine, 
 battle, captivitj-, or any the like tribulation, should pray 
 towards that city, and towards that house of pra3-er, the 
 Lord that sat in heaven would vouchsafe to hear them. 
 Though not sure of the place, yet this I am sure of, 
 that whethersoever of the two be spoken of, the holy 
 Lord hath dedicated it to holiness, and called it by 
 the name of ' an holy temple,' setting therebj' a bar 
 about it, as he did about the mount, to keep out beasts 
 and brutish men. For as his temple upon the earth 
 none should, so that other, more sacred and secret, 
 that is in heaven, none shall ever enter into, that 
 is unholy and unclean. To draw these scattered 
 branches home to their root again, the general sub- 
 stance of them altogether is this, that Jonah received 
 hope by remembering the Lord for his part, and that 
 the Lord on the other side accepted his prayer and 
 gave success to it. As Jeremiah spake in the Lamen- 
 tations, chap, ii., so might Jonah say, ' It is the 
 mercy of the Lord that I am not consumed.' The 
 reason is, ' For his compassions fail not.' The danger 
 seemed uncurable, because it liglited upon the soul, 
 not to the crazing and distempering alone, but the 
 utter overwhelming of it, and no hope left in himself 
 to heal the hurt. What doth he, then ? He betakelh 
 himself to the glass of memory, to see what succour 
 he can find there ; and as it is placed in the hinder 
 part of the head, so he reserveth it for the hinder part 
 of his miseries, and maketh it his latest refuge to ease 
 his heart. 
 
 I have read of memories in some men almost 
 incredible. Seneca writoth of himself,* that he had a 
 viry flourishing memory, not only for use, but to 
 deserve admiration. He was able to recite by heart 
 two thousand names in the same order wherein they 
 were first digested. Fortius Ijatro, in the same author, 
 wrote that in his mind which other in note-books, 
 codiees superrneuos fecertit, a man most cunninc in 
 histories. If you had named a captain unto him, ho 
 would have run through his acts presentlj'. Cyneas 
 being sent from Pyrrhus in an embassage to Rome, the 
 * Proocra. Cursor. 
 
Ym. 7.J 
 
 LECTURE XXVIII. 
 
 183 
 
 next day after lie came thither saluted all the senators 
 by their names, and the people round about them : a 
 singular gift from God in those that have attained 
 thereto, hovvsoeYer it be used. But yet as the object 
 which memory apprehendeth is more principal, so the 
 gift more commendable ; as Tullj', comparing Lucul- 
 lus and Hortensius together, both being of a wonder- 
 ful memory, yet preferreth Lucullus before Hortensius, 
 because he remembered matter, this but words. Now 
 the excellentest object of all others, either for the 
 memory to account, or for any other part of the soul to 
 conceive, is the Lord. For he that remembereth the 
 Lord, as the Lord hath remembered him, that_^nameth 
 his blessings by their names, as God the stars, and 
 calleth them to mind in that number and order that 
 God hath bestowed them upon him, if not to remember 
 them in particular, which are more than the hairs of 
 his head, yet to take their view in gross, and to fold 
 them up in a general sum, as David did, ' What shall 
 I render to the Lord for all his benetlts ?' though he 
 forget his own people and his father's bouse, though 
 the wife of his bosom and the fruit of his own loins, 
 yea, though he forget to eat his bread, it skilleth not, 
 he remembereth all in all, and his memory hath done 
 him service enough in reaching that object. And for 
 your better encouragement to make this use of me- 
 mory, understand that it is a principal means to avoid 
 desperation, only to call to mind the goodness of the 
 Lord forepassed either to ourselves or others. Think 
 with yourselves, that as ' it was he that took you from 
 your mother's womb, and hath been your hope ever 
 since you hung at the breasts, and hath opened his 
 hands from time to time to fill you with his goodness,' 
 so he is as able to bless you still. Compare and lay 
 together the times as David did, that because he bad 
 slain a lion and a bear at the fold, therefore God 
 would also enable him to prevail against Goliab. So 
 if the mercies of the Lord have been so bountiful 
 towards you in former times, to create you of the slime 
 of the ground, and to put a living and reasonable soul 
 into you, to nurse you up in a civil and well-mannered 
 country, to redeem you with the blood of his begotten 
 Sou, to visit you with the light of his gospel, to justify 
 you with the power of his free gratuital grace, to till 
 your garners with store andj'our baskets with increase, 
 and to give your sons and daughters to the defying of 
 your enemies in the gates ; say to yourselves, ' His 
 arm is not shortened,' he is the same to-day that 
 j'esterday, he will never forsake us with his loving- 
 kindness. This is the course that David taketh in 
 the Psalms, a captain never more skilful to lead in the 
 wars, though the Lord bad taught his fingers to fight, 
 than to conduct the desolate in the battles of con- 
 science : Ps. XXV., 'Call to remembrance thy tender 
 mercies, Lord, which have been ever of old.' This 
 was the song that he sang to himself in the night 
 season, in the closet and choir of his own breast, when 
 he communed with his private heart, and ' searched 
 
 out his spirits diligently.' ' Hath the Lord forgotten to 
 be gracious ?' Ps. Ixxvii. He hath then left his old 
 wont. No; David forgot that the Lord was gracious, 
 and afterwords confessed his fault of forgetfulness, 
 stirred ujj his decayed memory, and said, ' But I will 
 remember the years of the right hand of the Most 
 High.' Not the moments, not the hours, nor days, of 
 a few momentary afflictions, which he hath dealt forth 
 unto me with his left hand, but the years of his right 
 hand, his wonders and acts that have been ever of old. 
 So likewise in another psalm : ' Our fathers have 
 trusted in thee, Lord ; our fathers have trusted in thee, 
 and were not confounded,' Ps. xxii. What is that to 
 us ? Yes ; we are the children of those fathers, sons 
 of the same hope, and heirs of the same promises. 
 AVhen the disciples of Christ mistook the meaning of their 
 Master touching the leaven of the pharisees, suppos- 
 ing he had said so, because they had brought no bread, 
 he reproved them for lack of memory: ' ye of little 
 faith, why think you thus in yourselves ? Do je not 
 remember the five loaves, when there were five thou- 
 sand men, and how many baskets full ye took up ? 
 neither the seven loaves when there were four thou- 
 sand men, and how many baskets ye took up,' 
 Mat. xvi. Thus wo should remember indeed how few 
 loaves, and how many thousands of men have been 
 fed with them, and what reversions and remnants of 
 mercy the Lord hath in store for other times. 
 good Jesus (saith Bernard upon the Canticles*), we 
 run after the smell of thine ointments, the perfume 
 and sweet savour of thy fat mercies. We have heard 
 that thou never despisest the poor afflicted. Thou 
 didst not abhor the thief upon the cross confessing 
 unto thee, nor Matthew sitting at receipt of custom, 
 nor the woman that washed thy feet with her tears, 
 nor the woman of Canaan that begged for her daughter, 
 nor the woman taken in adultery, nor the publican 
 standing afar oft', nor the disciple that denied thee, nor 
 the disciple that persecuted thee and thine, nor the 
 wicked that crucified thee ; therefore we run after the 
 smell of thine ointments, and hope to be refreshed 
 with the like scent of grace. 
 
 Many have written precepts of memory, and made 
 a memorative art, appointing places and their furni- 
 ture for the help of such as are unexperienced. I will 
 also give you some helps. When your soul beginneth 
 to faint, as this prophet's did, remember what the 
 Lord is by name. Jehocah, a God not in show, but 
 in substance and performance. ' For they that know 
 thy name will trust in thee,' Ps. ix. Remember what 
 by nature, rich, in mercy, as others are rich in treasure, 
 Eph. ii. His justice, wisdom, and power, and what- 
 soever he hath, or rather is, besides, are also infinite 
 riches. God hath scarcity of nothing. But as his 
 mercy is above all his works, so the riches of his 
 grace above all other riches. Remember what he is 
 by promise. The Lord is faithful. ' I know whom I 
 * Ser. xxii. in Cantio. 
 
184. 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. JI. 
 
 have believed, and I am sure he is able to keep that 
 ■which I have committed uuto him,' 2 Tim. i. ; 'His 
 truth shall be thy shield and thy buckler,' Ps. xci. ; 
 ' Lord, be mindful of thy word, wherein thou hast 
 caused thy servant to put his trust,' Ps. csix. If God 
 be God, follow him, believe him, build upon his word ; 
 his fidelity is a thousand times alleged, that it may be 
 past doubt. Piemember what he is by covenant, made 
 unto Abraham and his whole seed, not in the blood of 
 bulls and goats, but in the blood of the seed of Abra- 
 ham : ' my people,' saith God by his prophet 
 Micah, chap, vi., ' Piemember what Balak king of 
 Moab had devised, and what Balaam the son of Bcor 
 answered him, that j-e may know the righteousness of 
 the Lord.' He crieth unto us all at this day, my 
 people, remember what the prince of darkness had 
 devised against you, and how Jesus Christ the Son of 
 the living God hath answered him, and stopped his 
 mouth with a voice of blood, and nailed his accusations 
 to a cross, that ye may know the righteousness of the 
 Lord, how assured it is to those that believe it. This, 
 this is the 'sure foundation,' Isa. xxviii., which he 
 that buildeth upon shall never fall. This is 'the 
 stone that was laid in Zion ; ' as for the bow of steel, 
 the wedge of gold, the strength of an horse, the pro- 
 mise of a man, lighter upon the balance than vanity 
 itself, the righteousness of the law, merits of saints, 
 they are the stones of Babylon. This hath been tried 
 to the proof, precious above all the merchandise of 
 Tyre ; and standeth in the head of the corner. He 
 
 that believeth in this stone, let him not haste, saith 
 the prophet. Let him not yield too soon to the frailty 
 of his flesh, nor be over-credulous to the suggestions of 
 Satan, nor suffer his hope to be quelled at the first or 
 second assault ; let him stay the leisure of the Lord, 
 for he will certainly visit him. I have shewed you 
 some helps and dii-ections for memory. I know no 
 better hiding-place from the wind, nor surer refuge 
 from the tempest, as Isaiah speaketh, no safer har- 
 bours and receptacles whei'ein to repose your wearied 
 souls, than those I have spoken of. What better secret 
 or shadow hath the Llost High? What closer wings, 
 warmer feathers to keep you from the snare of the 
 hunter — I mean not Nimrod or Esau, mighty, hairy, 
 and wild, making but temporal preys either of men or 
 beasts ; but the hunter of your souls, then when you 
 are distressed, and compassed with troubles round 
 about, and sins, which are the sorest troubles of all 
 other, have taken such hold upon you that you dai'e 
 not look up, when the soul faiuteth, as this prophet's 
 did, -wisdom hath hid itself, and understanding is gone 
 aside into a secret chamber, that you know not what 
 to advise, nor where to fetch a thought that maj- 
 minister comfort, than to remember the Lord of 
 hosts his name, how strong a tower of defence it is ; 
 his nature, how sweet and amiable ; his promises, 
 how faithful ; his covenant, how precious in his 
 eyes ; that the Lord may remember you again in his 
 holy kingdom ? 
 
 LECTURE XXIX. 
 
 They that wall upon li/iii// ranilies forsake their oini mercij. But I will sacrifice uiilo ihee, dr. — Jon.yh II. 8, 9. 
 
 THE narration is ended. Wc are now to annex the 
 conclusion of the song, wherein the prophet be- 
 taketh himself to a thankful acknowledgment, and as 
 his tenuity will give him leave, a remuneration and 
 requital of the goodness of the Lord, which his heart 
 had presumed before. The parts are three : 1. A 
 confutation and reproof of all kinds of idolaters, who, 
 as they call upon false gods, so they are likely to be 
 sped but with false deliverances : ' They that wait 
 upon Ij'ing vanities forsake their own mercy.' 2. An 
 affirmative or positive determination, and as it were 
 bond that he takcth of himself, to render kindness to 
 his merciful and faithful Lord : ' But I will sacrifice, 
 &c., and will pay that that I have vowed.' 3. A sen- 
 tence of acclamation, the aphorism and juice of the 
 whole song, the conclusion of the conclusion, the com- 
 prehension of sacrifice's, vows, prayers, thanksgivings, 
 all things : ' Salvation is the Lord's, or the Lord.' 
 
 1. 'J'lieij thai wait iqiou lijiixj ranilies f(>rsal;e Ihcir 
 own mercij. What eomnimiion is tlicrc between dark- 
 ness and light, falsehood and truth, the table of devils 
 and the table of the Lord, idolatr}- and the right ser- 
 
 vice of the righteous God? This is the cause that 
 Jonah bcginueth with confutation. Before he will 
 plant the vineyard, he will remove stones, and briars, 
 and all other obstacles that maj- hurt the growth of 
 the vines. Before he buildeth bis house, he will first 
 pull down a ruinous and rotten foundation. So is the 
 duty of a prophet in the tu-st of Jeremiah, ' This daj' 
 have I set thee over nations and kingdoms,' y/cs/, ' to 
 pluck up, to root out, destroy, thi'ow down ;' secondly, 
 ' to plant, and build, and set up again.' And so is 
 the duty of an evangelist also, who hath received the 
 administration of the gospel of Christ, first to prepare 
 the way, as it were, and to make straight paths before 
 the face of Christ ; that is, first to reprove and then to 
 teach concerning doctrine, first to correct and after- 
 wards to inform touching conversation, 2 Tim. ii. 
 John Baptist, you know, a middle man between the 
 law and the gospel, a prophet and more than a prophet 
 because he both foresaw, and visibly saw the Lord o 
 life, both prophesied and pointed with his finger, tmn- 
 ing his face, like their Jauus in Rome, both w'liys ; he 
 first made ready the houses and hewts of the people 
 
Vee. 8, 9.J 
 
 LECTURE XXIX. 
 
 185 
 
 before the King of Zion came, ' cast down hills, lifted 
 up valleys,' &c., that the gospel of the kiugdom might 
 Lave the freer admission. He began his preachings 
 with reprehension of then- vicious hves, ' ye genera- 
 tion of vipers ;' and convulsion of their false grounds, 
 ' Say not within yom'selves, we have Abraham to our 
 father,' &c. ' No man setteth a new piece to an old 
 garment ;' he maketh the rent but worse. ' No man 
 putteth new wine into old bottles ;' for he then marreth 
 both. It is to little piu'pose to offer truth, and the 
 tidings of peace, the news of the New Testament, to 
 the old man whose ancient corruptions hang ui^on him, 
 and his wedded conscience is thoroughlj- seized and 
 possessed with inveterate errors. There is but one 
 truth, oppugned by falsehoods without number, like 
 the aiTus of the sea ; but the nature and corn-age of 
 that one truth is, wheresoever she findeth falsehood, 
 not to dissemble her quarrel and emulation to her 
 enemy, but to play the part of truth, that is, simply, 
 ingenuously, apparently, to defy her adversary, and to 
 withstand her to the teeth. Fulgentius, in his first 
 book to Thrasymuud, king of Vandals, giveth the 
 reason of this orderly proceeding : Feiie id esse fide in 
 nolle assereie, quod iier/tire, it is almost all one to deny 
 the faith, and not to maintain it. He bringeth the 
 reason of that also : Uno eodemque silentio finntit erro- 
 rem, qtiijerrore seu iepoie i^ossessiis s'dendo non astniit 
 reritalem, because, by one and the same silence he 
 strengtheneth error, who, through fear or negUgenee 
 holding his peace, affii'meth not the truth ; as a 
 sleepy sentinel betrayeth the tents of the king, not that 
 he hath a will perhaps to betray them, but because he 
 keepetb not the watch as he ought, nor dcscrieth the 
 enemy which cometh to assault them. One heaven 
 holdeth not Michael and the di'agon in peace, nor one 
 house the ark and dagon, nor one womb Jacob and 
 Esau, nor one temple prayer and merchandising, nor 
 one camp the clean and the leprous, nor one bath John 
 and Cerinthus, nor one heart God and mammon, nor 
 one tongue God and Milchom, nor one conscience truth 
 and falsehood, religion and superstition. This, I sup- 
 pose, was the reason why Jonah beginneth his speech 
 with a triumph against idolaters, and being to magnify 
 the strong ann of the Lord, doth it with disdain and 
 contempt of all those that seek miprofitable means. 
 Thus much generally touching his order of proceeding. 
 The refutation divideth itself into two parts, an 
 antecedent and consequent, a position and privation, 
 what they do, whom he taxeth by his speech, and what 
 they lose by so doing. If they ' observe lying vani- 
 ties,' which is the former, they are sure to ' forsake 
 their osvn mercy,' which is the latter. In both these 
 joined together, the parts are so disposed, that there 
 is a matching of three with three. On the one side, 
 (1.) they are said to love, to be intentive and fond 
 upon ; (2.) that which they love is vanity, emptiness, 
 nothing ; (3.) that vanity is lijiiir/, fraudulent, deceit- 
 ful unto them. On the other, whereas they loved 
 
 before, now (1.) they leave, abandon, give over; (2.) 
 that which they leave, instead of vanity, is mercy, 
 which ;;might do them good ; (3.) that mercy is theiy 
 own, as proper and peculiar unto them, if they would 
 use it, as ever anything in then- rightful possession. 
 Do ye not see the change that worldlings make : corn 
 for acorns ; a state of innocency, immortahty, incor- 
 ruption, for an apple ; the prerogative of bnthright, 
 with the blessing that belongeth unto it, for a mess of 
 pottage, belly cheer, as Esau did; a kingdom upon 
 earth, and the kingdom of heaven also, for oxen, and 
 asses, and sheep, as Saul did; Christ, his gospel, 
 his mu'acles, his salvation, for an herd of swine with 
 the Gadareues; God for idols, mercy for vanity, the 
 comfortablest natiu-e that ever was created, for that 
 which profiteth not? 
 
 It is thought by some, that the speech here used is, 
 by a concession or insultation, against idolaters, and 
 as it were a farewell and defiance unto them. Derelin- 
 qiiant, ' let them forsake their own mercy,' if they like 
 the change so well, and 'will not receive warning; as 
 he in the comedy, Pereal, perdat, profitndat, let him 
 sink, and waste, and consume all that he hath, I will 
 never speak word unto him more. Against sinners 
 past grace, you shall often find renouncements unto 
 them: Ps. Ixis., ' Lay iniquity to their iniquity, and 
 never let them come into thy righteousness.' When 
 they have sold themselves to sin, and hate to be 
 reformed, this is the mercy that bcfitteth them. ' Re- 
 prove not a scorner,' saith Solomon, Prov. ix., ' lest 
 he bate thee.' If there be any amongst us with whom 
 the mercy of God is so vile and contemptible, that it 
 is not of force to over-sway lying vanity, but vanity is 
 the stronger man, and keepeth the house against mercy, 
 let them go on in vanitj- still, and as Christ gave over 
 the Scribes, Mat. xxiii., let them fulfil the measm'e of 
 their wretched choice. But let them know withal, 
 that as the prodigal son forsook his father's house for 
 a strange countr}'; his father's favour and inheritance 
 for a bag of monej'; father, and kindred, and friends, 
 for unhouest and uucourteous harlots; and the bread 
 in his father's house for the husks of beans which the 
 sw'iue abi'oad fed upon, and his soul desired : so they 
 forsake God for this present w'orld, heaven for earth, 
 the pleasure of sin for a season, fof everlastmg plea- 
 sures at God's right hand, and finally their own mercy, 
 as faithful and true unto them as ever was their soul 
 to then- body, for whorish and foreign vanities, which 
 live and die in an instant of time, and leave no sub- 
 stance behind them. Oh how happy were our Uves, 
 think we, if these two might stand together, vanity for 
 a while, till we had satisfied ourselves therewith, and 
 afterwards mercy with a wish ! ' Let me fii'st go kiss 
 my father,' and take my leave of friendly delights; let 
 me not sufl'er the flower of mine ago to pass without 
 garlands of rose-buds and sweet ointments, then I will 
 come and follow thee. It must not be. The liuu and 
 the bullock, leopard and kid, may feed and lie together, 
 
186 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II, 
 
 but vanity waited upon, as my text speaketh (service- 
 ably pursued, otiiciously and diligently embraced, and 
 di'awn with cords, as another prophet hath), and the 
 mercy of God, have no agreement. 
 
 1. In the former and positive member of the refu- 
 tation, we are directed to three particulars : first, their 
 habit and afl'ection of whom he speaketh, who are not 
 content to think of, or sometimes to commit, a vanity, 
 but they love, observe, attend upon it. They keep it, 
 and maketh much thereof, saith Jerome, as if they had 
 found a treasure, quasi invcnerint tliesauniui. Lyra 
 noteth pierseverance, Mercer pertinacy, as of a thing, 
 that in no case they can be persuaded to forego, inoi- 
 dicus retintnt. Secondly, the natm-e of that which 
 their affections are set upon ; vanity, that which is 
 not, as Narcissus loved the shadow that the water 
 cast up, nay, vanities. The singular is not enough 
 to express their folly. They run through all the 
 classes and ranks of vanity, the kennel and sink of as 
 much as their hearts can devise. Thirdly, the quality 
 of these vanities, that which must needs accompany* 
 them, unless they could cease to be vanities, that they 
 are lijing Mid unprofitable, ha\-ing no solidit}' in them. 
 The first noteth their superstition, in that they are so 
 diligent and observant. The second their folly and 
 indiscretion, in making so bad a choice. The third 
 then- confusion, that they trust and are tied to that 
 wherein no substance, no succour is. 
 
 (1.) They that love lying vanities. I know not so 
 well the reason, but I find that conclusion everywhere 
 jiroved, which our Saviour layeth dowTi in the Gospel, 
 ' The children of this world are wiser in their genera- 
 tion than the children'of light.' First there is nothing 
 that winneth the common people (mark it when you 
 will) more than superstition.* Add the judgment of 
 the Roman orator in the second place, f a man that 
 is won to superstition can never be quiet in mind. 
 Which, whether it be our pride that we are all in love, 
 as Pygmalion with his picture, so we with the works 
 of our hands, and devices of our heads, and there- 
 fore the true service of God we are not so soon allured 
 with, because it cometh by precept, as with the inven- 
 tions of our own braio, because we are the authors of 
 them cm-selves (Philo implieth so much, writing of 
 religions, that every man's part seemetb best unto 
 him, sua ciiique optima, because they judge not by 
 reason, but by afi'ection), or whether it be the care and 
 vigilancy of the devil, whom be hath gotten prisoners, 
 those to load witli the more irons, and to keep them 
 in safe custody, and if it be possible, to make them 
 love their captivity ; or whatsoever the cause else be, 
 this I know (to l)egin at the head), that Satan will 
 spare no pains in compassing the whole earth to gain 
 a soul, a Scribe or Pharisee will travel sea and land to 
 
 * Nulla res efEcaciila multitiuiinem movet quam supcr- 
 stitio. — Curt. 
 
 t Siipcrstitione qui est imbutus, quietus es33 minquam 
 potest. 
 
 win a proselyte, an idolatrous Jew will freely bestow 
 his jewels and earrings to make a golden calf, an Am- 
 monite will not spare his son or daughter from the fire 
 to sacrifice to Moloch, a priest of Baal will cut and 
 lance his own flesh to demerit his idol, a false prophet 
 will wear a garment of hail- next his skin to deceive 
 with, a friar will whip himself till the blood run down 
 his shoulders, the fathers and children of Babylon will 
 rise early and late to keep canonical hours, observe 
 fasts, walk pilgi-imagcs, run over their beads, and rather 
 lose a limb of their bodies than a ceremony of their 
 church, and in every act of their councils, and third 
 line of their writings, aiiatliema to men and angels that 
 hold otherwise. 
 
 Let it be their commendation that they take such 
 pains to do wickedly, Jer. ix. A thief is more watch- 
 ful to break through the house than the goodman to 
 guard it. The traitors that Ca3sar feared in Rome 
 were not those that were fat and well in proof, but 
 niacilcnti ct pallidi, Cassius and Brutus, that were lean 
 and pale, spending the sap of their flesh with travail- 
 ing, watching, plotting devices. 
 
 (2). What is it they love and labour upon so much ? 
 ]'i(inties. ' Is it not of the Lord of hosts that men 
 shall labom' in the fire,' to bm-n and consimie them- 
 selves, ' and the people shall even weary themselves 
 for very vanity' ? Hab. ii. They that j^lough wicked 
 ncss (a toilsome occupation), do they not reap iniquity 
 and eat the fruit of lies, because they trust in their 
 own ways ? Hos. x. A man may ask them with the 
 prophet, Isa. Iv., 'Wherefore bestow you your labour 
 and are not satisfied ? ' Or with the apostle, Rom. 
 vi., when he seeth their labour lost, ' ^^^lat profit had 
 ye in those things whereof ye are now ashamed ?' 
 
 The vanities he nameth are not only the idols of 
 the heathen, which have neither sight in their eyes 
 nor hearing in their ears, nor breath in their nostrils, 
 nor help in their hands to wipe away the dust from 
 their own faces ; but whatsoever the world hath, 
 visible or invisible, outward or inward, besides dis- 
 placing God of his right, and bearing our heart and 
 hope after it, it is our idol in some sort, and one of 
 those lying vanities that is here mentioned. Jonah 
 committed idolatry in leaving the mandate of God, 
 and bending his journey after the lusts of his owu 
 heart. That unprobablc cogitation which he fancied 
 to himself, of escaping the presence of God by taking 
 a contrary way, was the idol he seiTcd and waited 
 upon, and the lying vanity wherewith he was bcgniled. 
 The God of heaven called unto him, ' Arise, go to 
 Nineveh ; ' the god of his own making, the device 
 of his brain, commanilod otherwise. Arise, flee to 
 Tarsus. The covetous man is called an idolater in 
 plain terms, ]?iph. v. Job cxpresscth the right form 
 of their canonization, whereby they make gold a god : 
 ' They say to their wedge, Thou art my confidence.' 
 As treason and rebellion putteth up a new king (Absa- 
 lom for David), so covetousness a new god, mammon 
 
Yer. 8, 9.J 
 
 LECTURE XXIX. 
 
 187 
 
 for Jeliovali. You ' canuot serve God aud mammon.' 
 Dispute uot superfluously and idly * tbat j'ou can do 
 it, for God bath pronounced the contrary, Ou h-ovaeh. 
 God crieth, Lend, give, scatter, cast upon the waters, 
 feed, clothe, visit, harbour, and is not obeyed. 
 Mammon crieth on the other side, Take, gather, ex- 
 tort, striji, starve, spoil, aud is hearkened unto. 
 Whether of these two is now the God '? 
 
 Another idolatry is mentioned by Habakkuk, in the 
 irrst of his prophecy, of those that ' sacrifice to their 
 nets, and burn incense to their flews ; ' who, because 
 their portion is increased and their meat plenteous by 
 these instruments and helps which they use in their 
 trades of fishing or the like, they forget the right 
 author of their thrift, and arrogate all to themselves 
 and their serviceable means. Some make an idol of 
 taeir own brain, as the king of Tyi-e did, who thought 
 that ' by his wisdom and understanding he had gotten 
 riches into his treasury,' Ezek. sxviii., and his heart 
 was so highly exalted with that conceit, that he could 
 not forbear that most blasphemous and Luciferian 
 presiunption, I am a god ! Such are the statesmen 
 (as they love to be hekl), the politicians and Machia- 
 vellists of our sinful age, plotters of kingdoms and 
 commonweals, who think themselves wiser thanDanicl, 
 as the king of Tyre did, and that Moses and the pro- 
 phets are not so able to instruct them as they them- 
 selves. Some make an idol of the strength of their 
 arms, as Sennacherib did : ' By the multitude of my 
 chariots have I done thus and thus,' Isa. xxxvii. ; but 
 touching the true Lord of hosts, as if be were less than 
 nothing, and had lost the strength of his mighty arm, 
 he vaunteth to the king of Judah, ' Let not thy God 
 deceive thee.' The end of all is this, idolum nihil est, 
 an idol is so far from being more than vanity, that it 
 is mere nothing. I know, in an idol of silver, or gold, 
 or brass, there is both matter and fashion. Gold is 
 gold, and the thoughts of om- hearts, thoughts ; our 
 wisdom, beauty, and strength are qualities that have 
 their being. And if we make either belly or back our 
 god, they arc both creatures that God hath made, but 
 they are nothing of that which we suppose them to bo. 
 We make them our honom*, our hope, our confidence ; 
 such they are not. For j'et a little while, and the 
 moth, the worm, rottenness, rust, and consumption 
 shall inherit them all. The righteous shall behold it 
 and fear, aud laugh them to scorn that have been so 
 mad after vanities. 7'Jcce homo, ' Behold the man 
 which hath not made God his helper, but trusted in 
 riches,' Ps. Hi., or other like transitory things. 
 Wlierefore I exhort you all, as Paul his auditors at 
 Lystra, Acts xiv., that ye turn from these vain hopes, 
 ' from these foolish and paltry idols,' Ato ro-Jniv tuv 
 [lardiuv (whether you ai'e fallen in liking \vith your- 
 selves or other creatures), ' to serve the living God, 
 which made the heavens, the earth, the sea, and all 
 that therein is.' 
 
 ••■ Ex siiperfluo. — Chrysost. 
 
 The prophet might have called them by other 
 names, to note that iniquity, filthiness, abomination, 
 that is found in them ; but (setting the Lord and his 
 kingdom aside) he taxeth the whole world and what- 
 soever is therein contained, with the general censure 
 of Solomon, ' Vanity of vanities, all is vanitj'.' He 
 that filled the earth with his wisdom as with a 
 flood, filled it also with vanity as \rith a flood ; he 
 smitetb on both cheeks, vanity and vanity again ; 
 and to shew that he did not repent him of bis speech, 
 pronounceth a third time, ' All is vanity,' that you 
 may know whatsoever you may cleave unto besides the 
 true subsisting Lord, it hath not that substance and 
 certainty which you first imagined. 
 
 Therefore is the attribute set unto it, in the next 
 place, hjinfj vanit;/, because there is nothing but deceit 
 in them. In the 4th of Genesis, when Eve had 
 brought forth her first-begotten son, she called him 
 Cain, a man purchased or obtained of the Lord. 
 Some say more, ' I have obtained the man tbat is the 
 Lord,' vinim acqiiisivi Jehovam ; thinking, undoubt- 
 edly, that she had been the mother of that blessed 
 seed which should bruise the head of the serpent. 
 But finding herself deceived, and ovei-weening, in a 
 corrupt, cruel man, she named her second son Abel, 
 that is, r(i)iil>j, to note that her former hope was alto- 
 gether frustrated. The epithet is very fitly adjoined 
 to vanity, and in eflect significth the same that vanity 
 doth, for what is vanity but lying and deceiving ? 
 Aulus Gcllius* wTileth of a vain grammarian that 
 made himself most skilful in Sallust's words. Apolli- 
 naris, to trj' his skill, met him on a daj-, aud asked 
 bim what Sallust meant (if be were so cunning in the 
 blood and marrow of his history as he professed), by 
 saj'iug of C. Lentulus that it was a question whether 
 he were more foolish or vain, stolidiorne e.tset. an 
 vanior. The interpreter answered him, The know- 
 ledge I take upon me is in ancient words, priscontJii 
 ego verhoruni, dr., not these that are common and 
 worn by daily use. For he is more foolish and 
 vain than was that Lentulus, who knoweth not that 
 both these words note but the same weakness. Ai^ol- 
 linaris, not satisfied with this answer, and to satisfy 
 others that desired to be better instructed by him, at 
 length resolved that they were properly termed vain 
 men, not as the common people held, who were dull- 
 ards, witless, and fools, but in the opinion of the most 
 ancient learned, such as were given to lying and faith- 
 lessness, menJaces et injidi, dr., who gave lightness 
 for weight, and emptiness for that that hath true sub- 
 stance. Now, as in an idol in propriety, there are 
 sundry reasons that make it to be a lying vanity, for, 
 Jiist, the author and suggester was the father of lies ; 
 secoiulhj, the former of it lied to himself in thinking 
 til at it was the pleasure of God that idols should be 
 fashioned ; third! tj, he that trusteth therein lieth, for 
 he sayeth to wood or stone, Thou art my helper ; 
 * Lib. xviii., Noct. Attic, cap. iv. 
 
188 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 fourthly, the whole substance of the idol lietb, sub- 
 stantia tola mentitur, in promising help where none 
 is, and seeming to he that which it is not ; so, on the 
 other side, those other idols which I named a'e lying 
 vanities, and shall as little profit us when we crave 
 their truth, as gi-ass the mower that groweth upon the 
 house tops. If we trust unto them, let us look for no 
 better aid and comfort therein than those others in the 
 prophet, who confessed too late, ' We have made 
 falsehood our refuge, and under vanity are we hid,' 
 Isa. xxviii. I conclude the fii'st member. ' Trust 
 not in oppression or robbery. If riches increase, set 
 not your heart upon them.' ' JIau disquieteth him- 
 self in vain,' saith the psalm, ' heapeth up riches, not 
 knowing who shall gather them.' 'An horse is but 
 a vain thing to save a man, neither is it his bow that 
 can deliver him.' A man is a vain thing to save a 
 man; if you weigh him upon the balance, you shall 
 find him lighter than vanity. AVisdom is as vain, and 
 shall become as foolish as of the beasts that perish. 
 Strength is as vain, and shall become as weak as 
 water spilt. Beauty is as vain, and shall be changed 
 into loathsomeness more than the sores of Lazarus. 
 All these ai'e vanities, and vain vanities, lying vani- 
 ties, as empty as the wind, as fleeting as the mist iu 
 the air. God only is true, and his promise just. 
 ' His faithfulness is above the clouds, and his right- 
 eousnsss esceedeth as the gi-eatest mountains.' 
 
 2. The consequent or private* part of the refutation is 
 in the words following, ' They forsake their own mercy.' 
 (1.) Mercy forsaketh not them, but they mercy : 
 derelinqunt nvn dcrcliiuiintnhir. God is ever, foremost 
 in love, never hateth till he is first hated : Deus prior 
 in atnore, postrrior in odiu. It is not only to hazard, 
 and put in adventure, nor to extenuate and diminish 
 the mercy of God, but wholly to renounce it, and so 
 send a farewell to God, to embrace vanities. It is a 
 wall of partition betwixt us and grace ; I had almost 
 said it is as the great gulf that was betwixt Abraham 
 and the rich man. Surely it shall stand as the faith- 
 ful witness in heaven, that ' neither idolater, nnr adul- 
 terer, nor covetous persons' (both which, with many 
 other oli'enders, are idolaters in another kind), ' shall 
 ever inherit the kingdom of God,' Luke xvi. You see 
 how the consequence holdoth. Love they the one ? 
 They certainly leave the other. There is no halting be- 
 twixt two opinions; if God be God, they must follow 
 him alone ; there is no mingling of Baal with him. 
 Our God is a jealous God, and sutfereth no copartner 
 or competitor iu any part of that honour that belong- 
 eth unto him. 
 
 (2.) But in leaving mcrci/, so sweet and amiable a 
 nature in him that is love itself, unwise and unhappy 
 wretches, what do they leave ? More than all the 
 worldly solaces shall be able to supply unto them ; 
 they leave even the ' bowels of mercy,' '^-Xay/^a 
 iXfou,, as Zacharias sang in tlie Gospel of Luke, 
 * Qu. ' privative ' ? — Ed. 
 
 chap, i.; for 'as a father pitieth his children' (and 
 more by a thousand degrees), ' so hath the Lord com- 
 passion toward all them that fear him,' Ps. ciii. And 
 ' a mother may forget the fruit of her womb,' but the 
 Lord shall never forget his children of election. These 
 bowels and inwards of mercy they leave (mercy so 
 deep and afl'ectionate, that the seat of aftections in 
 man sufficeth not to express it) that relinquish God's 
 mercy. It had been more ease and happiness unto 
 them if their own bowels had fallen from their bodies, 
 as the bowels of Judas. They leave not handfuls of 
 barley and pieces of bread, temporal and trifling com- 
 modities, parcels of that bounty and goodness which 
 God hath bestowed upon them, but the universal 
 mercy of God, as great in quantity as the space of the 
 whole world ; for ' look how high the heaven is above 
 the earth, so great is his mercy towards them that fear 
 him ;' nay, the world may be measured and spanned, 
 but ' of his goodness there is no end.' They leave that 
 mercy that is better than their life, Ps. Ixiii. ; for what 
 is life without mercy '? Mercy gave it unto them at 
 the first, mercy preserveth it, mercy shall exchange it 
 hereafter, and mercy restore it at the last day. With- 
 out this life of mercy to their mortal lives, they live, 
 or rather die, in everlasting misery. Peter told his 
 Master in the Gospel, to shew how willing they were 
 to make Christ their only advantage, ' Behold, we 
 have left all.' He might as truly have said, Behold, 
 we have found all. They left their fathers, mothers, 
 kinsfolks, houses, nets, vanities; they found the morcy 
 of God, which made a full amends. These other wore 
 the things that were made to be left. 
 
 Linquenda tellus, et domus, et placena 
 
 Uxor.* 
 
 AVe must leave lands and houses, wives and child len, 
 with their temporal commodities. But the change of 
 the apostles of Christ was no unprofitable change, to 
 have left all for him that is above all.f But woe 
 unto them who, after their term of vanity expired, and 
 vanities left, have not miserere in store, a groan and 
 sob in their souls to call for mercy, and a favourable 
 propeusion in the ears of their Lord to hearken to 
 their cry. 
 
 (3.) Lastly, It is their own mercy which they for- 
 sake that embrace vanity. I mean not active mercy 
 in themselves, inhabiting their own hearts, but the 
 mercy of almighty God, tendered and exhibited to 
 each man in particular, whether he be bond or free, 
 Jew or Gentile; for his mercy is not only ' from gene- 
 ration to generation,' but from man to man. And ia 
 this sense it is true which God spake by Ezekicl, 
 'Every' soul is mine; the soul of the father is mine, 
 and the soul of the son is mine also.' Therefore it is 
 not said in my text that they leave the mercy of (tod, 
 but ' their own mercy,' the patrimony of their Father 
 
 • Horat. 
 
 t Non imitilis commutatio est. proeo qui est super omnia, 
 omnia ruliquissc. — Ilfni. 
 
Ver. 8, 9.] 
 
 LECTURE XXIX. 
 
 LS9 
 
 in heaven, a portion whereof was allotted to every 
 child. For the inheritance of the Lord is not dimi- 
 nished by the multitude of possessors ; it is as large 
 to every heir apart as to the whole number put 
 together.* 'This poor man cried' (saith the psalm, 
 naming a singular person, but leaving an universal 
 precedent to the whole church), ' and the Lord heard 
 him.' And that poor man erieth, and the Lord will 
 also hear him, isle piiiipet- et ille pauper. You may 
 make up a perfect induction and enumeration ; for if 
 all the poor and destitute in the world cry unto him, 
 he will hear them all. 
 
 The refutation is now ended, and giveth place to the 
 assertion or affirmation what himself will do ; not as 
 oefore he did, walking after the lusts of his own eye 
 and heart; nor as the manner of the heathen is, em- 
 bracing lying vanities, but acknowledging his life and 
 liberty to come alone from the Lord of mercy : ' But 
 I will sacrifice unto thee,' &c. To him only will he 
 pay the tribute that is due unto him, not deriving his 
 safety from any other imaginary helps. He will ofJ'er 
 sacrifice which the law required, and he will first make 
 and afterwards pay the vows which the law required 
 not ; the one an offering (in manner) of necessity, the 
 other of a free heart. He will not ofl'er with cakes or 
 wafers and oil (and yet perhaps not without these), 
 but with thanksgiving, an inward and spiritual sacri- 
 fice ; and that thanksgiving shall have a voice to pub- 
 lish it to the whole world, that others may witness it. 
 Sacrifices and vows I handled once before. Let it 
 now suffice, by way of short repetition, to let you 
 understand, that he ofTereth the best sacrifice who 
 offereth himself, body and soul, all the members of 
 the one, afl'ections of the other, to serve the Lord. 
 It shall please him much better, and cast a sweeter 
 smell into his nostrils, ' than a bullock that hath 
 horns and hoofs.' And he maketh the best vow who 
 vowcth himself. I say not in the world a virgin, but 
 a virgin to Christ; that whether he marry or marry 
 not, he hath not defiled himself with women (for he 
 that shall say, hath not coupled or matched himself 
 with women in an holy covenant, missetb the whole 
 scope of that scripture), that voweth himself, I say 
 not in the world a pilgrim, to gad from place to place, 
 but a pilgrim to Christ, that though he lie beneath 
 ' in a barren and thirsty ground where no water is,' 
 yet he walketh into heaven with bis desires, and in 
 affection of spirit liveth above, where his Master and 
 Head is; that voweth himself, I say not in the world 
 a beggar, but a beggar to Christ, that though he pos- 
 sess riches, yet he is not by riches possessed, and 
 albeit he leaveth not his riches, yet he leaveth his will 
 and desire to be rich. For it was well observed by a 
 learned father, Facilins saecus coutcmnitiir qiiain volun- 
 tas, the bag is more easily contemned than the will; 
 and if you will, you may relinquish all though you 
 
 * Hocreditas Domini non minuitur multitudine posses- 
 sorum ; tanta singulis, quanta universis. — August. 
 
 keep all : 5/ vullh, el'uim rehnemln rel'niqiiitis. This, 
 I say, is the richest sacrifice and rightest vow, to give 
 thyself, and vow thy service and adherence, to almighty 
 God, as we read that Peter did (but to perform it with 
 more fidelity), ' Though all forsake thee, I will not.' 
 And what, I beseech you, are these sacrifices and 
 vows but pensions of our duty, arguments and seals 
 of thankful minds, which is as marrow and fatness to 
 the bones of a righteous man, Ps. Ixiii., to praise the 
 Lord with joyful lips, to remember him on his bed, 
 and to think on him in the night watches ; th.at is, 
 both early and late, season and not season, to be tell- 
 ing of all his merciful works, and recounting to himself 
 his manifold loving-kiudnesses ? 
 
 The last thing I proposed is the sentence or epi- 
 phonema concluding the conclusion, or it may be the 
 reason of his former promises, ' I will offer sacrifices,' 
 &c. Why ? Because ' salvation is the Lord's.' I 
 am sure it is the sum of the whole discourse ; one 
 word for all, the very moral of the history. Shall I 
 say more ? It is the argument of the whole prophecy, 
 and might have concluded every argument therein. 
 The mariners might have written upon their ship, 
 instead of Castor and Pollux, or the like device, Sal- 
 valion is the Lonl's; the Nine\itcs in the next chapter 
 might have written upon their gates, Salration is the 
 Lord's; and whole mankind, whose cause is pitted 
 and pleaded by God against the hardness of Jonah 
 his heart, in the last, might have written in the palms 
 of their hands, Salration is the Lord's. It is the argu- 
 ment of both the testaments, the staff' and supporta- 
 tion of heaven and earth. They would both sink, and 
 all their joints be severed, if the salvation of the Lord 
 were not. The birds in the air sing no other note, 
 the beasts in the field give no other voice, than Salus 
 Jeliora-, Salvation is the Lord's. The walls and for- 
 tresses to our country, gates to our cities and towns, 
 bars to our houses, a surer cover to our heads than 
 an helmet of steel, a better receipt to our bodies than 
 the confection of apothecaries, a belter receipt to our 
 souls than the pardons of Rome, is Salus JehoviB, the 
 salvation of the Lord. Tlie salration of the Lord 
 blesseth, preserveth, uphokleth all that we have: our 
 basket and our store, the oil in our cruses, our presses, 
 the sheep in our folds, our stalls, the children in the 
 womb, at our tables, the corn in our fields, our stores, 
 our garners ; it is not the virtue of the stars, nor nature 
 of the things themselves, that giveth being and con- 
 tinuance to any of these blessings. And ' what shall 
 I more say?' as the apostle asked, Heb. xi., when he 
 hail spoken much, and there was much more behind, 
 but that time failed him. Rather, what should I not 
 say ? for the world is my theatre at this time, and I 
 neither tliiuk nor can feign to myself anything that 
 hath not dependence upon this acclamation, Salration 
 is the Lord's. Plutarch writeth, that the Amphic- 
 tions in Greece, a famous council assembled of 
 twelve sundry people, wrote upon the temple of 
 
ino 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 Apollo Pjtbius, instead of the Iliads of Homer, or 
 songs of Piudarus (largo and tiring discourses), short 
 sentences and memoratives, as, Know thyself, Use 
 moderalion, Beware of suretyship, and the like. And 
 doubtless though every creature in the world, whereof 
 we have use, be a treatise and narration unto us of the 
 goodness of God, and we might wearj' our ilesh, and 
 spend our days in writing books of that unexplicable 
 subject, j-et this short apophthegm of Jonah compre- 
 hendeth'all the rest, and standeth at the end of the 
 song, as the altars and stones that the patriarchs set 
 up at the parting of the waj's, to give knowledge to 
 the after-world, by what means he was delivered. I 
 would it were daily preached in our temples, sung in 
 our streets, written upon our door-posts, painted upon 
 our walls, or rather cut with an adamant claw upon the 
 tables of our hearts, that we might never forget 
 salvation to be the Lord's. We have need of such 
 remembrances to keep us in practice of revolving the 
 mercies of God. For nothing decayeth sooner than 
 love: nihil fiicilius guam amor putrescit.* And of all 
 the powers of the soul, memory is most delicate, tender, 
 and brittle, and first waxeth old, meinuria delicata, 
 tenera,fr(i(iUis, in qnani prinnim sevcctns incnrrit ; and 
 of all the apprehensions of memory, first a benefit, 
 prininm seiwscit ljeneficiuni.\ 
 
 To seek no further for the proof and manifestation of 
 this sentence within our coasts, I may say, as our Saviour 
 in the nineteenth of Luke to Zaccheus, This day is sal- 
 vation come unto this house. Even this day, my brethren, 
 came the salvation of the Lord to this house of David, 
 to the house of this kingdom, to the houses of Israel 
 and Aaron, people and priesthood, church and com- 
 monwealth. I held it an especial part of my duty, 
 amongst the rest, the day inviting, | and your expec- 
 tation calling me thereunto, and no text of mercy and 
 salvation impertinent to that purpose, to correct and 
 stir up myself with those four lepers that came to the 
 spoil of the Syrian tents, 2 Kings vii., I do not well : 
 ' this is a day of good tidings, and should I hold my 
 peace ? ' Let the leprosy of those men cleave unto 
 my skin, if it be not as joyful a thing unto me to 
 speak of the honour of this day, as ever it was to them 
 to carry the happy news of the flight of Aram. It is the 
 birthday of our country. It was dead before, and the 
 very soul of it quite departed. Sound religion, which is 
 the life of a kingdom, was abandoned, faith exiled, the 
 gospel of Christ driven into corners, and hunted beyond 
 the seas. All these full, with the fall of an honour- 
 able and renowned plant, which, as the first flower of 
 the fig-tree, in the prime and blooming of his age, was 
 translated into heaven ;§ they arose again with the 
 rising and advancement of our gracious lady and 
 sovereign. Were I as able as wifling to procure 
 solemnity to the day, I would take the course that 
 David did, Ps. exlviii., I would begin at heaven, and 
 
 ♦ Senec. t Diog. X '"''■ regn. Elizabet. 
 
 2 Hunc tantuin ten is fata oattndere. 
 
 call ' the angels and armies thereof, the sun, moon, 
 and stars ;' I would descend by the air, and call the 
 ' fire, hail, and snow, vapours, and stormy winds ;' 
 I would enter into the sea, and call for ' dragons ami 
 all deeps ;' I would end in the earth, and call for the 
 ' mountains and hills, fruitful trees and cedars, beasts 
 and all cattle, creeping things and feathered fowls, kings 
 of the earth and all people, princes and judges, j'oung 
 men and maidens, old men and children,' to lend their 
 harmony and accord unto us, to praise the name of 
 the Lord, to accompany and adorn the triumph of our 
 land, and to shout into heaven with no other crj- than 
 this, Salus Jehonr, Salvation is only from the Lord, by 
 whom the horn of this people hath so mightily been 
 exalted. happy English, if we knew our good, bona 
 sisiia norint Anijii ; if that royal vessel of gold, wherein 
 the salvation of the Lord hath been sent unto us, were 
 as precious and dear in our account as it rightly 
 deserveth ! Her particular commendations, common 
 to her sacred person not with many princes, I ex- 
 amine not. Let it be one amongst a thousand, which 
 Bernard gave to a widow queen of Jerusalem, and 
 serveth more justty to the maiden queen of England, 
 that it was no less glory unto her to live a widow 
 (having the world at will, and being to sway a king- 
 dom, which required the help of a husband) than a 
 queen. The one, saith he, came to thee by succession, 
 the other by virtue ; the one by descent of lilood, the 
 other by the gift of God ; the one it was thy happiness 
 to be born, the other thy manliness to have attained 
 unto ; a double honour, the one towards the world, the 
 other towards God, both from God.* Her wisdom as the 
 wisdom of an angel of the Lord (so spake the widow 
 sometimes to David), fitter for an angel than myself 
 to speak of; her knowledge in the tongues and liberal 
 learning iu all the liberal sciences, that in a famous 
 universitj' amongst the learnedest men, she hath been 
 able, not only to hear and understand, which were 
 something, but to speak, persuade, decide, like a 
 graduate, orator, professor ; and in the highest court 
 of parliament, hath not only sitten amongst the peers 
 of her realm, and delivered her mind, majestate mattiis, 
 by some bodily gesture in sign of assent, but given 
 her counsel and judgment not inferior to any, and her- 
 self by herself hath answered the ambassadors of 
 several nations in their several languages ; with other 
 excellent graces beseeming the state of a prince ;f 
 though they best know on whose hand she leaneth, 
 and that are nearest in attendance and observance 
 about her majesty ; yet if any man be ignorant of, let 
 him ask of strangers abroad, into whose ears fame hath 
 bruited and blown her virtues, and done no more but 
 right in giving such gifts unto hor as never were more 
 
 * llhid snccessionis est, hoc virtutis ; ilUvi tlLi ex genere, 
 ibtuil ex munere Dei, ilhul fo-licitor nata es, istud viriliter 
 nactaes. Duplex, lumor, alliTsecinulum seculum, alter secun- 
 dum Doum ; uterque a Deo. — Bern in epist. 
 
 f Postestas omni$ debet esse oruata. — Pert. 
 
Ver. 8, 9.] 
 
 LECTUEE XXIX. 
 
 191 
 
 rare in the rarest queen, and in the sex of womanhooil 
 carry admiration. Why do I say \Yomanhood '? 
 Virtue is tied neither to revenue nor kind.* Julita, 
 a woman, and one that \Yitnessed a good confession 
 for the name of Christ, as she was going to the stake 
 to be burnt, exhorted women, f that they should not 
 complain of the weakness of nature, because, first, 
 they were made of the same matter whereof man was 
 finished ; secondly, to the image of the same God ; 
 thirdly, as fit and as capable to receive any goodness ; 
 fourthly, invested into the like honour. Why not ? 
 saith she, seeing we are kin unto men in all respects. 
 For not their flesh alone was taken for the creation of 
 women, but we are bone of their bones ; for which 
 cause we are indebted to God for courage, iwtience, 
 virility, as well as men. And Basil addeth his own 
 advice, that, setting excuse of their sex aside, they 
 should set upon piety, and see whether nature hath 
 debarred them of anything that was common to men. J 
 I note it the rather because I know it grieveth 
 Abimelech at the heart, that a woman should cast 
 down a millsioiie upon his head, to kill him, Judges ix. ; 
 and therefore he calleth bis page to thrust him through, 
 that men might not say, ' A woman slew him'. It 
 grieveth Abimelech of Kome, and his whole faction, 
 that the church of England, and the whole estate of 
 our land under the government of a woman, should be 
 better able to defend itself against his tyranii}- than 
 any country in Christendom. Their hearts break with 
 envy hereat, their tongues and pens dissemble not 
 their grudge at the feminine priwacij, that a woman 
 should be the head (under Christ) of the church of 
 England. But as Chrysostom sometimes speaks of 
 Herodias and John Baptist, § so (by a contrary appli- 
 cation of their manners) may I of two as unlike as 
 ever fire and water, the one to Herodias, the other to 
 John Baptist, muUcr totius mundi rripiil tnincavit, a 
 ■woman hath beheaded (within her realms and domi- 
 nions) the falsely usurping and surmised head of the 
 whole world. Her father and brother of most famous 
 memory had broken his legs before, as they break the 
 legs of the thieves upon the cross ; the one his right 
 leg of rents and revenues, the milk and honey of our 
 land ; the other his left leg of idolatrous worships, the 
 doctrine of men, false and erroneous opinions, where- 
 with the children of this realm had been poisoned a 
 long time. Queen Elizabeth bath bruised his head 
 (for though his legs were broken, he began to gather 
 strength again). He now commandeth not, liveth not 
 ■within our land (saving in a few disordered and luxate 
 members, which, as the parts of an adder cut asunder, 
 retain some life for a time, but never, I trust, shall 
 grow into a body again), neither ever is he likely to 
 revive amongst us, unless the Lord shall raise him up 
 
 ♦ Nee censum nee sexiim exigit virtus. — Senec. 
 t Basil, ser de Julita mart. 
 J Sine cxcusatione sexus ite obviam pietati. 
 j Ser. de decoU. Joan, Bapt. 
 
 for a plague to our unthankfulness. And therefore, as 
 they said of Tarquiuius Priscus in Rome, a Corinthian 
 born, and a stranger to their city, he hath well deserved 
 by his virtues that our city shall never repent it of 
 choosing a stranger to be king ; ■* so by her gracious 
 and religious government amongst us hath her most 
 excellent majesty worthily purchased, that England 
 shall never be sorry that a woman was the queen 
 thereof. When she came to her crown, she found the 
 country (as Augustus the city of Eome) of brick, she 
 turned it into marble : iiiveni lateiUitun, rcliqui viav- 
 inoycam. She found it in the sands, she set it upon 
 a rock, the foundation of prophets and apostles ; she 
 found it a land of images, ignorances, corruptions, 
 vanities, lies ; she hath hitherto preserved it, and I 
 hope shall leave it to posterity, a land possessed of 
 the truth, and seasoned with the gospel of Christ 
 crucified. This is the savingest salvation that the 
 Lord baib, this the blessing and happiness that we 
 enjoy under her gracious government (besides our 
 peace, such as our fathers never presumed to hope 
 for, plenty, prosperity, corporal benefits, in that we 
 lend and borrow not, not only our milk, but our 
 blood, money, and men too, to those that want ; and 
 when we ring our bells for joy, and give ear to the 
 noise of timbrels and tabrets, others are frighted with 
 other kinds of sounds, the neighing of horses, roaring 
 of great ordnance, howling of women and children to 
 see their orbities and miseries before their e3'es) ; I 
 say this is the blessing we reap, that the gospel is free 
 by her procurement, our consciences not enthralled to 
 the ordinances of men, our zeal rectified by knowledge, 
 and our religion reformed bj-tbe statutes of the highest 
 God. Now as we have great reason to sing merrily 
 unto the Lord, and with a good courage. Salvation is the 
 Lord's, for these graces, so what was the cause of her 
 own so many miraculous deliverances, both before and 
 since she sat upon the seat of her fathers, but the 
 same salvation that, by saving her, saved us ? I am 
 sure she w^as in danger, either of wolves or of butchers, 
 when her righteous soul cried, Tanqnam oris ; and as 
 a sheep was she led to the slaughter, or not far from 
 it. When her innoconcy could not be her shield, but 
 though she were free from crime, mixpecta midla, pro- 
 bata nulla, and God and man might justly have cleared 
 her, yet she was not free from suspicion, when she 
 feared that the scaffold of the Lady Jane stood for 
 another tragedy, wherein herself sbonld have played the 
 woefullest part. Since which abiiost despaired escapes 
 (but that her time, as David spake, and her soul was 
 in the bauds of that Lord who deposeth and setteth 
 up princes), how it hath fared with her, both at home 
 and abroad, we all know ; partlj' from traitorous and 
 false-hearted Aliithophels, which have served her with 
 an heart and an heart ; partly from the bloody bishops 
 of Rome, and their pernicious seminaries, as full of 
 
 * Fecit virtutibus suis, ne ha;c civitaa pceniteutiam ageret, 
 &c. 
 
192 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 mischief to Chvistendom as ever the Trojan horse to 
 the inhabitants of Troy ; partly from the king of 
 Spain, whose study long hath been to be the monarch 
 of Europe, of whom it is true that they speak of an- 
 other, Philip of Macedon, that he bought the more 
 part of Greece before he conquered it ; * so he buyeth 
 countries before he wiiincth tliem, and would do that 
 by his Indian gold, which will be httio easy for him to 
 do by men. They have long maliced her, and I trust 
 longshall ; and malice shall do the nature of malice, 
 that is, drink out the marrow and moisture of those 
 that foster it, and bring their devices upon their own 
 heads, as Nadab and Abihu were consumed with the 
 fire of their own censers. So long as jSalm Jelwva 
 * Ante PMlippus mnjore ex pnrte mercator Grseciw, qiiam 
 victor. — Val. Max. 
 
 endureth, which is as long as Jehovah himself, our 
 hope shall not perish. He hath even sworn by his 
 holiness, as he did to David his servant, not to fail 
 queen Elizabeth. He that ' prevented her with liberal 
 blessings,' Ps. xxi., before she took the sceptre into 
 her hands, and set a crown of pure gold upon her 
 head, will maintain his own doings, perfect his good 
 work begun and continued a long time, glorify his 
 blessed name by advancing her to glory, increase his 
 kingdom by hers, subdue her people unto her, con- 
 found her enemies, and when the kingdom of England 
 is no longer capable of her (as Philip spake to Alex- 
 ander his son *), he will establish her in a kingdom of 
 a far more happy condition. Amen. 
 
 * Iilnneum et compar tibi regiium, fili, invenias, quoniam 
 Macedonia tui capax non est. 
 
 LECTUEE XXX. 
 
 And the Lord spake unto thefisli, and it cast ont Jonah ujion the dnj land.- 
 
 - Jonah II. 10. 
 
 JONAH hath ended his song of Sion in a strange 
 land, which was the second part of the chapter 
 now insisted upon. He hath brooked the seas with 
 patience, and digested his perils with hope, and is 
 now arrived at the haven of happy deliverance. _ The 
 inhabitants of the earth would never have believed 
 that the enemy could have entered within the gates of 
 Jerusalem, Lam. iv., nor that the prophet of the 
 Lord could have had egress from the gates and bars of 
 this monstrous iish. But so was it done by the Lord, 
 and it is marvellous in our eyes. And as ' the chains 
 fell from the hands of Peter,' Acts xii., the vei-y 
 night before Herod intended to bring him forth to his 
 trial, and ' he passed through the first and second 
 watches' without intorraption, 'and the iron gate 
 opened by its own accord unto him,' though he were 
 ' delivered to four quarternions of soldiers to be kept, 
 and that night slept between two, bound with two 
 chains, and the keepers before the doors of the jail' ; 
 so after seventy-two hours, which is the judicial hour 
 of many dangerous diseases, haply the timeliest time 
 wherein Jonah, if ever, was to look for liberty again, 
 and the whale might begin to plead to himself ever- 
 lasting possession of his prey so long retained, though 
 his head were wrapped about with weeds, as Peter's 
 hands bound with chains, and he were delivered both 
 to floods and depths, promontories and rooks, as he 
 to four quarternions, and at this instant of his delivery 
 lay between the bars of earth and sea, as Peter slept 
 between two soldiers, besides the throat and jaws of 
 the fish (his loathsome prison), wliich sat as keepers 
 before the doors, yet all these incumbrances" and lets 
 fill from the body of Jonah, and he passed through 
 the first and second watches, 1 mean, the entrails of 
 the whale, and that iron gate of his strong armed 
 
 teeth, and was cast up upon dry ground, as Peter was 
 restored to his friend's house. 
 
 In miracles and mysteries must 1 spend my dis- 
 course at this time. The miracles are not news unto 
 you, throughout the whole discourse of these histories, 
 uiiracidis et nn/steriif: (nnnia plena, wherein the Lord 
 hath the principal part, quifaeit mirahUia solus, ' who 
 only worketh wonders,' and only wonders. What 
 have you seen else ? Jonah was swallowed by a 
 miracle, by a miracle was preserved, lived, and sang, 
 and by a miracle is cast up. Who was the author of 
 the miracle ? The Lord. What were his means ? 
 His teord or commandment. Who the minister ? 
 The fish. The manner what ? Bi/ romitinfi, or dis- 
 gorging himself. Lastly, the terminus ad qnem or 
 place that received him ? The dnj land. In these 
 particulars doth the sentence of my text empty itself. 
 
 1. The Lord spake. One and the same hand both 
 wounded and recurod him. 
 
 Una eademque manus vulnus opemqne tulit. 
 
 Who else was of might to have encountered this fear- 
 ful boast ? For canst thou draw out leviathan with 
 an hook, or pierce his jaws with an angle ? Will 
 he make many prayers unto thee, "or speak thee fair '? 
 Lay but thine liand upon him, and thou shall have 
 cause to remember the battle, and to do no more so. 
 Behold, thine hope is in vain, if thou thinkest to 
 match him, for shall not one perish even at the sight 
 of him ? Job xl. Much less canst thou draw him to the 
 shore, and cast a line into his bowels, to draw out a pro- 
 phet or any spoil therehonce. They said of ])avid 
 in the psalm, ' Now he is down, he shall rise no more,' 
 Ps. xli. If thou hadst asked both land and sea, when 
 Jonah was fallen into the depths of them, they would 
 
Vhh. 10.] 
 
 LECTURE XXX. 
 
 193 
 
 have answered thee, Now lie is down, he shall rise no 
 more. Even his own most ' familiar friend, whom he 
 best trusted, with whom he had taken his sweetest 
 counsel,' the heart within his breast, told him many a 
 time, Thou shalt rise no more, thou art cast out of the 
 sight of the Lord and company of men for ever. But 
 he ' knew whom he trusted,' and who was best able 
 to restore the pawn committed unto him, though he 
 walked in the belly of the tisb, as in the valley of 
 death. Yet the Lord was on his side, what then 
 could hui't him ? The Lord liveth, the Lord hath 
 spoken, the Lord is his name, vivit Doiin'nu^-, (licit 
 iJoininus, Doiniiins nomcn ejus, and such like pro- 
 ambles to many sentences of Scripture, are most eBec- 
 tual motives of persuasion, and give us unquestionable 
 assurance of whatsoever therein set down. The angel 
 appeared unto Gideon, .Judges vi., and J said unto 
 him, ' The Lord is with thee, thou valiant man.' 
 What cause had Gideon, when he heard but that pre- 
 face, Dominus tecum, ' the Lord is with thee,' to 
 spenkof their miseries, andto call for wonted* miracles, 
 and to think that God had forsaken them ! The 
 weakest and feeblest soul in the world, assisted with the 
 valiancy of the most valiant Lord, cannot be endangered. 
 And therefore he bade Gideon, ' Go in this thy might, 
 and thou shalt save Israel out of the hands of Midian.' 
 Not in the might of thine own arm, for who hath en- 
 abled ,thee '? But 'in thin thy might,' this that 1 
 speak of, the presence of my majesty, mine by right, 
 thine by use and receipt ; mine by possession, thine 
 by communication ; mine originally, thine instrument- 
 ally ; for ' have not I sent thee ? and I will bo with 
 thee, and thou shalt smite Midian as one man.' The 
 like was the greeting of the angel to the mother of the 
 Tiord, Dominus tecum, 'The Lord is with thee.' 1 
 have said enough ; I need not give reasons of my 
 message. Ask no questions, make no doubt of thine 
 overnatural and unkindly conception, when thou shalt 
 but hear ' The Lord is with thee, and the power of the 
 Most High shall overshadow thee.' 
 
 2. The Lord sjiake to the fish. The instrument 
 that the Lord used in the delivery of his prophet, is 
 that Delphian sword, or universal instrument which 
 he used iu forming the world and all the creatures 
 thereof. ' He said, Let there be light,' ' Let there be 
 a firmament,' ' Let the waters be gathered into one 
 place,' ' Let the dry land appear,' &c., and it was ful- 
 filled. Gen. i. And at this hour the overliving Word 
 of God ' beareth up and supporteth all things by his 
 word,' Heb. i. What is his word, then, but his mere 
 and elfectual commandment, and the giving of efi'ect 
 to that which his heart hath intended ?t Who as he 
 goeth without feet, seeth without eyes, and reacheth 
 without hands; so there is no question buthe speaketh 
 without a tongue, and such instruments of speech as 
 
 * Qu. ' wanted ' ? or ' unwonted '?— Ed. 
 t Dixit, id est. perfecit. — Alchjm. Posuit, nt celerita- 
 tem et facilitatem operis Dei ostenJeret. 
 
 are ordinary with the sons of men. For what ears 
 had the light, the firmament, and other less works, to 
 hear and observe his words if he had pronounced 
 them, or what capacity and intelligence had the fish 
 iu this place ? But as the oflice of speech in man is 
 to be the messenger and interpreter of his heart, and 
 to signify his conceits inwardly and secretly "purposed ;* 
 so somewhat the Lord doeth, whereby he imparteth a 
 knowledge, even unto insensible creatures, what his 
 mind and pleasure is. 
 
 3. Therefore it is said, that the Lord spake to the 
 fiah, when he commanded that service of him, and 
 compelled him to execute his will, f when he moved 
 him to more mercy than nature had shaped him 
 unto,; and brought him to the shore, whom the huge- 
 ness of his body naturally enforced to keep the depths 
 of the sea.§ It sheweth what divinity there is (if I 
 may so term it) in the word of God, how imperious 
 to command, how easy to obtain when it hath com- 
 manded. One fiat is of power to make that which 
 was never made before, and had lain in everlasting 
 infirmity, if God had spared to speak, to establish 
 nature when it is not, and to change nature when it 
 is ; to create angels, men, birds, beasts, fishes ; to 
 store heaven, earth, and the deep with innumerable 
 armies of creatures, and to make them bow their 
 knees to their Maker, and render unlimited obedience 
 to all his decrees. "When God was manifested in the 
 flesh, and went about doing good, as the evangelist 
 writeth, a believing centurion, in a suit that dearly 
 alTected him. Mat. viii., desired not the travel of his 
 feet, nor any receipt of physic to heal his servant, no, 
 not so much as the laying on his hand, which some 
 had requested, nor coming within the roof of his 
 house, but only a word from his lips : ' Speak but the 
 word. Lord, and my servant shall be healed.' ' Man 
 liveth not by bread,' neither recovereth by physic 
 ' only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the 
 mouth of God.' A leper had told him in the next 
 words before, ' Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make 
 me clean.' Voiuntns tua, opus est,\\ Thy will is thy 
 work. 'And he said, I will; be thou made clean.' 
 As if with the breath of his mouth he had spoken to 
 his leprosy, Begone, as he afterwards spake to the 
 devils, 'jTrdyin, be packing into the herd of swine, and 
 they went the next way over the rocks and clifls, as 
 if a whirlwind had borne them. He relmketh the 
 winds and the sea in the same place, with more 
 authority than ever Peter rebuked Ananias and 
 Sapphira, and with the like success, for he smote the 
 breath from the winds, and motion from the sea, and 
 a great concussion of waters became a great calm, 2£/ff- 
 //.hg ii.iyac, yaKYi^fi iJ,iy%y.ri. Who is this, that the 
 
 * Dicere est priEcipere. — QScolampad. 
 
 t Quia coactus est facers voluntatem Dei.— iJ. Kimchi. 
 
 t Ad bonitatem piscem adigit. 
 
 'i Natura Solent pisecs grandea salo se defendere — Flin. 
 
 II Origan. 
 
 N 
 
194 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 winds and the sea obey him ? For they not only hear 
 him, 'Axoiouff/v, but hear him with effect, ' T^raxoiouff/i', 
 they go, and run, and stand still, like servants of 
 their master, and, as it were, live and die at his com- 
 mandment. The prophet, in the 29th Psalm, speakcth 
 of one voice that the Lord hath, ' a mighty and glori- 
 ous voice ' (a voice that hath a sensible sound indeed, 
 and smiteth the ears Loth of man and beast some- 
 times with tingling and astonishment), that it ' break- 
 eth the cedars, even the cedars of Libanus, and 
 shaketh the wilderness, even the wilderness of Kadesh, 
 that it divideth the flames of lire, maketh the hinds 
 to cast their calves, and discovereth the forests. But 
 this voice, whereof I speak, maketh the cedars, even 
 the cedars of Libanus, and createth the wilderness, 
 even the wilderness of Kadesh, formeth the flames of 
 fire, fashioneth the hinds and their young ones, and 
 planteth the forests ; and this was the word that spake 
 to the fish to cast up Jonah. Behold, at the voice of 
 the Lord, leviathan casteth his young, and aborteth a 
 prophet before he is willing. So true it is by absolute 
 experience, which the Spirit of God testifieth, Heb. 
 iv., that ' the word of God is lively and mighty in 
 operation, and sharper than any two-edged sword, 
 and entereth through even unto the dividing of the 
 soul and the spirit, and of the joints and the marrow, 
 and is a discerner of the thoughts and the intents of 
 the heart. Neither is there any creature which is not 
 manifest in his sight, but all things are naked and 
 open imto his eyes, with whom we have to do.' You 
 hear how far it entered, in the words of my text. It 
 •went into the bowels of a whale lying in the bowels of 
 the seas, and as narrowly searched all his entrails, as 
 Laban Jacob's stuff ; it divided between his teeth and 
 their strength that they could not chew, and went be- 
 tween his stomach and the appetite thereof that it 
 durst not concoct ; it drew him as an angle and hook 
 to the land, ransacked his maw, and opened the 
 Etraits of his throat, that the prophet of the Lord 
 might come forth. 
 
 4. He cast )i/> Jonali. The manner of his coming 
 forth seemeth to have been without ease and pleasure 
 to the whale. For as a stomach over-charged or 
 offended with meat that it hath received is not at rest 
 till it hath unloaden itself, so the whale, feeling a 
 morsel within him wOiich he cannot turn into nutri- 
 ment, what should he do, for his own quiet, but by 
 the riftings and retchings of his stomach send it 
 forth ? Thus it is said of the hypocrite. Job xx., 
 ' Who hath undone many, and spoiliid houses which 
 he never buildod, whose wickedness was sweet in his 
 mouth,' as perhaps Jonah in the mouth of the fish, 
 and he hid it under his tongue, kc. That 'his meat 
 in his bowels was turned, and that the gall of asps 
 was in the midst of him ; that he had devoured sub- 
 stance, and should vomit it up, for God would draw 
 it out of his belly ; that he should restore the labour, 
 and devour no more ] that he should feel no quietness 
 
 in his body, neither reserve anything of that which he 
 desired : ' there you hear at large what the nature of 
 a surfeit is. And doubtless ill-gotten goods, when a 
 man snatcheth at the right hand, and catcheth at the 
 left, without being satisfied, and eateth up the people 
 of the land as bread, is a spiritual surfeit, and not a 
 kindly or wholesome maintenance to him that hath 
 coveted it. So is pleasure, and sweetness in sinning. 
 When one favoureth it (as Zophar there speaketh), 
 and will not forsake it, but keepeth it close in his 
 mouth, though it dwell in darkness as dark as night, 
 and say to the soul and reins. Hide me safe, yet it is a 
 surfeit too ; and when the belly hath been tilled with 
 abundance thereof, it shall be in pain (to continue the 
 phrase of that book), and God shall send upon it his 
 fierce wrath. The angel of the Laodicean church, 
 Pievelation the third, was unto God as raw and undi- 
 gested meat which his heart could not brook. His 
 lukeness and neutrality of dealing in his service did 
 so much oflend him, that although he had been 
 received into some inward favour, as sustenance is 
 taken into the stomach, yet he is threatened to be 
 spued up again, MsXXoi us s/iiaa/. The phrase is some- 
 what unfrequent and rare in the Scripture, yet is it 
 nowhere used, but it deserveth wisely and weightily to 
 be considered. In this place, to conclude, the mean- 
 ing is, that Jonah was not descended into the belly of 
 the fish to become a prey unto him, but to dwell in a 
 desert and solitary house for a time, as Jeremiah 
 wished him a cottage in the wilderness, and as it were 
 to go aside, and hide himself from the anger of the 
 Lord, till the storm might be overpassed. 
 
 The words of Micah do rightly express my mind 
 herein: chap, vii., ' I will bear the wrath of the Lord, 
 because I have sinned against him, until he plead my 
 cause, and execute judgment for me. Then will he 
 bring me forth to the light, and I shall see his right- 
 eousness : when thou that art mine enemy shalt look 
 upon it, and shame shall cover thee, which sayest unto 
 me. Where is the Lord thy God ? ' 
 
 5. Lastly, the place which received Jonah was the 
 (Irij land. Which noteth a quality of the earth com- 
 modious and fit for habitation. He felt the (irnnnd 
 before, when he went down to the bottom of the 
 mountains, and the earth was about him with her bars, 
 but he felt not the dry ijroinid. He walked not then 
 upon the face of the earth, which is the manner of 
 living souls, but was under the roots of the mountains, 
 where he had not liberty nor power to lireatho, but 
 by special providence. In the beginning of the crea- 
 tion, the waters were above the earth, till the Lord 
 said, ' Let the waters under the heaven be gathered 
 into one place, and let the dry land appear, and it was 
 so,' Gen. i. According to the words of the Psalms : 
 ' He hath founded it upon the seas, and established it 
 upon the floods,' Ps. xxiv. And again, Ps. exxxvi., 
 ' He hath stretched out the earth upon the waters, for 
 his mercy endureth for ever.' A strange kind oE 
 
Ver. 10.] 
 
 LECTURE XXX. 
 
 195 
 
 building, when others lay the foundations upon the 
 rocks, the Lord upon the waters. And yet ' he hath 
 so set the earth upon those pillars that it shall never 
 move,' Ps. civ. When thou callest to mind that thou 
 treadest upon the earth hanging (like a ball) in the 
 air, and floating in the_wators, is it not evident enough 
 unto thee, even by this one argumcut, that there is a 
 God. 
 
 Cum te pendenti reputas insistere terroe ; 
 
 Nouue vel Iiinc dare conspicis esse Deuin ? 
 
 By the confessions of all, the natural place of the 
 waters is above the earth.* This at the first they 
 enjoyed, and after repeated and recovered again, in 
 the overwhelming of the world, when the Lord for a 
 time delivered them as it were from their bauds, and 
 gave them their voluntary and natural passage. And 
 at this day there is no doubt but the sea, which is the 
 collection of waters, lieth higher than the land, as 
 seafaring men gather by sensible experiments, and 
 therefore the psalm saith, ' Thou coveredst it with the 
 deep as with a garment.' For as a vesture, in the 
 proper use of it, is above the body that is clothed 
 therewith, so is the sea above the land ; and such a 
 garment would it have been unto the earth, but for 
 the providence of God towards us, as the shirt that 
 was made for the murdering of Agamemnon, where the 
 bead had no issue out. Therefore the psalm addeth 
 immediately, ' The waters would stand above the 
 mountains, but at thy rebuke they flee, at the voice of 
 thy thunder they haste away. And the mountains 
 ascend, and the valleys descend to the place which 
 thou hast established for them. But thou hast set 
 them a bound, which they shall not pass ; neither 
 shall they return to cover the earth.' The like in the 
 book of Job, chap, xxxviii., where the phrases are, 
 that ' the Lord bath established his commandment 
 upon the sea' (though a wild and untamed creature), 
 ' and set bars and doors about it, and said, Hitherto 
 shalt thou come, and no further ; here will I stay thy 
 proud waves.' What, from the chambers, c caiiacxli.i, 
 that are above, and from the fountains and sluices that 
 lie beneath, how easy a matter were it for the former 
 of all things to set open his windows and dams, 
 Gen. vii., and every hour of our life to overrun us 
 with a new deluge ? Nay, he hath water enough to 
 drown us within our own bodies. He can there com- 
 mand a full sea of distempered and redundant humours 
 to take our breath from us.f We little bethink our- 
 selves how daily and continually we stand beholding 
 to the goodness of God for sparing our lives, who, 
 though he withhold the forces of those outward ele- 
 ments, water, and fire, and the rest, that they do us 
 no harm, yet we have elements within, whereof we 
 are framed and composed, we have heat and cold, 
 moisture aud drought, which he can use at his plea- 
 sure to our own destruction. Let these brethren of 
 
 * Locus alius naturalis, alius fatalis et miraculosus. 
 ■j" Heraclius the emperor died of a dropsy. — Volalerr. 
 
 one house, but withal the fathers and founders as it 
 were of our nature, fall at variance within us, and they 
 will rend our lives asuuder like wild boars. How 
 many have been buried alive in the graves of their 
 earthly and melancholy imaginations ! How many 
 burned in the flames of pestilent and hot diseases : 
 their bowls sot on fire like an oven, their blood dried 
 up, their inwards withered and wasted with the 
 violence thereof ! The vapours and fumes of their 
 own vicious stomach, as a contagious air, how many 
 have they poisoned and choked [up ! Finallj', how 
 many have been glutted and overcharged with waters 
 between their own skin and bones I And therefore we 
 must conclude and cry with the prophet. Lam. iii., 
 ' It is the mercy of the Lord that we are not con- 
 sumed,' both from without and from within, ' because 
 his compassions fail not.' 
 
 Hitherto of the miracles, the former part of my 
 promise, and the second experiment of the overflowing 
 mercy of God continued towards Jonah his servant. 
 Oh living and large fountain of grace, always drawn, 
 yet never dried up, because it runneth from the breast, 
 and is fed with the good pleasure of an infinite and 
 immortal God ! For what better reason can be given 
 of his loving afl'ection towards us, than that which 
 Micah hath in the end of his prophecy : ' Because 
 his mercy pleased him,' Micah vii. What other causa 
 hath induced him (not to remove in haste from the sweet 
 song of the prophet) to ' take away iniquity, and pass 
 by the transgressions of his heritage, not to retain his 
 anger for ever,' though for ever deserved, but ' to return 
 and have compassion upon us, to subdue our unright- 
 eousness, and cast all our sins into the bottom of a 
 sea, deeper and farther from his sight than were these 
 seas of Jonah, to perform his truth to Jacob, and 
 kindness to Abraham, according to his oath in ancient 
 time, but because mercy pleaseth him ? For who 
 hath first loved, or fii'st given, or any way deserved, 
 and it shall be restored unto him a thousandfold ? 
 Blessings and thanksgivings for evermore be heaped 
 upon his holy name, in whom the treasures of mercy 
 and loving-kindness dwell bodily, who of his own 
 benevolent disposition hath both pleased himself and 
 pleasured his poor people with so gracious a quality. 
 Even so. Lord, for that good pleasure and purpose 
 sake, deal with the rest of thy people as thou hast 
 dealt with Jonah and the mariners, ' take away those 
 iniquities' of ours, that take away thy favour and 
 blessings from us, and as a stranger that knoweth 
 them not, ' pass by our transgressions, retain not 
 thine anger for ever,' though we retain our sins, the 
 cause of thine anger, ' but return to us' by grace, who 
 return not to thee by repentance, and ' have compas- 
 sion upon us,' who have not compassion upon our own 
 souls, subdue our reigning and raging unrighteousness, 
 and ' drown our ofl'ences in the bottom of the sea,' 
 which else will drown us in the bottom of perdition. 
 
 The mysteries buried under this type of the cast- 
 
196 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 ing up of Jonah, the second principal consideration 
 wherein I bounded myself, are collected by some, 1, 
 the preaching of the gospel to the Gentiles, not before 
 the passion and resurrection of Christ, because Jonah 
 went not to Nineveh till after his sinking and rising 
 ngain ; 2, a lantern of comfort to all that sit in the 
 darkness of affiiction and in the shadow of death, held 
 out in the enlargement of Jonah, who, though he were 
 swallowed down into the bowels of an unmerciful 
 beast, yet by the hand of the Lord he was again cast 
 out. These are somewhat enforced. But the only 
 counterpane indeed to match this original is the resur- 
 rection of the blessed Son of God from death to life, 
 figured in the restitution of the prophet to his former 
 estate of livelihood, and by him applied in the Gospel 
 to this body of truth, who is very and substantial 
 truth. For so he telleth the scribes and pharisces 
 twice in one evangelist. Mat. xii. and xvi., 'An evil 
 and adulterous generation ' (degenerated from the 
 faith and works of their father Abraham, wherein 
 standcth the right descent of his children) ' asketh a 
 sign ; but no sign shall be given unto it, save the sign 
 of the prophet Jonas. For as Jonas was three days 
 and three nights in the whale's belly, so shall the Son 
 of Man be three days and thi'ee nights in the heart of 
 the earth.' His meaning was, that if this so unlikely, 
 and in nature so incredible, a sign could not move 
 them, all the tokens in heaven and earth would not 
 take eflect. That Christ is risen again, there is no 
 question. The books are open, and he that runneth 
 may read enough to persuade him. He that told 
 them of the sign before mentioned signified the same 
 work under the name and shadow of the temple of 
 Jerusalem, a little to obscure his meaning, and that 
 he termed a sign also, ItiIj-uov ; 'Destroy this temple, 
 and I will build it again in three days.' He meant 
 not the temple of Solomon, as they mistook, John ii., 
 buttho templcof his body, more costlyand glorious than 
 ever'that admired temple of theirs, the building whereof 
 in the counsel of his Father was more than forty and six 
 years, even from the first age of the world, and every 
 stone therein, angular, precious, and tried, cut out of 
 a mountain without hands, Dan. ii., ordained from 
 the highest heavens without human furtherance ; and 
 snch whereof he affirmed long before in the mouth of 
 his prophet, Ps. xvi. who could justify his saying: 
 ' Thou shalt not suffer thine holy one to see corrup- 
 tion ; ' though of the other temple he prophesied, 
 Mat. xxiv., and it was performed, ' there shall not a 
 stone be left standing upon a stone that shall not be 
 cast down ;' jnyiili.ril, ct rerixil,* he gave warning be- 
 fore that it should be so, and ho fulfilled it. The 
 earthquake at the very time of his resurrection. Mat. 
 xxviii., the testimony and rebuke of angels, — Luke 
 xxiv., ' Why seek ye the living among the dead ? He 
 is risen, he is not here,' — his manifestation to one, to 
 two, to twelve, to more than five hundred at once, 
 • Bern. Ser. 1. in patch. 
 
 once and again, his breaking of bread amongst them, 
 the prints of his hands and side, their very fingers and 
 nails for evidence sake thrust into them,* together 
 with so many predictions that thus it must be, and so 
 many sermons and exhortations that so it was, are able 
 to resolve any spirit that setteth not itself of purpose to 
 ' resist the Holy Ghost. Or if there he any of so 
 audacious impiety as to deny the Scriptures (the war- 
 rant whereof is so strong, that Paul in the Acts of the 
 Apostles, chap, xxvi., not tarrying the answer of king 
 Agrippa, by his own mouth speaketh in his name by 
 a reasonable and undoubted concession, ' I know thou 
 believest them ;' and he thought it afterwards firm 
 enough to prove any article of the faith without other 
 force, (iccordiiir/ to the Scriptures, 1 Cor. xv.), let them 
 listen a while to that learned disputation that great 
 Athanasiusf held concerning this point. He proveth 
 that the Son of God could not choose but die, having 
 taken unto him a body of death ; and that he could 
 not but live again, because that body of his was iit(E 
 sacrarium, the vestry or chapel wherein life was con- 
 served. And he holdeth it a senseless thing, that a 
 dead man should have the power so to extimulate and 
 prick the minds of the living ; that the Grecian and 
 pagan was brought to forsake his ancient national 
 idolatries, and worship the Saviour of the world ; that 
 a man forsaken of life, and able to do nothing, should 
 so hinder the action of active and lives-men, that by 
 the preaching of Jesus of Nazareth, an adulterer leav- 
 cth his adulteries, a murderer his bloodsheds, and at 
 the naming of his dreadful name, the very devils de- 
 part from their oracles and oratories. He urgeth yet 
 further, How can the carcase of a dead man prevail 
 so much with the living, that upon the confidence of 
 life therein contained, they have endured the loss of 
 liberty, country, wife, children, goods, good name, 
 and life itself, with such Christian magnanimity, that 
 the Arians espying it, began to receive it as a ruled 
 and resolved case not to be doubted of, ' A^iu/LanxZg, 
 there is no Christian living that feareth death ? As 
 for the slander of his sworn enemies, the Jews, whose 
 malice cannot end but in the end of the world, who, 
 contrary to common humanity, belied him in his 
 gi'ave, and gave not leave to his bones to rest in peace; 
 saying, and hiring men to say, and with a great sum 
 purchasing that untruth, as the chief captain did his 
 burgess-ship. Acts the two and twentieth, ' His dis- 
 ciples came by night, and stole him away while wo 
 slept,' Mat. xxviii. ; let it sleep in the dust with them 
 till the time come, when ' every eye shall see him, 
 even those that pierced him ' upon the cross, and 
 those that watched him in his grave also, and then 
 they shall say, too late. We and our moneys are both 
 perished. Why have we taken or given the accursed 
 
 * Qui alto ilubitat, alfius credit. — Pclr. Chri/soloff. de 
 Thoma. 
 
 t Quo vivontc res Cliristiana rairiCce, 4G anuis sustoutata 
 est. — riatina in Siricio. 
 
Ver. 10.] 
 
 LECTURE XXX. 
 
 197 
 
 wages of unrighteousness to speak falsoliood ? But 
 how could it be the mean time, that you may know 
 they shewed themselves starkest fools, where they 
 professed greatest, wisdom ? Was there not caution 
 and provision enough beforehand ? ' Sir, wc remem- 
 ber this deceiver said thus.' Was not ' a great stone 
 {rv •yag'/xh/a; afoh^a) rolled to the mouth of the gi'ave ? 
 and their seal set upon the stone ? and a watch ap- 
 pointed to attend the sepulchre '? Standeth it with 
 reason, that a few disciples, their eyes yet streaming, 
 and their hearts aching with their late loss, bruised 
 reeds, the stafl' of their comforts being taken from 
 them, the children of the bride-chamber mourning for 
 the absence of the bridegroom, lambs amongst raven- 
 ous and blood-sucking wolves, should dare to attempt 
 an act so dangerous to be undertaken, and so unpos- 
 slble to be compassed ? But they did attempt it by 
 stealth, when there was need of engines to remove the 
 stone, and it could not be done without most tumul- 
 tuous heaving and shouldering. And the soldiers 
 slept, they say; as if sleepers could truly report that 
 which they knew not. But why do I tight against a 
 disai-med and unworthy falsehood ? If angels, men, 
 women, disciples, strangers, friends, foes, a cloud of 
 sufficient witnesses ; if the emptying of the sepulchi-e, 
 and leaving of the linen clothes, which those that had 
 eyes to see with might behold ; if the amazement of 
 the watch, news of the soldiers, subornation of high 
 priests and elders, the letter of Pilate to the emperor 
 to signify no less ; if his own walking, talking, eating, 
 drinking, conversing, visible ascending; if preaching, 
 believing, and both living and dying in that belief, be 
 enough to move credit : ' Christ is risen from the dead, 
 and now he dieth not again, neither hath death any- 
 more dominion over him,' Rom. vi. ; rather hath he 
 dominion over death: for 'ho is alive but was dead; 
 and, behold, he is alive for evermore. Amen ; and he 
 hath the keys of hell and of death,' Rev. i. For who 
 was worthy, nay, who was able, of all the host in 
 heaven and earth, to open this last seal of death and 
 destruction, but the Lamb that was killed, or rather 
 the lion that was raised by the power of his own 
 might ? And, therefore, it is right well observed by 
 Bernard, ■^^ that aU those resurrections which we read of 
 informer times, of the Sbunamite's son and others, were 
 istius pncambuUf, not only forerunners and leaders to 
 this, but surely they were wrought in the finger and virtue 
 thereof. And these were the differences betwixt those 
 and this later, that then they came forth of their graves, 
 or were recovered to life, mortui, sed Itcruin moritttri, 
 dead, I confess, but withal they were to die again ; Christ 
 dieth no more. That Elijah restored a child, xcd al- 
 teriim non seipsum , another, not himself; Christ himself. 
 And they were rather raised than did rise themselves, 
 catcros diciinus. quidcrn resuscitalos : Christum resurrex- 
 issc: for they were but patients whilst the act was done 
 upon them ; Christ arose by his own strength. 
 * In die pasch., ser. 1. 
 
 But to return to the head of the race where we first 
 began ; we have found the sign and the thing signified 
 thus far fitted together, that as Jonah the third day 
 was cast up out of the belly of the fish, so our holy 
 Redeemer arose from the heart of the earth. Shall 
 we here rest ? or shall it suffice us to know what the 
 body to that shadow is, and not to suck therehence 
 the sweetness and juice which that body yieldeth us ? 
 The Jews asked a sigr, and this sign was given them. 
 And when they saw it fulfilled, either they spake 
 against or they did but wonder at it. To us it shall 
 be more than a sign, even dearer to our souls than our 
 souls are to us. It shall have wonder and wonder 
 enough, but withal we will not lose our fruit and our 
 part therein for a world's ransom. Our hope would 
 vanish like smoke, and our hearts within us wither 
 away as grass upon the house-tops, death would sting 
 us to death indeed, and the grave shut the mouth 
 upon us, and hell make her full triumph, but fur this 
 grain of faith, that ' Christ is risen from the dead, and 
 is become the first fruits of those that sleep,' 1 Cor. 
 sv. And he is ' the head of the body of the church ' 
 (not an head to himself \\'ithout respect to his mem- 
 ber), ' the beginning and first-begotten of the dead' 
 (not without brethren and sisters in the same kind of 
 generation), ' that he in all things might have the pre- 
 eminence,' Col. i. What other restorative had the 
 fainting and dying soul of Job to comfort itself with ; 
 what other blessing and sap in the vine, in that dead- 
 est winter of affiiotion ; what other couch to lodge bis 
 distressed and diseased bones upon ; what helper, 
 when his wife molested him ; what friend, when his 
 friends forsook him ; but this only meditation, which 
 was instead of friends, wife, bed, board, all things unto 
 him, ' I know my Redeemer liveth '? that is, The life 
 of my life can never be destroyed ; and for the enrol- 
 ment of this happy argument, he called for books of 
 the longest continuance, and pensof the hardest points, 
 that the latest liver of all after worlds might learn by 
 it. 'Hence came it, that the blessed vessel of election 
 made that free challenge to all the actors and pleaders 
 that condemnation had, fearing neither the district* 
 justice of God, nor the malice of his own heart, nor 
 the uncessant accusation of Satan day and night : 
 ' Who shall condemn ? It is Christ which is dead, 
 yea, or rather, MaX'/.ov, which is risen again, who is 
 also at the right hand of God, and maketh request 
 likewise for us,' Rom. viii. So that the sinews and 
 strength of his confidence is not so much in the death, 
 as in the resurrection of the Son of God, not to a 
 weak and contemptible life, as before-time, but to a full 
 possession of glory, nor for himself alone, but for his 
 orphan members upon the earth, for whom he maketh 
 continual intercession. And upon this stock he seem- 
 eth to plant the whole body of Christianity in his 
 former epistle to the Corinthians, chap. xv. For ' if 
 
 * That is, drawn, like a sword. — Ed. 
 
198 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. II. Ver. 10. 
 
 Christ be not risen, then is preaching vain, and faith 
 Tain,' and the Hviug are ' yet in their sins,' and 'those 
 that are fallen asleep are perished,' and ' we were of 
 all men most wretched.' As much as to say. Pull 
 down temples and synagogues, hum the writings of 
 prophets and apostles, stop your ears at the voice of 
 charmers, praise the dead more than the living, and 
 rather than them both, those that have never been ; 
 commend the wisdom of the epicure, who taketh his 
 portion in this life, and suft'ereth not the flower of bis 
 youth to pass without pleasure, if Christ be not risen 
 again. But 1 bring you other tidings ; our phcenix 
 is revived,* the seed that was mortified in the 
 ground is come up again with abundance of fruit; 
 and the beautiful flower of the root of Jesse, though 
 withered and defaced for a while in his passion, 
 hath so reflourishcd by raising himself, that in him 
 is the blooming and springing of all that love his 
 name. This is that which Paul in his answer before 
 Agrippa called the ' hope of the fathers,' xVcts sxvi. ; 
 and this I may as properly term, ' the faith and 
 patience of the saints,' Kev. xiii. For as in every 
 action the virtue that moveth the agent to undertake 
 it is the hope of good to come, viitiis ai/oiJi, sjtes 
 futuri (for he that soweth, soweth to reap, and he that 
 fighteth, fighteth to get the victory), so, take away 
 the hope of resurrection, and all the conscience or 
 care of godliness will fall to the ground. f Gregory 
 upon these words of the last of St Matthew, ' But 
 some doubted ' (whereupon he elsewhere noteth, that 
 it was the especial providence of God that Thomas 
 should be away, and afterwards come and hear, hear 
 and doubt, doubt and handle, handle and believe, 
 that so he might become a witness of the true resur- 
 rection, and that it was not so much a touch of in- 
 firmity in them, as a coniirmation to us, J who by that 
 means have the resuirection proved by so many the 
 more arguments), there are many, saith he, who, con- 
 sidering the departure of the spirit from the flesh, the 
 going of that flesh into rottenness, that rottenness into 
 dust, that dust into the elements thereof, so small 
 that the eye of man cannot perceive them, deny 
 and despair of the resurrection, and think it unpos- 
 siblc that ever the withered bones should be clothed 
 with flesh, and wax green again. Terlullian frameth 
 their objections more at large. Can that body ever 
 be sound again that hath been corrupted, § whole that 
 hath been maimed, full that liath been emptied, or 
 have any being at all that hath been altogether turned 
 into nothing ? Or shall the fire and water, the bowels 
 of wild beasts, gorges of birds, entrails of fi.shes, yea, 
 the very throat that belongeth to the times themselves, 
 ipsorum teiiijionim propria jula, ever be able to restore 
 
 * Bernard. 
 
 ■f ToUc spem resiirroctionis, ot rcsoluia est obsorvantia 
 omnis pietatis. — Cliri/sost. 
 
 % Non tarn infirniila.s illonira, qiiam nostra firmitas fuit. 
 J 111 integrum do corrupto, &c. — Z>e licsur. Carnis. 
 
 and redeliver it to the former services thereof '? Here- 
 upon they inferred, who had no longing after life nor 
 desire to see good days, ' Let us eat and drink, for 
 to-morrow we shall die ;' that is, they will not die 
 before to-morrow, but in drunkenness and excess they 
 will bury themselves to-day, eras sperando moriuiitur, 
 et Jiodie biheiido sepeUuntur ; and live whilst thou 
 mayest live, vire dum viris ; and it is better to be a 
 living dog than a dead lion ; and there is nothing after 
 death, no, not death itself, iiihil esse post mortem, 
 Epicuri sehola est, &c. Who if they held not, saith 
 Gregorys the faith of the resurrection by submitting 
 themselves to the word of God, surely they should 
 have held it upon the verdict of reason. For what 
 doth the world daily, in the elements and creatures 
 thereof, but imitate our resurrection ? Quid enim 
 mundiis quotidie nisi resurrectionem nostram in ehmcntis 
 stiis imitetur f We see by degrees of time the wither- 
 ing and falling of the leaves from the trees, the inter- 
 mission of their fruits, &c. And behold, upon the 
 sudden, as it were from a dry and dead tree, by a 
 kind of resuiTection, the leaves break forth again, the 
 fruits wax big and ripe, and the whole tree is ap- 
 parelled with a fresh beauty. Consider we the little 
 seed whereout the tree ariseth, and let us comprehend 
 if we can in that smallness of seed how so mightj' a 
 tree, and where it was couched. Where was the 
 wood, the bark, the glory of the leaves, the plenty of 
 the fruit, when we first sowed it '? When we threw it 
 into the ground, was any of these apparent ? TIMiat 
 marvel is it, then, if of the thinnest dust, resolved 
 into the first elements, and removed from the appre- 
 hension of our eyes, God at his pleasure re-form a 
 man, when from the smallest seeds he is able to pro- 
 duce so huge trees ? The apostle useth this simili- 
 tude of the seed and the body that springeth from it, 
 1 Cor. XV.: 'Thou fool, that \\hich thou sowest is 
 not quickened except it die ; and that which thou 
 sowest, thou sowest not the body that shall be, but 
 the naked and simple seed,' whereof the blade and 
 the ear, with the rest of the burden and increase 
 ariseth. And Terlullian much wondereth that the 
 earth is so kind unto us, to return our corn with such 
 abundance ; of a deceiver she beeometh a preserver. 
 And before she preservcth, she first destroyeth : first 
 by injury, then by usury ; first by loss, then by gain. 
 De Jraudatricefit serratri.r lit eustodiat, perdit ; injuria, 
 nsurit ; dnmno, luero, Ac. This is the manner of her 
 dealing. He addcth, to give more light even from the 
 star of nature, the revolutions of winters, summers, 
 autumns, springs, as it were so many deaths and so many 
 resurrections ; the dying of the day daily into night, 
 and uprising to the world again, as freshly bedecked 
 with honour and bravery as if it had never died. So 
 true it is which Arnobius wrote against the Gentiles : 
 Behold, how the whole creature doth write a commen- 
 tary to give us comfort in this point.* If we shall 
 '"• Vide adeo quam in solatium nostrum omnis creatura 
 
Chap. III. Ver. 1, 2.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXI. 
 
 199 
 
 sliew this book to the atheists and epicures of these 
 days, and bid them read therein the resurrection of 
 the tlesh lively discoursed, and they answer us again, 
 either that they cannot read it because the book is 
 sealed and not plain unto them, or will not because 
 their hearts are seared. I say no more but this, as 
 Paul of the biding of the gospel to the like night-birds, 
 I am sure they are seared and sealed to them that 
 perish. So let them rest, their bodies rotting in the 
 ground, ' as the seed under the clods,' Joel i., which 
 God blesseth not, the grave shutting her mouth, and 
 destruction closing her jaws upon them ; and when 
 others awake to sing, Isa. xsvi., themselves awaking 
 to howling and everlasting lamentation. For our own 
 parts we rest assured in the author and finisher of our 
 faith, that ' if the Spirit of him who raised up Jonah 
 and .Jesus from the dead dwell in us, he that raised 
 up them shall also quicken our mortal bodies,' Rom. 
 Tiii. And as he spake to the fish and it cast up 
 Jonah, spake to the earth and it cast up Jesus (for 
 upon the truth of his Father's word 'did his flesh rest 
 in hope,' Acts ii.), so ' the time shall come when all 
 that are in the graves shall hear the voice of the Son 
 of God,' John v., when he shall speak to the earth, 
 Give ; and to the sea, Eestore my sons and daughters ; 
 to all the creatures in the world, Keep not back mine 
 inheritance ; and finally, to the prisoners of hope lodg- 
 ing a while in the chambers of the ground, ' Stand 
 forth and shew yourselves.' And as Jonah was cast 
 up against the will of the fish, his bowels not able to 
 hold him longer than the pleasure of God was,'"' and Christ 
 returned to life with a song of triumph in his mouth, 
 ' O grave, where is thy conquest ? ' because ' it was 
 unpossible that he should be holden of it,' so when 
 that hour cometh, ' the earth shall disclose her blood, 
 and shall no longer hide her slain,' Isa. xsvi. ; and 
 the sea shall find no rest till the drowned be brought 
 forth ; nor any creature of the world be able to 
 
 meditetur, — Lib. yiii. Observa orbem rerum iu se remean- 
 tium. — Senec. 
 
 * Evomuit : empliaticum, quod ex imis mortis vitalibus 
 victrix vita processerit. — Hieron. 
 
 steal one bone that hath been committed unto it; 
 but all kinds of death shall be swallowed up into a 
 general victory, and in his name that hath won the 
 field for us, we shall joyfully sing, ' Thanks be unto 
 God that hath given us victory, through our Lord 
 Jesus Christ,' 1 Cor. xv. 
 
 And as Jonah was cast up upon the dry ground, the 
 land of the living, where he might walk and breathe 
 and repose himself without danger of miscarrying, and 
 Christ restored to life and immortality, and exalted to 
 a glorious estate at his Father's right hand, so the 
 Lord ' shall also shew us the paths of life,' Acts ii., 
 and fill us with the joy of his countenance for over- 
 more. ' Our corruptible shall put on incorruption, 
 our mortal immortality,' 1 Cor. sv., and we shall live 
 with the Lamb that was slain in eternal glory. Others 
 ' shall rise to shame and perpetual contempt,' Dan. xii., 
 and to 'the resurrection of condemnation,' John v., 
 Sadducees, Saturnians, Basilidians, epicures, atheists, 
 which have trodden this precious pearl of doctrine 
 under their swinish feet, and have not believed that 
 they might be saved ; but we to the length of days in 
 the hands of God, and to the sight of his holy face, 
 which is most blessed blessedness. Other particulars 
 of stature, age, and the like, we cease to inquire of, 
 because God hath forborne to deliver them.'* We 
 will not lose that by our curiosity which Christ hath 
 bought with his blood, and is gone to possess in the 
 body of his flesh, that we may also possess it. I am 
 sure there shall be all well, for else it should not be.f 
 There shall be a dry ground, for this valley of tears 
 and sea of miseries ; a land of the living, for this 
 desert of the dead ; a commodious and settled habi- 
 tation, for this tossing to and fro. There shall be no 
 monsters of land or sea to make us afraid any more, 
 no sorrow to disquiet, no sickness to distemper, no 
 death to dissolve us, no sin to object us to the wrath 
 of God, and to bring us in danger of losing his grace. 
 
 * Non addamus inquirere quod ille non addidit dicere et 
 de compendio iiuita sit omuls qusestio. — August. 
 
 t Quicquid futurum est decebit, quia non futurum est si 
 non decebit. 
 
 LECTUEE XXXI. 
 
 And Ihe word of the Lord came unto Jonah the ■■^ecoud time, saijimj, Arise, ijo unto Xinereh, that ijreat city, i(x. — 
 
 Jonah III. 1, '2. 
 
 THE sum of the whole prophecy, and of every part 
 therein, I have often told you, is, in variety of 
 examples, the mercy of God towards his poor creatures. 
 The bounds whereof, if any desire to learn how large 
 they are, let him consider that in this present history 
 it is e hibited both to Jews and Gentiles : an example 
 of the former was Jonah, of the latter the mariners 
 and the Ninevites ; both to prophets and others of 
 meaner and mechanical callings, both to prince and 
 
 people, aged and infants, men and beasts ; that no 
 man may think either himself, or his seed, or any the 
 silliest worm that moveth upon the earth, excluded 
 therehence. Paul in his first to Timothy, chap, i., 
 glorieth in the ' mercy of Jesus Christ which he had 
 shewed upon him, to the ensample of such as should 
 believe in time to come.' But here are four examples 
 at once, and as it were four Gospels, preaching to 
 every country and language, age, and condition, and 
 
200 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 sex, the hope of better things. Blessed be the Lord 
 God, which hath written a whole ' book of remem- 
 brances,' Mai. iii., and filled it with arguments to so 
 good a purpose. 
 
 This third chapter, which by the will of God we 
 are entered upon, treateth in general of the mercy of 
 God towards Nineveh, and sheddeth itself orderly 
 into four parts. 1. The calling or commission of 
 Jonah renewed. 2. The performance of his i; s:-age. 
 3. The repentance of Nineveh. 4. Their delivery. 
 
 Jonah is called and put in charge again in the two 
 former verses. Wherein (besides the author and 
 other particulars heretofore extracted from the same 
 words) we will rest ourselves especially upon these 
 three points : 1, the repetition of his warrant: The 
 word of the Lord came the second time; 2, whither 
 he is willed to go : to Niiietrh ; 3, what he is to do 
 there : (1.) touching the matter, he must preach the 
 preachinr/ that God shall hid him; (2.) touching the 
 manner, he must do it by proclamation. 
 
 1. And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the 
 second time, sayinr/, Arise, i/o unto Nineveh, that f/reat 
 cilij. Jonah being become a new man, after bis bap- 
 tism and regeneration in the water of the sea, receiveth 
 a new commission, his former being forfeited by dis- 
 obedience. First, it is not lawful, we know, for any 
 man to take that honour unto him without calling, 
 Heb. V. ; nor to set himself upon a candlestick who 
 hath no power to burn unless God Idndle him.* ' I 
 have not thrust in myself for a pastor after thee, 
 neither have I desired the day of misery,' Jer. xvii. 
 Then, because Jonah had disannulled his first commis- 
 sion, it stood as void unto him and of none efiect till it 
 was repeated the second time. Peter denying his 
 Master three times, and not less than losing thereby 
 his legatine and apostolic authority, repaireth his 
 broken credit by three confessions, and is newly in- 
 vested into his former office. If I fall now and then 
 into the same points which I have already handled in 
 the first chapter, you may easily pardon me. For, 
 first, the words are the same, or not much altered ; 
 and haply, as the first commission of Jonah took 
 shipwreck in the Syriac Sea, so the first notes I gave 
 are perished in your memories, and therefore there 
 may bo need of repetition of such doctrines, no less 
 than of his charge. 
 
 There is no material difference between the two 
 verses, wherein the mandate is given unto him, but 
 in the addition of one particle : the second time. Which 
 carrieth a double force : first, of proponsion in the 
 nature of a man to fall away from God, unless it be 
 daily and continually renewed. The apostle was fain 
 to 'travail in birth, and to do it again' {cjkos itenmi 
 parturio), with hia little children the Galatians, till 
 Christ were formed in them, Gal. iv. ; for as the ripen- 
 ing and perfecting of a child in his mother's womb 
 
 * Quid teipsum super candelabrum pouis, qui teip3um 
 non acceadis ?— £ern. scr. 17 m Oinlic. 
 
 asketh the time of nine months at least, so the breed- 
 ing of Christ in the consciences of men, and begetting 
 or preserving of children to God, cannot be done with- 
 out often and careful endeavour bestowed therein. 
 Secondlij, of the merciful clemency of God towards 
 Jonah, in restoring him to his former dignity ; for he 
 not only gave him his life, which was despaired, but 
 the honour and place of a prophet. He might have 
 lived still, and seen long life and many days, a stranger 
 to his own home, an alien to his mother's sons, an 
 exile from the Israelites, a byword of reproach, for 
 leesing his wonted pre-eminence ; and as they won- 
 dered when they heard that Saul prophesied, ' What ! 
 is Saul become one of the prophets ?' so it might have 
 given as just a cause of admiration that Jonah was 
 become none of the prophets. But Jonah abideth a 
 prophet still, and is as highly credited as if he had not 
 broken his former faith. I know the patience of God 
 is very abundant : ' He is merciful and gracious, long- 
 suffering, andof greatgooduess.' He crioth unto the fools 
 (and such we are all), Proverbs i., ' j'e foolish, how 
 long will ye love foolishness ?' be dealeth with sinners 
 as David dealt with Sau!, who took away his spear, 
 and his watcrpot, and sometimes a isiece of his cloak, 
 as it were snatches and remembrances, to let us under- 
 stand that we are in his hands, and if we take not 
 warning he will further punish us. He dresseth his 
 vineyard, Isaiah the fifth, with the best and kindliest 
 husbandly that his heart could invent ; afterwards he 
 'looked' (required not the first hour, but tarrying the 
 full time), ' he looked that it should bring forth gi-apos' 
 in the autumn and vintage season. He waiteth for 
 the fruit of his fig-tree three years, Luke the thirteenth, 
 and is content to be entreated that ' digging and dung- 
 ing,' and expectation a fourth year may be bestowed 
 upon it. They say, that morahze the parable, that he 
 stayed for the synagogue of the Jews ; the first year 
 of the patriarchs, the second of the judges, the third 
 of the kings, and that the fourth of the prophets it 
 was cut down. Likewise that he hath waited for the 
 church of Christianity three years ; that is, three revo- 
 lutions and periods of ages, thi-icc five hundi'ed years 
 from the jjassion of Chi-ist ; or, if we further repeat it, 
 that he hath tarried the leisure of the whole world, 
 one year under nature, another under the law, a third 
 under grace. The fourth is now in passing, wherein 
 it is not unlikely that both these fig-trees shall be cut 
 down. Whatsoever judgments arc jsronounced (Amos 
 the first and second) against Damascus, and Judah, 
 and the rest, are ' for three transgressions and for 
 four ;' so long he endured their iniquities. He was 
 able to charge them, in the fourteenth of Numbers, 
 that they had seen his glory, and yet provoked him 
 ten times. Jerusalem's provocation in the gospel, 
 Mat. xxiii., and such care in her loving Saviour to 
 have ' gathered her children under his wings ' of sal- 
 vation, 'as the hen her chickens,' seemeth to be with- 
 out number, as appearcth by this interrogation, ' O 
 
Ver. ],2.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXI. 
 
 201 
 
 Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often .-' Notwithstanding 
 these precedents and presumptions of his mercy, the 
 safest way shall be to rise at his first call, and not to 
 defer our obedience till the second, for fear of preven- 
 tion, lest the Lord have just cause given by us to 
 excuse himself: ' I called, and you have not answered,' 
 Isa. Isv. And albeit at some times, and to some 
 sinners, the Lord be pleased to iterate his sufl'erauce, 
 yet far be it off that we take incitement thereat to 
 iterate our misdeeds. He punished his angels in 
 heaven for one breach, Achan for one sacrilege, Miriam 
 for one slander, Moses for one unbelief, Anauias and 
 Sappbh'a for one lie ; he may be as speedy and quick 
 in avenging himseh' upon our ofl'ences. But if we 
 neglect the lii'st and second time also, then let us 
 know that danger is not far off. Jude had some rea- 
 son and meaning in noting the corrupt trees, that were 
 twice dead ; for if they twice die, it is likely enough that 
 custom will prevail against them, and that they will 
 die the thu-d time, and not give over death till they be 
 iinally rooted up. 
 
 There are two reasons that may justly deter us 
 from this carelessness and security in offending, which 
 I labour to dissuade. 
 
 (1.) The strength that sin gathereth by grow-ing and 
 going forwards. It creepeth hko a canker, or some 
 other contagious disease in the body of man ; and, 
 because it is not timely espied and medieined, threat- 
 eneth no small hazard unto it. It fareth therewith 
 as with a tempest upon the seas, in which there are, 
 first, leves uulUc, little waves, aftenvards m.ajoia volu- 
 mina, gi'eater volumes of water, and then, perhaps, 
 iijiui fjlohi, balls of fire, et ji actus ad caium, and surges 
 mounting up as high as heaven. Isaiah describeth 
 in some such manner the breeds of serpents : ' Fii-st 
 an egg, next a cockatrice, then a serpent, and after- 
 wards a fiery flying serpent.' Custom, they hold, is 
 another nature, altera iiatma, and a nature fashioned 
 and wrought by art, ajfahricata natura; and as men 
 that are well inured are ashamed to give over,* so 
 others of an ill habit are as loath to depart from it, 
 cum in projunduni veniunt neyHijunt. The curse that 
 the men of Crete used against their enemies was not 
 a sword at their hearts, nor fire upon their houses, 
 but that which would bring on these in time, and 
 much worse, that the}- might take pleasure in an evil 
 custom, lit mala consnetudine dclectentur.^ Hugo 
 the cardinal noteth the proceeding of sin upon the 
 words of the seventh Psalm : ' If I have done this 
 thing, it' there be any wickedness in my hands, &c., 
 then let mine enemy persecute my soul ' by suggestion, 
 ' and take it ' by consent ; ' let him tread my life upon 
 the eai'th,' by action, ' and lay mine honour in the 
 dust,' by custom and pleasure therein ; for custom in 
 sinning is not only a grave to bury the soul in, but a 
 great stone rolled to the mouth of it to keep it down. 
 
 * Bene consuetos pudebit dissuescere. — Seiuc. 
 t Yaler. Max., lib. vii. cap. ii. 
 
 And as there is one kind of drunkenness in excess of 
 wine, ebrit'tas viiii, another of forgetfuluess, obln-ionis, 
 so there is a third that cometh by lust and desire of 
 sinning, lihidinis peccandi. 
 
 (2.) Now if the custom of sin be seconded with the 
 judgment of God, adding an overweight unto it, blind- 
 ing our eyes and hardening our hearts, that we may 
 neither see nor understand, lest we should be saved, and 
 because we do not those good things which we kiiow, 
 therefore we shall not know those evil things which 
 we do,* but as men bereft of heart, run on a sense- 
 less and endless race of iniquity, till the daj's of gra- 
 cious visitation be out of date, it will not be hard to 
 determine what the end will be. Peter saith, 2 Peter 
 ii., ' Worse than the first beginning.' Matthew sheweth 
 by how many degrees worse, chap. xii. For whereas 
 at the fii-st we were possessed but by one devil, now 
 he cometh associated with ' seven others, all worse 
 than himself,' and there they intend for ever to inhabit. 
 Therefore it shall not be amiss for us to break off' 
 wickedness betimes, and to follow the counsel that 
 Chrysostom giveth, alluding to the pohcy of the wise 
 men in returning to their country another way, Mat. 
 ii. Hast thou come, saith he, by the way of adultery ? 
 venisti per xiain furnicationis / &c. Go back by the way 
 of chastity. Camest thou by the way of covetousness ? 
 Go back by the way of mercy. But if thou return the 
 same way thou camest, thou art still imder the king- 
 dom of Herod. For as the sicknesses of the body, so 
 of the soul there are criticiil days, secret to ourselves, 
 but well known to God, whereby he doth guess whether 
 we be in hkelihood to recover health, and to hearken 
 to the wholesome counsels of his law or not. If, then, 
 he take his time to give us over to om-selves and the 
 malignity of our diseases, we may say too late, as some- 
 time Christ of Jerusalem, ' Oh that we had known the 
 things that belong to om- peace, but now they are hid 
 from our eyes.' 
 
 2. Arise, (JO unto Xinereh. ' Arise ' is but a word 
 of preface or preparation, and noteth, as I said before, 
 that forwardness that ought to be in the prophets of 
 the Lord. Lying down for the most part is a sign 
 that both the body and mind ai-e at rest. Cubatio siy- 
 num quieti et corporis etaniini, itc. Sitting betokeneth the 
 body at ease, but the mind may be occupied. Rising 
 most commonlj' is an argument that both are disposed 
 to undertake some work. Now, as it is both shame 
 and sin for any sorts of men to trifle in their calling 
 (for we shall all rise in our order, but those inordinate 
 walkers, saith Bernard, in what order shaU they rise, 
 who keep not that order and rank which God hath 
 assigned them unto ?j, so especiaUy for those that are 
 sent about the message. Christ told his disciples in 
 the nineteenth of Matthew, that when the Son of man 
 sat they should also sit. But I beseech you (saith 
 Bernard), when sat he in this world ? where rested he ? 
 
 * Quia non faciuut bona quse cognoscunt, non cognosceut 
 mala quse faciuut. — August. 
 
202 
 
 KING ON JOXAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 or what place bad he to lay liis head upon ? Rather he 
 rejoiced, ais a giaut refreshed with wine, to run his 
 race, and he went ab«ut doing good, as it is witnessed 
 in the Acts of the Apostles : ' Birds had their nests, 
 aud foxes then- holes,' but Christ had no resting place 
 till, his work being finished, he had dearly earned and 
 deserved to have his leave warranted unto him, when 
 ' the Lord said to oui- Lord, Sit at my right hand.' 
 Thomas Becket, an evil man, aud in an evil cause, 
 but with words not impertinent to his place if he had 
 well applied them, answered one who advised him to 
 deal more moderately towards the king. Sit I at the 
 stern, and would you wish me to sleep ? ClaciDii 
 teneo, et ad somnuin me vocas ? Our Saviour, to the 
 like effect, when he found his disciples asleep, ' Why 
 sleep you ?' and to Peter by name, ' Sleepest thou, 
 Peter T Is Judas waking ? are the high priests con- 
 sulting ? the soldiers banding ? the Son of man near 
 his betraying "? the envious man sowing his tares, 
 marring the field, hindering the good seed, and the 
 gospel of the kingdom, aud will not you awake ? llise, 
 let us walk, and consider the regions far and wide, 
 that they arc not only ' white to the harvest,' but dry 
 to the fire, alh(e ad messcm ; sicac ad vjnciir* if they 
 be neglected. They must be labom-crs that are sent 
 into that harvest ; and to shew what a blessing it is 
 that such be sent, the Lord of the harvest must be 
 earnestly prayed unto. Such a labourer was he, who, 
 though he were ' born out of due time,' yet he omitted 
 uo due time of working, and though the least of all 
 the apostles, in some honours of that calling, 1 Cor. 
 XV., yet in the burdens aud tasks that belonged unto 
 it, he attributed it to the special grace of God, that he 
 'laboured more abundantly than all they.' Seneca 
 was so far at odds with idleuess, that he professed he 
 had rather be sick than out of business. Malo mihl 
 male esse qiidin moUiler. I sleep very little ; saith he, it 
 is enough for me that I have but left watching. Some- 
 times I know I have slept, sometimes I do but suspect 
 it.f The examples of heathen monj so studiously 
 addicted to their work, that they forgot to take their 
 ordinary food, and tied the hair of their heads to the 
 beams of their chambers, lest sleep should beguile 
 them in their intended labours, are almost incredible, 
 but to the open disgrace of us, who, having a mark set 
 before our eyes, and rurniing to the prize which they 
 knew not, are so slack in our duties. 
 
 But as before, so again I demand, why to Nineveh? 
 Wc have already conjectured four reasons, let us add 
 a fifth. The force of example wc all know, and very 
 gi'oat to induce likeness of manners, aud to verify the 
 proverb in the prophet, Isa. xxiv., ' Like people, like 
 priests ; like servant, like master ; like maid, like 
 mistress ; like buyer, like seller ; like lender, like bor- 
 
 * Born. 
 
 t fc-iitis est railii vigilare ilcsiisso. Alicjuando mo dormisso 
 solo, ali<iuando suspicor. — Epist. 33. 
 X Caruoados, I'ra.\agonis. 
 
 rower ; like giver, Uke taker of usury.' And the greater 
 the example is, the greater authority' it hath to draw to 
 similitude. Facile Iraiisititr ad pliires* we are easily 
 moved to go after a multitude. I may add, facile 
 tninsitur ad majores, it is uo hard labour to make us 
 imitate great authorities, be our patterns good or bad. 
 Evil behaviour in priuces, prophets, and higher 
 degrees whatsoever, corrupteth as it were the air 
 round about, aud maketh the people with whom they 
 live as like uuto them in naughtiness as, they say, 
 bees to bees. God telleth Jerusalem in the 16th of 
 Ezekiel, that all that used proverbs should use this 
 amongst the rest against her, ' As is the mother, so is 
 the daughter : thou art the daughter of thy mother, 
 that hath cast olf her husband and her childi-en ; and 
 thou art the sister of thy sisters, which forsook their 
 husbands and their children.' You see how evenly 
 they tread in the same steps of the same sins : ' Your 
 mother is an Hittite, and your father an Amorite.' 
 Bid the daughter degenerate from her kind ? ' Her 
 elder sister at her left hand was Samaria, aud her 
 daughters : aud the younger at her right hand, Sodom 
 and her daughters ; ' father and mother, daughter and 
 sisters, and the whole brood was alike infected. Jero- 
 boam the son of Nebat is never mentioned in the 
 writings of Israel, but he draweth a tail after him like 
 a blazing star: ' Who sinned, and madelsrael to sin.' 
 A sick head disordered all the other parts, and a dark 
 eye made a dark body ; a fearful instruction to those 
 that fear God, to make them beware of binding two 
 sins together, that is, of sinning themselves, and sinning 
 before others, to put a stumbling-block before their feet, 
 of falling into the like oflence, especially when the 
 credit, and countenance, and priority of their places 
 maketh others the bolder to sin, because they sin with 
 such authors, tiitiim est pcccare aulhoribus illis. Such 
 bitter roots shall answer for themselves and their cor- 
 rupted branches ; such poisoned fountains shall not 
 escape with single judgment, because they have polluted 
 the whole course of waters : such leprous and con- 
 tagious souls, as they heap sin upon sin, so by numbers 
 and heaps they shall receive their plagues, aud account 
 to the justice of God, not only for the pollution of 
 their own person, but of many thousands more, whom, 
 by the warrant of their precedency, they have pulled 
 into wickedness. 
 
 And for this cause I take it, amongst others, 
 Nineveh is crowned iii the next words with the honour- 
 able title of her greatness, to let her know that the 
 more eminent in dignity, the nearer she lay to danger ; 
 and as she gave to the inferior cities of the land an 
 example of sinning, so she should also be an example 
 of desolation uuto them. 
 
 (Jo to yiiicn'li, that i/ivat citij ; that is, preach re- 
 pentance to the mother, aud the daughters will draw 
 their instructions from her breasts. Win the lady 
 and princess, and her handmaids will soon bo brought 
 • Seueo. 
 
Vek. 1 , 2.] 
 
 LECTUKE XXXI. 
 
 203 
 
 to obedience ; speak to the haughty monarch of the 
 world, knock at the gates of his proud palace ; beat 
 the ears of those insolent and wealthy merchants, 
 shake them from the settled lees of their long con- 
 tinued abominations : and thou shalt end many labours 
 in one, thou shalt do a cure upon the heart of the 
 principal city, the benefit whereof shall spread itself 
 into the parts of the whole countrj'. But if Nineveh 
 be so great in wealth, and so deeply rooted in pride, 
 that she will not be reformed, tell her she hath 
 climbed so high to have the lower downfall, and 
 though her children should die in their sins, yet thou- 
 blood, for example given, shall especially be required 
 at her hands. Many goodly cities were there in Asia 
 (Babylon, so big that Aristotle called it a country, 
 Xwoan, not a city ; and Nineveh greater than Babylon ; 
 and Troy less than them both, but in her flourishing 
 days, the pillar of that part of the world*), of which, 
 and many their companions, we may now truly say, 
 jam periere ndiia, the very ruins of them are gone to 
 ruin. The king of the Goths, when he saw Constanti- 
 nople, pronounced that the emperor there was an 
 earthly god. They write of Quinsey at this day, that 
 it is a hundred miles about, and furnished with twelve 
 thousand bridges of marble. f Let not Jerusalem 
 lose her honour among the rest, though her honour 
 and happiness were laid in the dust long since. They 
 that were alive when Jerusalem lived, to have ' num- 
 bered her towers, considered her walls, and marked 
 her bulwarks, and to have told their posterit.y of it,' 
 might have made a report scarcely to have been be- 
 lieved. I am sure, when ' the kings of the earth were 
 gathered together, and saw it, they marvelled ; they 
 were astonished, and suddenly driven back,' Ps. xlviii. 
 Let me add the renowned cities of Italy, by some 
 never sufficiently magnified, rich Venice, elites Yenctia, 
 gi'eat Milan, lufjens Mcdiohiiium, ancient Ravenna, 
 fruitful Bononia, noble Naples, with all their glorious 
 sisters and confederates, and her that hath stolen the 
 birthright from the rest, and saith she is aucientest, 
 and the mother to them all, which only is a city in 
 the judgment of Quintilian, and others are but towns; 
 ■were they all cities, great and walled up to heaven, as 
 those of the Anakims, Dent, iii., were they regions, as 
 he spake of Babylon, and every one a world in itself; 
 yet time shall wear them away, sin shall dissolve and 
 undo their composition ; and he that is great over all 
 the kingdoms of the earth, can cover them with 
 brambles, sow them with salt, and turn them upside 
 down as if they had never been. When the emperor 
 Constantius came in triumph to Rome, and beheld 
 the companies that entertained him, he repeated a 
 saying of Cjmeas the Epirote, that he had seen so 
 many kings as citizens, tot se'^vidisse irges quot cives. 
 But viewing the building of the city, the stately arches 
 of the gates, the turrets, tombs, temples, theatres, 
 baths, and some of the works like Babel, so high that 
 * Columen poUentis Asia:. — Lucan. t P- Venet. 
 
 the eye of man could scarcely reach unto them, ut co 
 vix aspicei'e ocuhts Immaiius jiosset, he was amazed and 
 said, that nature had emptied all her strength upon 
 that one city, naturam rires oiiines in uiiam iiibeni ef- 
 fudisse. He spake to Hormisda, master of his works, 
 to erect him a brazen horse in Constantinople, like unto 
 that of Trajan the emperor which he there saw. Hor- 
 misda answered him, that if he desired the like horse, 
 he must also provide him the hke stable, stabidioii 
 quoqac tide c(jiidas oportet,si coles cqw.im talent succedere, 
 all this and much more in the honour of Rome. At 
 length he asked Hormisda what he thought of the 
 city, who told him that he took not pleasure in any- 
 thing but in learning one lesson, which was, that men 
 also died in Rome : id tantwn sibi placcre rcspondit, 
 quod didicisset ibi qnoque homilies mori.*' This was 
 the end of those kingly men, which Constantius so 
 termed, and the end of that lady city, the mirror and 
 mistress of the world, will be the same that hath be- 
 fallen her predecessors ; and as nature emptied her- 
 self upon it, so she must empty herself into natm-e 
 again, if she be so happy to fulfil the number of her 
 day.s, and come to a perfect age ; but such may be the 
 iud<'meut of God unon her notorious and incurable 
 witchcrafts, that as an untimely fruit she may perish, 
 and reap the meed of the blood-sucker in the psalm, 
 not to live out half her days. 
 
 3. Preach unto it the pivachin;/ uhich I bid thee, or 
 proclaim against it the proclamation which I enjoined 
 thee. So that, jirst, the matter must be received from 
 the Lord ; secondly, the manner must be by procla- 
 mation and out-crying, which requireth not only the 
 loudness of voice, but the vehcmeucy and fervency of 
 courage to execute his Maker's will. In Isaiah they 
 are both joined together, for, first, the prophet is willed 
 to ciy, Isa. xl., and secondly, because he was loath 
 to trust the invention of his own spirit, he taketh his 
 text from the mouth of the Lord, ' What shall I cry ? 
 that all flesh is grass,' &c. John Baptist in the Gospel 
 is but a voice (himself not the author nor speaker), but 
 only ' the voice of one that cried in the wilderness, 
 Prepare the ways of the Lord ; ' and whether he spake 
 as loud as the will of that crier was, I report me to 
 the scribes and Pharisees, publicans, soldiers, Herod 
 and Herodias, whose ears he clave in two, with de- 
 nouncing his Master's judgment. 
 
 (1.) The preachiuij uhich I bid thee. How dangerous 
 it is for any messenger of the Lord to exceed the 
 bounds of his commission, by adding his own devices 
 thereunto, and taking words into his mouth which 
 were never ministered unto him, or to come short of 
 it, by keeping back the counsels of his Master which 
 he hath disclosed to be made luiown, let that foai-ful 
 protestation in the end of the book, summing and 
 sealing up all the curses and woes that went before, 
 testify to the world : Rev. xxii., ' I protest unto every 
 man that hearcth the words of the prophecy of this 
 « Platin. in vita faiho. ii. 
 
204 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 book,' (and of all those other books that the finger of 
 Gotl hath written,) ' if any man shall add unto these 
 things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are 
 written in this book : and if any man shall diminish 
 of the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall 
 take away his part out of the book of life, and out of 
 the holy city, and from those things which are written 
 in this book.' The protestation hath weight enough 
 without help, to make it sink into the dullest ears of 
 those who dare adventure at such a price to set their 
 sacrilegious bands to those nice and religious points. 
 Let them beware that preach themselves, and in their 
 own name, and say. The Lord hath said, when he 
 never said, that abuse the world with ' old wives' 
 tales,' and old men's dreams, ' traditions of elders,' 
 constitutions of popes, precepts of men, unwritten 
 truths, unlrue writings, or that sell the word of tho 
 Lord for gain, 2 Cor. ii., and merchandise, that pearl 
 which the wise merchant will buy with all the treasure 
 he hath ; that ' hold the truth of God in unrighteous- 
 ness,' and dare not free their souls for fear of men, 
 and deal in the work of the Lord as adulterers in their 
 filthiness ; for as these esteem not issue but lust,' so 
 the others not the glory of God, nor profit of their 
 hearts, but their own wantonness. Some have too 
 many fingers upon their hands, like the giants in 
 the Second of Samuel, chap, xxi., and some too few, 
 like those whom Adoni-bezek maimed, Judges i. ; some 
 ofl'end in excess, some in defect, some add, some 
 diminish. But he that hath power to add plagues, 
 whilst the world standeth, tliat is, to multiply and 
 continue them in such sort, that they shall ever in- 
 crease to an hundred hundredfold, and never see an 
 end, and to diminish blessings so low, that not the 
 least dram of them shall remain, he shall retail 
 their doings into their bosoms, and give them their 
 reward in the same manner and kind wherein they 
 have deserved it. Tho apostle walked wisely in this 
 calling, and stinted himself with that measure which 
 God had divided unto him. Quod accepi a doiniiio 
 Iradidi: ' what,! have received of tho Lord, that I have 
 delivered unto you,' 1 Cor. xi., neither more nor less, 
 but jnst weight. And being jealous over Timothy with 
 a godly jealousy, for ic^ar he might ' err concerning 
 the faith,' as others had done before him, he ' adjureth 
 him in the sight of God, who quickeneth all things, 
 and before Jesus Christ, who under Pontius Pilate 
 witnessed a good confession, to keep tho command- 
 ment given unto him without s])ot, and unrebukeable, 
 until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ,' 1 Tim. 
 vi. And in that prescience he had of times to come, 
 and love he bare to his scholar, he callotb unto him 
 with intensive inclamation,* ' Timotheus, kee)) that 
 pledge or gage that is committed unto thee '? VVho is 
 that Timotheus in our times ? Tho church, the priests, 
 the doctors, the pastors, the treaters of the word of God 
 
 • Kxelamatio ista et jirescicntia; est et charitutis. — Vincent. 
 Lirin. adv. jiroji/ian. noviit. 
 
 whatsoever.* Keep it because of thieves, because of 
 enemies which watch to sow their tares, that that is 
 committed unto thee, not that thou hast invented ; f 
 that thou hast received, not devised ; a matter not of 
 thine own wit, but of thy learning; not privately 
 caught up, but publicly taught ; wherein thou must 
 not be an author, but a keeper ; nor a master, but a 
 scholar ; nor a guide, but a follower. J The talent of 
 the universal faith, wherew'ith thou art creilited, keep 
 unviolated ; thou bast received gold, return gold, give 
 not lead, or brass, or copper instead of gold. 'The 
 precious jewelsof heavenly doctrine, cut and adorn, give 
 beauty, grace, and comeliness unto them, but suborn 
 them not ; illustrate that which was obscure, and let 
 posterity gratulate itself for understanding that which 
 before they reverently esteemed, being not understood. 
 But ever be sure that thou teach the same things 
 which thou hast learned ; and though thou bring unto 
 them a new fashion, let the matter and substance be 
 all one. § Much more, and in fitter terms, doth 
 Viucentius utter to the same purpose. 
 
 (2.) Preach or pruclaim unto it. The office of a 
 faithful prophet, when he hath received his message 
 from the Lord, is as faithfully to deliver it. Jeremiah 
 saw what ensued upon his simple and plain dealing, 
 in not dissembhng the faults of the world, but setting 
 them in order before the faces of men. ' Since I 
 spake, I cried out of wrong, and proclaimed desolation ; 
 therefore the word of the Lord was made a reproach 
 unto me, and had in derision daily.' And ' he heard 
 the railing of many, and fear on every side,' and 
 thought to give over speaking in the name of the Lord ; 
 but his word was ' as fire within his bones, and ho 
 was weary of forbearing, and could not do it. He 
 afterwards ' cursed the day of his birth, and the man 
 that brought news to his father, saying, A man child 
 is born, and wished the messenger in case of one of 
 those cities which God overtm-ued without repenting 
 him, because he had not shiin him from the womb, 
 that his mother might have been his grave, and his 
 belly his everlasting conception ; that he might not 
 have come fi)rth to see labour and sorrow,' and to have 
 consumed his days with shame ; he went not into 
 corners to smother the will of him that sent him, but 
 in terms of defiance, and personal application to the 
 stoutest that bare an head, roundly disclosed it : ' And 
 thou Palshur,' &c. He had shewed the preciscness of 
 his calling, that he must not spare either small or 
 great, though it pulled tho whole world upon him, not 
 long before, and with words of no less heaviness : 
 chap. XV., ' Woe is me, my mother, that thou hast 
 born me a contentious man, and a man that slriveth 
 with tho whole earth ! I have neither lent in 
 
 * Ecolcsia, i)ra;))Ositi, sacenlos, tractator, doctor, 
 t Quod tibi crctlitum, non quod u to inventum, &c. 
 X Non autlior debes esse sed custos, non iustitutor sod 
 soctaior, non ducoua sed scquens. 
 2 Ut cum dicaa novo uou dicns nova. 
 
Vek. 3.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXir. 
 
 205 
 
 usury, nor men liave lent unto me ;' that is, I deal 
 not in these affairs which for the most part hreed 
 quarrels and heart-burnings, ' yet every one doth 
 curse me.' 
 
 We are the children of those prophets that have lived 
 in former days. We were horn to contend and strive 
 ■with the whole earth; we are despised, despited, hated, 
 cursed of evei-y man, because we preach the preach- 
 ings that the Lord hath bidden us, and proclaim his 
 vengeance against sinners ; our hand against every man, 
 and everj' man's hand against us ; our tongue against 
 every vice, and every tongue walketh and rangoth at 
 liberty through our actions. We are thought too 
 clamorous against the disorders of common life, too 
 busy and severe in making philippics and declama- 
 tions against every oflence. Forgive us this fault. A 
 necessity is laid upon us. And as it is our woe that 
 oiir mothers have bred us to so quarrelsome a vocation, 
 so it is another and our greater woe if we preach not 
 the gospel ; if not also the law ; if not the tidings of 
 joy to those that rejoice in our message; if not also 
 the terrors of judgment to those that contemn it ; if 
 not liberty to captives ; if not also captivity to libertines ; 
 if we pipe not to those that will dance after us. and 
 sound not a trumpet of war to those that resist ; if 
 we build not an ark to those that will be saved, and 
 pour not out a flood of curses against those that will 
 perish ; lastly, if we open not the doors to those 
 that knock and are penitent, and stand not at the 
 gates with a flaming sword in our mouths against those 
 that are obstinate. Wliat ! Shall the invincible tents 
 of Christ, saith Cyprian,* defended with the strength 
 of the Lord, give place to the terrors and threat- 
 enings of men ? Ecclesia cedet cnpitolio ? Shall the 
 church yield to the capitol? Majora fioriifium scelcra, 
 quiim saccrchitxnn judicin? Shall the outrages of mad 
 men be greater than the judgments and censures of 
 ministers ? It must not be. If we be the light of 
 the world, we must espy faults ; and if voices of John 
 Baptist, we must crj- against them. If we be the seers 
 of the Lord, we must not be blind ; and if his criers, we 
 * Lib. i. cpist. 3 ad Cornel. 
 
 must not be dumb or tongue-tied, videns, non videns, 
 priTco miitiis. I know the preaching of mercy is more 
 acceptable unto you. ' Oh how beautiful arc the feet,' 
 and how sweet the tongues ' of those that declare 
 peace, and publish good things ! ' and how unwelcome 
 of those that proclaim wars, and publish woes. If 
 every congregation we came into, we would cry Peace 
 to this place and to this auditory, and would sing upon 
 earth as the angels sang from heaven, ' Glory be to 
 God, and peace to men,' then no men better pleasing. 
 But you will not sufler us to think the thoughts of 
 peace. When we say we will meditate of mercy, we 
 are presently interrupted, and called to a song of 
 judgment. These hitter and last days, full of the 
 ripest and last sins, which no posterity shall be able 
 to add unto, 
 
 Non habot ulterius quod uostris muribus a'ldat, 
 Posteritas, 
 
 so di'unken and drowned in viciousness, that, as in a 
 plague, we marvel not so much at those that die, as 
 at those that escape ; so in this general infection of 
 sin, not at the vileness of the most, but that any 
 almost is innocent, give us no rest from bitter speak- 
 ings. And to give you one reason for many, we are 
 fearfully afraid if we take not that wise advertisement 
 that the apostle gave in the epistle to the Colossians, 
 chap, iv., ' Say to Archippus, Take hood to the 
 ministry that thou hast received in the Lord, that thou 
 fulfil it.' Paul wrote it to the Colossians, and the 
 Colossians must do it byword of mouth to Archippus, 
 and they all to us all (as many as are in the office of 
 Archippus), write, speak, proclaim, and, lest it might 
 be forgotten, set it in the end of many precepts, and 
 advise it by way of postscript. Take heed, look unto 
 it, give good and careful regard, have your eyes in 
 your heads, and your hearts in your eyelids ; it is a 
 work, not a play, a burden, nor an honour ; a service, 
 not a vacancy ; and you have received it in him that 
 will require it, talent and use, principal aud interest, 
 and give you the fulness of wrath if ye do it to halves, 
 and not perfectly fulfil it. 
 
 LECTURE XXXII. 
 
 So Jvnah arose, and xvoit to Ninrvcli. accnidiiii/ to tJir irord of the Lord. Xou- Niiicvcli ivas a great and excellent 
 
 cilij of three days' journey. — Jonah III. 3. 
 
 THE first part of the chapter, wherein the commis- 
 sion of Jonah is renewed unto him, we have 
 already absolved ; and are now to proceed to the 
 execution thereof, which was the second general branch. 
 Wherein he so warily behaveth himself, having bought 
 his experience with cost, that he departeth not an 
 hair's breadth from his directions perfined. Being 
 bidden to arise, he arisetb ; to go, he goeth (not now 
 to Tarshish, as before, but to Nineveh) ; to proclaim, 
 
 he proclaimeth, not the fancies or supposals of his 
 own head, but the preaching, no doubt, which the 
 Lord bade him, because it is said, ' according to the 
 word of the Lord.' As for that which is added, or 
 rather interposed, and by a parenthesis convoyed into 
 the rest, of the greatness of Nineveh, it maketh the 
 rather for the commendation of his duty, that failed 
 not in so large a province, and the faith of that people 
 who were so presently reformed. I mil follow the 
 
206 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. Ill 
 
 card that Jonah doth. As he went to Nineveh, and 
 preached according to the word of the Lord, so because 
 the same word of the Lord again repeated in my text 
 tieth me to a rememoration of the same particulars 
 which erst I have delivered, let it not oflend j-our ears 
 that I pass not by them without some further explica- 
 tion. The present occurrents arc, 1, his readiness 
 and speed to obey the calling of the Lord : so Jonah 
 arose ; 2, his running to the mark proposed, not out 
 of the way : and went to Nineveh ; 3, his walking by 
 line and level : accordinrf to the word of the Lord ; 4, a 
 caution, or watchword, thrown out by the Holy Ghost 
 concerning the gi-eatness of the city ; as if it were 
 plainly said, Be careful not to forget the compass 
 of Nineveh. If you think on that in the course of 
 this story, you will easily grant that the service 
 of my prophet was the more laudable in persisting, 
 and the conversion of the inhabitants in taking so 
 short a time. 
 
 1. They spake of the Lacedjemonians in former 
 times, a people in defence of their right most prodigal 
 of their lives, and quick to encounter any danger, 
 that it was a shame for any man to fly from battle ; 
 but for a Lacedasmon, even to pause and deliberate 
 upon it, turpe est cuilibet viro fuf/ere ; Laconi etiam 
 deliberdsse. Jonali being willed to arise and go to 
 Nineveh, is now so far from flying the face of the Lord, 
 that as if his car were pulled, and his soul goaded 
 with that word, he taketh the first handsel of time to 
 begin his work. So truly was it said by Isaiah, in the 
 fortieth of his prophecy, ' They that wait upon the 
 Lord shall renew their strength ; they shall lift up 
 their wings as the eagles ; they shall run, and not bo 
 weary ; and they shall walk, and not faint.' Jonah 
 was quick enough before, when he hied himself to 
 Tarshish with more haste than good speed (as the 
 wicked and disobedient have wings upon their heels to 
 bear them to destruction ; their feet are swift to shed 
 blood, and they run with more alacrity to death than 
 others to life*) ; but he wanted that encouragement 
 which Isaiah spoaketh of, he waited not upon the will 
 of the Lord, neither had he the testimony of a good 
 conscience, and therefore was soon weary of that 
 unhappy race. Now he ariseth with a better will, and 
 feelcth agility put into his bones, which before he was 
 not acquainted with. The word implioth many times 
 such haste as admitteth no dalliance. The Jews in 
 the second of Nehemiah having heard of the goodness 
 of their (iod upon them, and the w<n'ds of the king for 
 the repairing of Jerusalem, presently made answer to 
 the speech of Nehemiah, ' Let us rise and build.' Let 
 us not lose so good an opportunity, nor give advan- 
 tage to our enemies by protraction of time. And it 
 followeth immediately upon that accord of theirs : ' So 
 they strengthened their hand to good.' The latter 
 expoundcth the former. Let us rise and build ; that is, 
 let us strengthen our hands, and heartily address our- 
 * Alacriua curniiil ad mortem iiuum nos ail vilaiii. — Ijvrn. 
 
 selves to despatch this business. Afterwards, when 
 their adversaries reproached them, and charged them 
 with rebelling against the king, Nehemiah answered, 
 ' The God of heaven will prosper us,' and under the 
 warrant of his protection, we his servants ' vnll rise 
 and build,' that is, we will not be removed fi'om our 
 work with all your threatenings and discountenanc- 
 ings. ' Then arose Ehashib the high priest, with his 
 brethren the priests, and they built the sheep-gate,' 
 itc, chap. iii. And surely if you consider the order 
 and manner of their building, how they flanked one 
 the other in the work, some setting themselves to the 
 sheep-gate, some to the fish-port, some to the gate 
 of the old fish-pool, others to the valley gate, 
 these next unto those, and all in their appointed 
 wards and stations ; and I doubt not but every 
 man (except the gi-eat ones of the Tekoites, who 
 ' put not their necks to the work') as earnest as 
 Baruch was, of whom it is said that he killed and fired 
 himself, accendit se, in the doing of his task, for they 
 watched in the night time, and put not otf their clothes, 
 save only for the washing,' chap. iv. ; you will easily 
 confess that their meaning was, when they first said, 
 ' Let us rise and build,' to do their work at once, 
 and to busy themselves about nothing else, hoc age, 
 not to give rest to their bodies more than nature did 
 necessarily and importunately call for, nor vacation 
 to their minds till their work were at an end. Thus 
 Jonah arose (for I am as willing, in these our lazy 
 and loitering days, to build upon the word, as those 
 upon the fragments and ndns of Jerusalem), that is, 
 he strengthened, and armed, and inflamed himself to 
 run with his errand to Nineveh ; his legs are as pil- 
 lars of marble, and his feet as the feet of an unicorn, 
 to undertake the travel. lie knew that, ' as vinegar 
 is to the teeth, and as smoke to the eyes of a man, so 
 is a slothful messenger to him that sendeth them,' 
 Prov. X. ; but much more a slothful prophet would 
 grievously offend so high a Lord as he was now to deal 
 with. So Jonah arose. The example ariseth with 
 full strength against idleness, a sin as idly and care- 
 lessly neglected in this place, as carelessly committed. 
 I will speak with your good leave. Your collections 
 for the poor (by hearsay) are not over-sparing. (The 
 Lord increase not only your oil and meal in your ves- 
 sels, but yonr mercy within your bowels. The lower 
 j'on draw forth these wells of charity, the clearer will 
 30ur waters flow unto you), lint where are correc- 
 tions for the slothful the mean time ? an alms as ne- 
 cessary as the former, and a work of mercy not to be 
 slipped in a well-ordered commonwealth. The faith- 
 less steward in the Gospel being warned to make his 
 account, and give over the stewardship, Luke xvi., 
 amidst his perplexed thoughts \Yhat he should do for 
 times to come, said within himself, ' I cannot^dig, and 
 to beg I am ashamed.' These more faithless in their 
 callings than that unrighteous steward, are not ashamed 
 to beg, though they are able enough to dig, and sus- 
 
Ver. 3.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXII. 
 
 207 
 
 taiu the burden of other labours, but will not ; as 
 unprofitable to the earth as Margites in the poet, of 
 whom it was said, that be neither ploughed nor delved, 
 nor did any thing in his life throughout, that might 
 tend to good. Ncqiw arasse neqiic fodisse, &e. Will 
 you know the cause that ^gysthus became an adul- 
 terer '? We need not call for (Edipus, or any cunning 
 interpreter, to render a reason of his lewd living ; in 
 prowptii causa est. Slothfulness was the bane that 
 poisoned him ; and if you will know the cause of so 
 many robberies in the fields, riots in your streets, 
 disorders in common life, we may shortly, and in a 
 word, derive them from idleness : it is so rank a sink 
 (saith Bernard) of all lustful and lawless tempta- 
 tions. It is not less than a wonder in nature, that 
 Pliny, in his Natural History,* reporteth of the bees, 
 their industry and painfulness to be such, and so 
 hardly to be matched in the world, that almost of the 
 shadow, saith he (rather than substance), of a very 
 small living ci'eature propi ex umbra ininiini anima- 
 Us, nature hath made an incomparable thing, //(- 
 compamliile quiddam. They never lose a day from 
 labour, if the air will give them leave to work, nid- 
 lus, cum 2ier ca;lu!n Ucuit, otto pcrit dies. And when the 
 weather is lowering and troublesome, they cleanse 
 their hives, and carry out the filth of those that la- 
 boured within doors. The manner of their working 
 is this : in the day time they keep watch and ward at 
 the gates, as they do in camps, tnoic castromin ; in 
 the night they take their rest, and when the day is 
 sprung, they have an officer to call them up with hum- 
 ming twice or thrice, as with the sound of a trumpet, 
 gemino aut triplici bomho ut buccino nliqno. The 
 younger go abroad to fetch in work f, the elder stay 
 at home ; some bring burdens, other unload them ; 
 some build, other polish; some supply them with stuft" 
 for the work, 'others take care for their victuals, for they 
 take not their diet apart, nequc cnim separaliui vcsciin- 
 tur, that they may be equal in all things. Moreover, 
 they are very observant and strict in exacting the 
 labours of every one, iiiiia obseivalio npcris, and such 
 as are idle they note, and chasten with death. Ccssaii- 
 tium iuertiam notant ct puuiunt morte. Finally, the 
 drones, which are the servants of the right bees, rera- 
 rum apum servitia, they are content to give house-room 
 unto, in fruitful years, but they rule them as their 
 slaves, and put them foremost to the labours, and if 
 they be slack, punish them without pity ; and when 
 the honey is ripe, they drive them from their dwell- 
 ings, and many falling upon one spoil them of their 
 lives. Go to the bees, sluggard, consider their 
 ways and be wise ; they are but small amongst fowls, 
 yet doth their fruit exceed in sweetness, saith the son 
 of Sirach, and their labour in greatness. And go to 
 the bees, ye magistrates of the earth, and learn from 
 that little kingdom of theirs to use the vigour and 
 
 * Lib. si. cap. v. &c. 
 
 t Mane ruunt portis, nupquam mora — Viigil. 
 
 sharpness of discipline against our unserviceable 
 drones, who, like the paralytic members in the body 
 of man, loose and unbound in the joints of obedience, 
 say to the head. Command us not, for we will not stir 
 at thine appointment. I will add to the former ex- 
 ample what the same history speaketh of the pismires, 
 ' a people not strong, yet prepare they their meat in 
 summer,' Prov. vi. and xxx. They labour likewise as 
 the bees ; but these make, the other hoard up meat. 
 Scd ilhv faciunt cibos, luc coiiduiit* Their bodies, and 
 the burdens they bear, have no comparison ; but 'such 
 as are over great ibr their strength, they set their 
 shoulders unto, Inmieiis obui.nr, and with their hinder 
 legs draw them backwards ; and because they fetch 
 their provision from sundry places, the one not know- 
 ing which way the other goetli, therefore they ordain 
 certain days of mart, wherein they meet and confer, 
 and take a general account each of other's labour. 
 Certi dies ad, recoffuitionem mutnam nundinis dantur. 
 We see, saith he, that the very flints are worn, and 
 paths trodden out, with their" journeying, lest any 
 might doubt, in every creature of the world, how avail- 
 able it is to use never so little diligence. Nc quis du- 
 bitet quatibet in re quid possit quaiitulacunque assi- 
 duitas. I say again, Go to the pismires, slug- 
 gard, consider their ways and be wise; 'for they 
 having no guide, governor, nor ruler, provide their 
 meat in summer, and gather their food in harvest,' 
 Prov. vi. We having our rulers and guides of many 
 sorts, soul to govern our bodies, reason our souls, 
 God our reason, nature to shew us the way, as it did 
 these creatures, law to hold us therein, aiid grace to 
 further us ; and not labouring for the food of this 
 transitory life alone, but for that meat that perisheth 
 not, and for the rest from our labours, yet are content, 
 as it were, to languish alive, and to linger out our 
 little time in a continual weariness of well-doing, as if 
 the law had never been given to the sons of Adam to 
 labour, nor to the daughters of Eve to pass through 
 affliction ; and when (I say not pismires and bees, 
 and the little worms of the ground) but the angels of 
 heaven are evermore attending upon their businesses, 
 for ' thousand thousands stand before him, and ten 
 thousand thousands minister unto him,' yet we will 
 sit down and hold ourselves bound to no ministration; 
 nay, when the Lord himself sanctified not his rest, 
 before he had first laboured and finished the work of 
 six days, we are ever in our Sabbaths and rests, and 
 suffer our days of work to slide without remembrance. 
 But as verily as the God of heaven hath sanctified 
 both labour and rest in his own person, so truly shall 
 it be fulfilled, that if we rest in the time of labour, we 
 shall labour in (he time of rest. Jonah arose, 
 
 2. Aud u-eut to Nineveh. The first-born of idleness 
 is to do nothing; the next issue she hath, is to do 
 that that appertaineth not unto us ; for to follow un- 
 necessary business, to keep ourselves in exercise, is 
 * riin. lib. xi. cap. xxx. 
 
208 
 
 KING OX JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 little praise, pro rilando otto, otiosa scctari, ridicuhnn 
 est, and most commonly it falleth out that there is a 
 fellowship and affinity between these two, as Paul 
 writeth of the wanton young widows', 1 Tim. v., that 
 they learned nothing in their idleness, but to go about 
 from house to house ; and that they were not only 
 idle, and did nothing, but wore also prattlers and busy- 
 bodies, Ue^ligyoi, and given to utter uncomely speech, 
 a curious kind of people to know the lives and aft'airs 
 of other men, desiduous and negligent to amend their 
 own.-:- The corruption is natural to us all, and an- 
 ciently descended. Adam, in that richest and royallest 
 liberty of his, over all the works of God's hands, had 
 more desire to know and to do that that was forbidden 
 him than all the rest, and the very commandment of 
 God which should have restrained him, gave occasion 
 to his will to become more wilful. From thence it 
 Cometh that we, his unwise and ungracious children, 
 are physicians to other men rather than ourselves, 
 and statesmen in foreign commonwealths rather than 
 our own, and meddlers in any calling of life rather 
 than that which God hath enjoined us. Harpers will 
 deal with the sceptres of princes, and tell them how 
 to vulc, aliud phrtnim, alliiil sceptriiiii. The people 
 will put on Aaron's robes, and teach him how to 
 teach, stolani Aawiiis omiws assiimimus. The cob- 
 ler will find fault with the thigh of the picture, though 
 his art go no higher than the foot, sutor ultra crepi- 
 (lam. The emperor's stewards will pei-vert Scriptures 
 to strengthen the Arian heresy, though fitter to 
 be a market-man, or to command broth for the 
 emperor in the kitchen. f Uzzah will bear up the 
 ark, though he overthrow himself by it, and Nadab 
 and Abihu offer strange fire, though they burn in the 
 flames of it. God will surely require of us all for 
 doing more than wo should, or that which we ought 
 not, as he did of the Jews for doing less. Isa. i., 
 Qiiis istii a roliis requifiirit ? ' WTlo hath required those 
 things at your hands?' 2 Cor. xii., 'There are di- 
 versities of gifts and diversities of administrations, 
 and diversities of operations, though the Spirit be l)ut 
 one, and God the same that worketh all in all. Are 
 all apostles ? are all prophets ? are all teachers ? are 
 all doers of miracles ? have all the gifts of healing ? 
 do all speak with tongues ? do all interpret ? ' Or 
 liath not God divided these graces to sundry men, that 
 every one might know and do what belongcth to his 
 calling ■? The members in the body of man are not 
 the same, nor ordained to the same function. Rom. 
 xii., ' If the whole body wore an eye, where were the 
 hearing ? or if the whole were an ear, where were the 
 smelling ? Seeing then that we liavc gifts that are 
 diverse, according to the giMce that is given unto us, 
 whether we have prophecy, let us prophesy according 
 
 * Curiosum genus ad cognoscendam vitam alienam, desi- 
 (liiisum a'l corrigendum suam. — Au/. x. Conf. 
 
 t Tuuni est piilmciita Casari jira^pararo, iion ovrn;j:clium 
 exponoro. — Basil. 
 
 to the proportion of faith ; or whether an office, let us 
 wait on the office ; he that teacheth, on teaching ; he 
 that exhorteth, on exhoi'tation ; he that distributeth, 
 let him do it with simplicity ; he that ruleth, with 
 diligence ; he that sheweth mercy, with cheerfulness.' 
 ' Let every man, as he hath received the gift, minister 
 the same (and not his brother's or companion's), as 
 good disposers of the manifold grace of God,' 1 Peter 
 iv. One and the same Spirit, which is the author of 
 order, not of confusion, see how constant he is, and 
 like himself in the mouths of sundry- apostles, to teach 
 this ambitious and idly-busj' age (bringing into nature 
 the like deformed informity of things, bj' mingling all 
 together, wherein the world sometimes was, and whilst 
 it doeth all things, doeth nothing worthy of thanks), 
 neither to be wise in matters appertaining to God or 
 man, more than may stand with sobriety, and having 
 a charge of their own properly distinguished, not to 
 trouble their heads with alien and unnocossarj' aft'airs.* 
 It was a worthy epigram that Aldus ]Manutius wrote 
 upon the door of his chamber, to avoid such weari- 
 some guests. Their cause of troubling him (a man 
 carefully bent to eularge the bounds of good learning) 
 was, neijotii iiiopia, want of business, for then their 
 agreement was, eamiis ail Ahluin, come let us go to 
 Aldus. At length, to prevent them, he set an un- 
 mannerly watchman at his door, which could not 
 blush, and whose entertainment was on this manner, 
 AVhosoever thou art, Aldus doth heartily beseech thee, 
 if thou have any business with him, briefly to despatch 
 it, and presently be gone, unless thou comest as Her- 
 cules did, when Atlas was weary, to put his shoulders 
 under the burthen. For neither thyself canst want 
 work of thine own at any time, nor any of those that 
 repair to this place. f 'To conclude the note, Jonah 
 arose and hasted before at his first call ; there wanted 
 not speed to his travel ; he wont like the liglitning, 
 as Ezckiel speaketh of the four beasts, and spared 
 neither the pains of his body nor the benefit of wind 
 and sails to boar him forwards. But he lost the ap- 
 probation and reward of his labour, because he mis- 
 took Tarshish for Nineveh, and bended his course to a 
 wrong place. Now he hath learned the song of 
 David, I will not only run, but ' I will run the way of 
 thy commandments,' Ps. cxix. And as the feet of the 
 beasts before mentioned (which, in the tenth of 
 Ezekiel, are interpreted to be cherubims) were straight 
 feet, pedcx coriim pi'iiex recti, Ezek. i., so are the foot of 
 Jonah straightened towards Nineveh, and, like an arrow 
 that flieth to the mark, so settoth he his face and 
 heart upon the place commanded. 
 
 * S]iartam nanctus cs, lianc orna. ~Pr(rfal in I. de arte rhetor, 
 ad Andream Nau(jerium. 
 
 t Quisquis es, rogat to Alibis etiam alque etiatn. ut si quid 
 est quod ii so velis, ii(>r|iaueia agas, dciiido actutum alieas ; 
 nisi tanqnani ITorcules ilufesso Atlanti veneris suppcisiturus 
 Innncros. Semper enim crit quod et tu agas, et quotquot luic 
 altulorint pedes. 
 
Ver. 3.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXII. 
 
 20.) 
 
 3. Accordimi to the word of the Lord. The most 
 absolute, constant, infallible rule that ever was de- 
 %ased ; and as many as walk according to this rule, they 
 shall not fail to be blessed. It was desei'vedly wished 
 and longed for in the psalm, ' Oh that my ways were 
 made so direct that I might keep thy statutes, so 
 should I not be confounded, whilst I had respect unto 
 thy commandments,' Ps. cxix. It is said of the chil- 
 dren of Israel, Numbers the ninth, that ' at the month 
 of the Lord,' secniidnm as Jehov/r, ' they Journeyed, and 
 at the mouth of the Lord they pitched or lay still.' 
 They knew his mind by the cloud that was over the 
 tabernacle. For ' if it abode upon the tabernacle two 
 days, or a month, or a year, they also abode, but if 
 it were taken up, then they went forward.' Again, it 
 is added in the same place, and, as it were, with a 
 breath, to praise their obedience, At the command- 
 ment of the Lord, ex prasiitnto Jchovie, they pitched, 
 and at the commandment of the Lord they journeyed, 
 and at the commandment of the Lord they kept the 
 Lord's watch, by the hands of Moses ! happy and 
 heavenly sound of words, where the lusts of their own 
 e.yes, and counsels of their own hearts, were displaced, 
 and the commandment of the Lord in all things, for 
 going and tarrying, from a day to a month, and so to 
 a year, was only observed. That which David de- 
 manded in behalf of a young man, we may ask of 
 young and old,'and all sorts of men, Ps. cxix. : In quo 
 corrifjet, ch. ? ' Wherewithal shall a young man amend 
 his ways ? ' or an old man his '? or theirs, the prince, 
 subject, noble, unnoble, priest, prophet, for we are all 
 crooked, and have need to be rectified. But where- 
 withal ? Even ' by ruling ourselves after thy word.' 
 Whither shall we else go ? as Peter asked his Master 
 in the Gospel, John vi., ' Thou hast the words of 
 eternal life ; ' not only the words of authority to com- 
 mand and bind the conscience, nor the words of wis- 
 dom to direct, nor the words of power to convert, nor 
 the words of grace to comfort and uphold, but the 
 words of eternal Ufe to make us perfectly blessed. 
 And therefore ' woe to the foohsh prophets that follow 
 their own spirits, and prophesy out of their own 
 hearts,' Ezek. xiii. ; so, likewise, woe to the foolish 
 people that follow their own spirits, and walk by the 
 dim and deceitful light of their own devices. I may 
 say unto such, as Jeremiah to their like, in the eighth 
 of his prophecy, ' How do you say we are wise, and 
 the law of the Lord is with us ? ' for he answereth 
 them, with wonder and demonstration to the world, 
 that they were too senseless to build upon so false a 
 ground. ' Lo, they have rejected the v?ord of the 
 Lord, and what wisdom is in them?' The messen- 
 ger that went to Micaiah to fetch him before Ahab 
 and Jehoshaphat, might sooner have craved his head 
 and obtained it, than one word from his mouth con- 
 trarying the word of the Lord. He spake him very 
 fair in a foul matter, 1 Ivings xxii., ' Behold now the 
 words of the prophets declare good unto the king with 
 
 one accord. Let thy word, therefore, I pray .'thee, 
 be like the word of one of them, and speak thou good.' 
 But the prophet wisely answered him, knowing that 
 the best spejch is that, not which pleaseth the humours 
 of men, but the mind of God, 'As the Lord liveth, 
 (though I die for it myself), whatsoever the Lord 
 saith unto me, that will I speak.' So likewise, what- 
 soever the Lord saith unto us, that let us do, and let 
 us learn how dangerous it is to swerve from his will. 
 I say not by open rebellion, as Jonah did, but in the 
 least commandment, by the smart of Moses and 
 Aaron, who being willed, in the twentieth of Numbers, 
 only to ' speak unto the rock,' and to use no other 
 means save the word of their mouths, and it should 
 ' give water unto them ;' because they ' smote it with 
 the rod,' and ' smote it twice,' both to shew their dis- 
 trust of the promise of God, and to utter their impa- 
 tience, they were also smitten with the rod of his 
 lips, and had a judgment denounced against them, 
 that they should not bring the people into the laud 
 which he had promised unto them. 
 
 4. Now Nineveh was a r/reat and an excellent city of 
 three days' journey. We have heard of the greatness 
 of Nineveh twice beforej once, verse 2, so late that a 
 man would think it were needless so presently to re- 
 peat it. Howbeit, we shall hear it again, and this 
 third time in another manner than before, forcibly 
 brought in as it were, and breaking the hedge of the 
 sentence, and with gi-eater pomp of words, and every 
 place of her groimd exactly measured unto us. Jonah 
 was going apace to Nineveh. The history was run- 
 ning onwards as fast, and keeping her coiu'se. And, 
 it may be, the minds of those that hear or read the 
 history, pass too quickly and lightly over the sequel 
 thereof. They hear of the greatness of Nineveh, as 
 that queen did of the greatness of Solomon ; but they 
 will not believe how great it is, unless they may see 
 it with their ej'es, and have a table or map thereof 
 laid before them at large. This is the reason that, 
 fii'st, the wisdom of God interrupteth the sentence, 
 and maketh a hole, as it were, in the midst thereof, 
 as God in the side of Adam, and closeth not up the 
 flesh again till the greatness of Nineveh be thoroughly 
 known. ' Now Nineveh,' &c. That is, I must tell 
 you, by the way, once again, for fear of forgetting ; I 
 will rather hinder the history a while, than not put 
 you in mind of a matter worthy yom' gravest attention, 
 that Nineveh was a great city, yea very great ; a city, 
 though lent to men, yet better beseeming the majesty 
 of God, magna Deo, so stately and excellent that we 
 find not in earth wherewith to match it ; and some- 
 what to say in particular, not filling your ears alone 
 with general terms, the very walk of their borders will 
 ask the ' travel of three days,' itincre Iridui. 
 
 A yreat and excellent city, or exceedingly great : per- 
 qnam maxima. The mother tongue wherein the his- 
 toi-y was written hath it thus, ' a city great to God.' 
 The like manner of speech is used bj' Rachel, Gen. 
 
 O 
 
210 
 
 KING OX JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 XXX., when Bilhah her maid had the second time borne 
 a son to Jacob, and Leah ceased to be fruitful : ' With 
 the wresthngs of God have I wrestled with my sister, 
 and gotten the upper hand ; ' that is, with wrestlings 
 above the natm-e and reach of man. I take the 
 meaning of the phrase to be this (if life finite and in- 
 finite have any proportion), either that Nineveh was as 
 great for a city as God is great for a God, or that it 
 surpassed so far the nature of created and inferior 
 things, that nothing but the most excellent himself 
 must be named with it ; or haply, as Troy was 
 feigned to be the building of the gods, Cfdiiim 
 ir/rcfliKS labor, SO no workman in heaven or earth was 
 worthy to be credited with the building of Nineveh, 
 but the chief of all. Others do otherwise intei-pret it, 
 
 1 know, that therefore it is called a city to God, 
 iirbs Deo, because there was no idol in it; but it was 
 traly and properly dedicated to the service of one only 
 God ; — whereas the contrary is manifest, both by the 
 ' multitude of her fornications,' mentioned in the third 
 of Nahum, and by Nisroch their false god, which 
 Sennacherib was worshipping in tlie temple of Nineveh, 
 
 2 Kings xix. 2, when his two sons slew him ; — or be- 
 cause it was in especial regard with God, in that he 
 sent a prophet to reclaim it, and to pluck it forth of 
 the fire of his intended judgment; — whereas Bethle- 
 hem, ' the least amongst the thousands of Judah,' and 
 but an handful to Nineveh, and ' Bethany, the town of 
 Mary and Martha,' .John xi., though more tender in 
 the eyes of God, for the birth, doctrine, and miracles 
 of more than a prophet, were never so called. Un- 
 doubtedly the reason is, whatsoever in nature or art 
 is most perfect and exquisite, and hath, as it were, a 
 kind of divinity in it, that to ascribe to God for these 
 footprints, and that imitation's sake which it hath of 
 his perfection. Ordiuaiy mountains, cedars, or cities, 
 have their fellows and equals upon earth where- 
 with to be sorted ; but such as excel in greatness, 
 and refuse the copartnership of all in that kind, be- 
 cause it wore an injury and disparagement unto them 
 to match them with their inferiors, they are claimed 
 by God himself as his especial riglits. Not to exempt 
 the smaller from his care and providence (who is as 
 great a God in the least as in the greatest,* and 
 hath given more wisdom to the little ants and bees 
 than to asses and camels), but to teach the unwise 
 world to esteem his majesty as it is ; not to seiwo him 
 with lame or lean, base and unpcrfect ofl'erings, and 
 to think there is nothing in the whole Godhead but is 
 most rarely and incomparably excellent. 
 
 Of three ddi/s' joiiniei/. Some say, if you walk the 
 streets a soft and leisurely pace, with all the lanes and 
 alleys that arc therein per direrticuhi et /le.rione.i, 
 Ictilc el pedelentim. Some, if you join the villages 
 round about, cum jxif/is, the dition, liberties, and 
 marches, that appertained to Nineveh. Others, if you 
 
 * Non est parvus iu j.arvis. — Auj. ad Volus, ep. 3. 
 
 take it with the subm-bs alone, ami suburbiis. For 
 though the name of the city be limited within the 
 walls, yet the name of Eome, or Nineveh, includeth also 
 the continent buildings, url>is appellatio maris, RonDs 
 aiitem contiiientibus adijiciis Jinitur. Lastly, others 
 expound it, of the very ambit of their walls and tur- 
 rets. And bv the judgment of the civil law, which 
 defineth a day's journey by twenty miles, Nineveh 
 might justh' spend the labour of three days. I applj' 
 these testimonies of her largeness to that which I'ol- 
 loweth. 
 
 Nineveh was a gi'eat city (whether you take the 
 people or their dwellings), Jonah not more than an 
 ordinary man ; Nineveh was very great, Jonah very 
 httle, and in comparison but as a locust among them ; 
 Nineveh ' a city of three days' journey,' Jonah had 
 newly 'begun to enter his voyage of the first day,' ver. 4; 
 and yet this gi-eat and spacious city is presently re- 
 formed by the preaching of an ordinary, common, and 
 contemptible prophet. I will not reap the harvest of 
 the next words, but only view them in haste, to make 
 my connection. They are all, if you mark them, 
 stinted and diminished by the Holy Ghost : Jonah 
 berjan, had not finished; to enter into the city, had not 
 gone over it ; the journey of one day, the second and 
 third were behind ; yet Nineveh, in these beginnings, 
 did not only begin, but almost end and consummate 
 her repentance. And as Jonah cried, ' Yet forty days, 
 and Nineveh shall be destroyed,' so Nineveh cried 
 unto him again. Yet not forty hours, and thou shalfc 
 see Nineveh wholly changed. Our Saviour, in the 
 eighth of Matthew, telleth his disciples that ' the people 
 had endured him now three days, having nothing to 
 eat (for ho held their stomachs and appetites that they 
 might not hunger, as he held the disciples' eyes that 
 were walking towards Emmaus that they might not see; 
 and when ho had fed them sufficiently with the bread 
 of life, then he restored them to nature again, and 
 gave them leave to hunger and thirst after corporal 
 relief). Tlie people of Nineveh, as commendable in 
 another kind, never weary of the preaching of Jonah ; 
 and willing to endure him more than three days with- 
 out eating or drinking, they weary not him so much 
 as to put him to the toil of the second and third day, 
 neither suffer they the next morning's sun to arise 
 upon their former day's iniquit3'. But. as if every 
 soul in the ehy had been summoned as Lot was. Gen". 
 xix., 'Escape for thy life, make haste and save thy- 
 self,' so those address themselves with all possible 
 speed to escape the wrath of God ; and the momin<' 
 and the evcnnig wore the first day of their repentance! 
 At the boginnnigs of the preaching of John Baptist, 
 tbey went out by flocks unto him. 'Jerusalem, and all 
 Judea, and all the regions about Jordan (as if the 
 cities and towns had emptied themselves to fill the 
 wilderness, and to lead new colonies into desert and 
 unhabitable places), and they were baptized of him 
 in Jordan, confessing their sins ; and many of the 
 
Ver. 3.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXir. 
 
 211 
 
 Pharisees and Sadducees also went toliis baptism,' Mat. 
 iii. At one sermon of Peter, Acts the second, the 
 principal and final application whereof was, ' Save 
 yourselves from this froward generation,' there were 
 ' added unto the church about three thousand souls,' 
 which was as great a number as a man may imagine 
 at one time to have been capable of the speaker's voice. 
 The Lord hath not dealt so sparingly with our nation. 
 ' The vision hath spoken a long time,' Hab. ii., and 
 we not waited for it, but it for us, and he that hath 
 begim a good work in us, hath endeavoured to make 
 it perfect. Our King hath followed the parable, 
 Matthew the two and twentieth : ' He hath sent forth 
 his servants to call us away,' not to the house of 
 mourning, as he did Nineveh, but to the marriage 
 feast of his only Son (which what honour it is to sit 
 and eat at the king's table, let Haman report to his 
 wife and friends, Esther v.). Again, 'he hath sent 
 forth other servants,' to tell us what provision he hath 
 made, and to invite us with the hope of most bounti- 
 ful entertainment. But we, as these unworthy guests, 
 rather esteeming the dinners of this world than the 
 supper of the Lamb, which is the last meal of the day, 
 and whereof whoso tasteth shall never hunger again ; 
 and thinking the garlic and onions of Egypt to have a 
 better relish than the milk and honey in the land of 
 promise, make light of his often biddings, and not 
 much less than enforce him to pronounce against our 
 luithankfulness, and to commune with his servants of 
 furnishing bis house with worthier guests. All the 
 day long hath he stretched out his hands unto us, 
 and made as long a day as ever he did to Jo.shua, chap. 
 X., and as long hours of the day as ever were shadowed 
 upon the dial of Ahaz, Isa. sxxviii., to provoke our 
 repentance ; for the twelve hours of the day, he hath 
 given us thrice twelve years, under the happy and 
 peaceable government of our godly Josiah. Yet as 
 Paul asked them of Ephesiis, Acts xix., 'Whether 
 tliej' had received the Holy Ghost,' and they answered 
 him, ' We have not so much as heard whether there 
 be an Holy Ghost ;' so such strangers are we to the 
 work and fruits of repentance, that scarcely we under- 
 stand what repentance meaneth. And so far is it oflf 
 that we are become true Israelites, with Nathanael, 
 John i., or but almost Christians with Agrippa, Acts 
 xxvi., that we are rather proved fully atheists. And 
 that which Tully reportoth amongst his wonders in 
 nature, that in one country drought causeth dirt, and 
 rain stirreth up dust,* ma}' be truly applied unto us, 
 that abundance of grace hath brought forth in us 
 abundance of sin ; and as ' sin took occasion by the 
 law to wax more sinful,' so iniquity had never been so 
 rife amongst us but through the rifeness of the gospel. 
 Surely the men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment 
 against us, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah 
 newly begun amongst them ; the men of Jerusalem, 
 
 •"- In agro Narniensi sicoitate lutum fieri (ex Pliiiio), im- 
 bre pulverem. 
 
 and .Judea, and the regions about .Jordan, and some 
 of that serpentine brood of the Pharisees and Sidducees 
 shall rise in judgment against us, for they confessed 
 their sins, and were baptized at the first pi'eaching of 
 John Baptist ; the Parthians, Modes, Elamites, and 
 of every nation under the heaven, some shall rise in 
 judgment against us, for they were ' pricked to their 
 hearts,' and bethought them ' what to do' at one ser- 
 mon of Peter, and were added to the church ; and lo ! 
 we are still in our sins, and as men ' without feeling, 
 have given ourselves to wantonness, to work all un- 
 cloanness even with greediness,' Eph. iv., though we 
 have learned Christ a longer time than Christ lived 
 amongst us, and prophets have early risen, and late 
 continued, to win us to repentance. The sins of 
 Nineveh are not specified by Jonah. Thoj' are said, 
 in the first chapter, to ascend into the presence of 
 God, and to stand like Satan amongst his children 
 before bis face. Job i. ; surely ours are as impudent 
 and saucj' as ever were theirs. And if theirs cried 
 into heaven, ours are not tongue-tied. In the prophecy 
 of Nahum, chap, iii., she is described ' a bloody city, 
 and full of lies, and robbery, and one from whom the 
 prey departeth not ;' she is famous for ' tlio lion's dens, 
 and the pasture of the lion's whelps.' We reach home 
 to them with our wickedness ; I would to God our 
 repentance were as theirs. Our houses, hands, and 
 hearts are full of blood ; our words and works full of 
 lying ; the lion teareth in pieces for his young ones, 
 and worrieth for his lioness, and his hole is full of 
 spoils. We all climb up to honour and might (as 
 Jonathan and his armour-bearer to the garrison of the 
 Phihstines by the raggedness of the rocks, 1 Sam. 
 xiv.), so we by the ruins and desolations of the coun- 
 try about us. Blessed is the man, in this vain and 
 ambitious age of building, wherein the Lord doth even 
 scorn them from heaven (what do these weak builders ? 
 will they fortify themselves? Neb. iv. ; will tlioy establish 
 their seed for ever '? will they dwell in houses of brick 
 and hewn stone for all eternity ?) ; I say, blessed is the 
 man, the timber of whose beams, and stones from whose 
 walls and foundations, crieth not a woe against him. 
 Behold the days come, when you shall be bruised 
 yourselves, ye bruisers of the people ; and the prey 
 shall be pulled from your teeth, ye lions and lions' 
 whelps, and youi' holes emptied of your hidden trea- 
 sure. How long have we ci'ied against such oppres- 
 sions, and smitten the oppressors with the rod of 
 God's vengeance, as Moses smote the rook ! and yet, 
 what one drop of remorse have we ever wrung from 
 their stony hearts ? How long have we clapped our 
 hands at the shameless usury of this place ! If usury 
 be too stifl" to be moved, yet we must free our souls ; 
 and, if it were possible, we would also free them that 
 are wi-apt in her snares. If they little esteem the 
 warning of the fifteenth Psalm, that give their money 
 upon usury, let them at least take heed that receive 
 it. Let them not try to bear an ox upon their 
 
212 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 shoulders, wheu they are unable to bear a goat ;* that 
 is, if poverty be burden enough unto them, let them 
 not add the burden of usury. The}' ask what they 
 shall do. Doest thou ask ? saith Plutarch. Thou hast 
 a tongue, beg; thou hast hands, work ; thou hast feet, 
 walk; thou hast an heart, think. Narii/a, reiiavir/a, 
 sail forward and backward, take any pains rather than 
 to fall into the mercy of an usurer. There is nothing 
 so bitter as to restore. Kiltil tarn moleslum qudm 
 rfiddere. Our adulteries are like Absalom's, even upon 
 the house tops, open to the world; we know their faults 
 as we know their faces that commit tliem ; and such 
 in some ' as are not named amongst the Gentiles,' 
 1 Cor. V. I scarcely persuade myself that Sodom lieth 
 in ashes for a greater offence than hath been found 
 amongst us within these few days.f Pride, it seemeth, 
 is proud that she is so much talked of ; she loveth to 
 be noted, though it be with a coal. Woe be unto her. 
 We have spit in her face seven times, and yet she 
 blusheth not. I have seen drunkenness drunk till it 
 thirsted, and gluttony vomit till it hungered again. J 
 Go to, drunkards, and hear what yom' doom is, from 
 his mouth who hath threatened to pull the cup from 
 your mouths : ' Drink, and be drunken, and spue, and 
 fall, and rise no more.' These are the links which 
 held the chain of your plagues together, and where- 
 with you shall'as certainly be bound as ever your flesh 
 was tied together with sinews. Of the contempt of 
 the word of God, his Sabbaths, and sacraments, and 
 
 * Plutarch, de usura. t Pater filiara. 
 
 J Villi ebriosorum sitim et vomentium famem, — Sen. 
 
 whole service, I speak not. I know there are ' a few 
 names in Sardis ' which have not given themselves to 
 the company of those wicked. God grant I be not 
 deceived in them. For though I see them come to the 
 wells of salvation, as Christ came to the well of Jacob, 
 perhaps they have not pitchers to draw with ; that is, 
 they have left their minds and meditations behind 
 them, wherewith these waters should be received. 
 But as the disciples of Christ spake of the few loaves 
 amongst so many thousands, so may I of so few souls 
 amongst such a multitude of inhabitants, ' What are 
 these amongst such a number ?' I would humbly 
 beseech the magistrate, because he serveth God in a 
 double place, to have care not only of his own soul, 
 but of the souls of others. And as Paul, Rom. ix., 
 had so fervent a love towards his brethren that he 
 wished to be ' made an anathema,' that is to be sepa- 
 rated from the love of God, for their sakes, so let him 
 also become an anathema for the time, and separate 
 himself — I say not from the favour of God, but from 
 the assemblies of the brethren — for their brethren's 
 sake. Let him go forth into the highways with those 
 servants of the king, and walk the streets, and ransack 
 the idle and irreligious corners of the city, and com- 
 pel them to come into the house of the Lord, that the 
 rooms may be filled. It shall be a crown unto his 
 own head, a recompense of our labour, a sweet sme'l- 
 ing sacrifice to the Lord, the joy of angels, a blessing 
 to the city, the saving of souls, and revocation of such 
 from destruction who are speedily falling thereinto, by 
 their obstinate contempt. 
 
 LECTUEE XXXIII. 
 
 And Jonah Liyaii to enter i)ito the cit'j a daijs jiinnien, iCc. — Jonah IIL 4. 
 
 WHAT we have heard already in the former verse 
 was but a preparative and an introduction to 
 this that follows : as that, 1 , he arose, who before- 
 time had been slack and undisposed ; 2, vent to 
 Nineveh, who elsewhen had diverted to Tarshish ; 3, 
 accordinfi to the ivord of the Lord, which erst he had 
 disobeyed. Thus far we understood whither he went; 
 now we are to learn what he did in Nineveh, namely : 
 1, for the time, he heijinneth his message presently at 
 the gates ; 2, for the place, he had entered hut a tliird 
 part of the city, so much as might be measured by the 
 travel of one day ; 3, for the manner of liis jjreaching, 
 he cried; 4, for the matter or contents. Yet forty daijs, 
 and Nineveh shall, be destroyed. I have tasted nothing 
 of this present verse, but what might make a connec- 
 tion with the former ; for the greatness of Nineveli, 
 repeated in the latter end thereof, served to this pur- 
 pose, partly to commend the faith of tlu^ Ninevitos, 
 who at the first sound of the trumpet changed their 
 lives ; partly, to give testimony to the diligence anl 
 
 constancy of the prophet, who was not dismayed by 
 so mighty a charge. 
 
 1. And Jonah her/an to enter into the city. All the 
 words are spoken by diminution. Jonah heyan, had 
 not made an end, to oiter the city ; had not gone 
 through a day's journey, which was but the third 
 part of his way. Not that Jonah began to enter the 
 city a day's journey and then gave over his walk, for 
 he spent a day and days amongst them in redressing 
 of their crooked ways. But Nineveh did not tarry the 
 time, nor defer their conversion till his embassage 
 was accomplished amongst them, which is so much 
 the more marvellous, for that he came unto them a 
 messenger of evil and unwelcome tidings. It is rather 
 a wonder unto me that they scorned him not, that they 
 threw not dust into the air, ran upon him with vio- 
 lence, stopped bis mouth, threw stones at him with 
 cursingand with bitter speaking, as Sbimei did at David ; 
 and as Ahab burdened Elias with troubling Israel, 
 1 Kings sviii., so that they had not challenged Jonah 
 
Ver. 4.J 
 
 LECTURE XXXIII. 
 
 213 
 
 for troubling Nineveh, because be brought such tidings 
 as might set an uproar and tumult amongst all the 
 inhabitants. That wicked king of Israel, whom I 
 named before, hated Micaiah unto the death for no 
 other cause, but that he ' never prophesied good unto 
 him,' 1 Kings xsii. A man thr.t ever did evil and no 
 good, could not endure to hear of evil. And for the 
 same cause did Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, banish 
 Amos from the land, for preaching the death of Jero- 
 boam and the captivit}' of Israel, therefore the Lord 
 was not able to bear his words, Amos vii., and he had 
 his passport sealed : ' thou, the seer, go, flee thou 
 away into the land of Judah, and there eat tby bread, 
 and prophesy there, but prophesj' no more at Bethel, 
 for this is the king's chapel, and this is the king's 
 court;' so I would rather have thought that they 
 should have entertained Jonah in the hke manner, be- 
 cause he came with fire and sword in his mouth 
 against them ; the city is not able to bear thy words ; 
 we cannot endure to hear of the death of our king, 
 and the universal overthrow of our people and build- 
 ings. thou, the seer, get thee into the land of 
 Judah, and return to thy city of Jerusalem, and there 
 eat thy bread and prophesy there, but prophesy no 
 more at Nineveh, for this is the king's chapel, nay, 
 this is the court of the mighty monarch of Assyria. 
 But Nineveh hath a milder spirit, and a softer speech 
 and behaviour in receiving the Lord's prophet. 
 
 2. Now, on the other side, if you set together the 
 greatness of Nineveh, and the present onset which the 
 prophet gave upon it, that immediatelvupon his charge, 
 without drawing breath, he betook him to his hard pro- 
 vince, it make th no less to the commendation of his faith- 
 fulness, than their obedience. For when he came to 
 Nineveh, did he deliberate what to do ; examine the 
 nature of the people whether thej' were tractable or no ; 
 inquire out the convenientest place wherein to do his 
 mesage, and where itmight best stand with the safeguard 
 of his person ? Did he stay till he came to the market- 
 place, or bourse,, or the king's palace, where there was 
 greatest frequency and audience ? No ; but where 
 the buildings of the city began, there he began to 
 build his prophecy. And even at the entrance of the 
 gates, he opened his lips and smote them with a terror 
 of most ungrateful news. Again, he entered their 
 city, not to gaze upon their walls, not to number their 
 turrets, nor to feed his eyes with their high aspiring 
 buildings, much less to take up his inn, and there to 
 case himself; but to travel up and down, to weary out 
 his strong men, not for an hour or two, but from 
 morning till night, even as long as the light of the 
 day will give him leave to work. I depart not from 
 my text, for, as you hear, 1, Jonah began, protracted 
 not ; 2, to enter, not staying till he had proceeded ; 
 3, to travel, not to be idle ; 4, the whole day, not 
 giving any rest or recreation to his body. 
 
 If we will further extend and stretch the meaning 
 of this sentence, we may apply it thus. It is good for 
 
 a man to begin betimes, and to ' bear the yoke of the 
 Lord from his childhood' (as Goliath is reported to 
 have been a warrior from _his youth) ; to enter in the 
 vineyard the first hour of the day, and to hold out 
 till the twelfth ; to begin at the gates of his life to serve 
 God, and even from the womb of his mother, to give 
 his body and soul, as Hannah gave her Samuel, Naza- 
 rites unto the Lord, that his age, and wisdom, and 
 grace may grow up together, as Christ did ; and that 
 as John Baptist was sanctified in his mother's womb, 
 Solomon was a witty child, Daniel and his young 
 comp.anions were well nurtured in the fear of the 
 Lord, and David wiser than his ancients, so all the 
 parts and degrees of his life, from the first fashioning 
 of his tender limbs, may savour of some mercy of God 
 which it hath received. That whether he be soon 
 dead, they may say of him, He fulfilled much time, 
 Wisd. ; or whether he carry his gray hairs with him 
 down into the grave, he may say in his conscience, as 
 David did, Ps. cxix., ' Thy statutes have been my 
 songs in the house of my pilgrimage.' As for the 
 devil's dispensation, youth must be borne with, detui- 
 atati a/iqiiid, and, as that unwise tutor sometime 
 spake, Non ps<^ iiiihi crede, vitiiim adolesceiiti, &c. : it is 
 not, trust me, a fault in a young man to follow harlots, 
 to drink wine in bowls, to dance to the tabret, to wear 
 fleeces of vanity about his ears, and to leave some 
 token of his pleasure in every place : so giving him 
 hcense to build the frame of his life upon a lascivious 
 and riotous foundation of long practised wantonness. 
 It was never written in the book of God, prophets and 
 apostles never dreamt of it, the lawgiver never de- 
 livered it, hell only invented it of policy, to the over- 
 throw of that age which God hath most enabled to do 
 him best service. And as it was the wisdom of the 
 king of Babylon to take the young children of Israel 
 whom they might teach the learning and tongue of 
 Chaldea, Dan. i., rather than their old men, so it is 
 the wisdom of the devil to season these green vessels 
 with the liquor of his corruption, that they may keep 
 the taste thereof while life remaineth. But ' their 
 bones are filled with the sin of their youth, and it lieth 
 down with them in the dust,' Job xx. ; and when 
 their bodies shall arise, then shall also their sin, to 
 receive judgment. So s.iyeth the wise preacher, giv- 
 ing them the reins in some sort, but knowing that the 
 end of their race will be bitterness : Eccles. xi., ' Re- 
 joice, young man, and let thy heart cheer thee in 
 the days of thy youth, walk in the ways of thine 
 heart, and in the sight of thine e3-es : but know, that 
 for all these things, God will bring thee to judgment.' 
 Let the examples of Eli his sons, whom he tenderly 
 brought up, to bring down his house and whole 
 stock to the ground, and the boys that mocked 
 Elisha, be a warning to this imguided age, that the 
 Lord will not pardon iniquity neither in young nor 
 old, and that not only the bulls and kine of Bashan, 
 but the wanton and untamed heifers, and the calves 
 
214 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [ClIAP. III. 
 
 that play in the grass, shall Lear their transgressions. 
 It is the song of the young men, Wisdom the second, 
 Let not the iiower of our life jiass from us, &c. ; and 
 it is the cry of the young men in the fifth of the same 
 bools. What hath prido profited us? For whilst they 
 take their pleasures upon earth, the Lord ' writeth 
 bitter things against them ' in heaven. Job siii., and 
 shall ' make them possess the iniquities of their 
 youth.' 
 
 3. And he cried. His manner of preaching was by 
 proclamation, loud and audible, that it might reach to 
 the ears of the people ; he hid not the judgments of 
 God in his heart, as Mar}' the words of her Saviour, 
 to make them his proper and private meditations, but 
 as ever the manner of God was, tliat his prophets 
 should denounce his mind, lest thej' might say. We 
 never heard of it ; so did Jonah accordingly fulfil it. 
 Thus Isaiah, chap. Iviii., was willed to ' cry, and to 
 lift up his voice like a trumpet ;' Jeremiah, chap. ii. 
 and 1., to ' cry in the ears of Jerusalem, to declare 
 amongst the nations,' and even to ' set up a standard' 
 and proclaim the fall of Babj-lon. And Ezekiel had a 
 like commandment, chap. xxi. : Clcnna ct uhdajili homi- 
 nis, ' Cry and howl, son ofman,' forthis ' shall come unto 
 my people, and it shall light upon all the princes of 
 Israel.' Our Saviour likewise bade the apostles 'what 
 they heard in the ear, that to preach upon the house- 
 tops,' Mat. X. They did so ; for being rebuked for 
 their message, and forbidden to ' speak any more in 
 the name of Jesus,' they answered boldly in the face 
 of that wicked consistory,' ' Whether it be fit to obey 
 God or man, judge ye,' Acts iv. Wisdom herself. 
 Proverbs the first, crieth not in her closet, and the 
 secret chambers of her house, but ' without in the 
 streets ;' neither in the wilderness and infrequent 
 places, but in the ' height of the streets, and among 
 the press, and in the enterings of the gates,' that the 
 sound of her voice may be blown into all parts. If 
 John Baptist were ' the voice of a crier in the wilder- 
 ness,' Mat. iii., then was Christ the crier, and John 
 Baptist but the voice. Surely it wanted not much that 
 the very ' stones in the streets should have cried' the hon- 
 our and power of God, Luke xix., for even stones would 
 have found their tongues, if man had held theirs. 
 The commandment, then, and practice of God himself, 
 is to cry, to leave the world without excuse ; the nature 
 of the word biddeth us cry ; for it is a fire, and if it 
 flame not forth, it will burn bis bowels and heart that 
 smothcreth it. I thought ' I would have kept my 
 mouth bridled,' saith the prophet, Ps. xxxix., ' whilst 
 the wicked was in my sight, I was dumb and spake 
 nothing, I kept silence even from good, but my sorrow 
 was the more increased. My heart was hot within 
 me, and while I was musing, the fire kindled, and I 
 spake with my tongue.' Lastly, the nature of the 
 people with whom wx> have to deal requireth crying. 
 Deaf adders will not be charmed with whispaing, nor 
 ' deaf and dumb spirits,' which neither hear nor an- 
 
 swer God, cast forth ' without much prayer and fast- 
 ing,' nor sleepy and careless sinners, possessed with a 
 spirit of slumber, and cast into a heavy sleep, as 
 Adam was when he lost his rib ; so these not 
 feeling the maims that are in their souls by Satan, 
 awaked without crying. Sleepers and sinners must 
 be cried unto again and again (for sin is a sleep) 
 ' W^hat, can you not watch one hour '?' And dead men 
 and sinners must be cried unto, for sin is a death, 
 and asketh as mway groanings and out-cries as ever 
 Christ bestowed upon Lazarus, John xi., E.ri foras 
 Lazare, ' Lazarus come forth,' and leave thy rotten 
 and stinking sins, wherein thou hast lain too many days. 
 Happy were this age of ours, if all the cryings in the 
 daytime could awake us. For I am siu'e that the cry 
 at midnight shall fetch us up ; but if the meantime 
 we shall 'refuse to hearken, and pull away the shoul- 
 der, and stop our ears that they should not hear, ami 
 make our hearts as an adamant stone,' Zech. vii., that 
 the words of the Lord cannot sink into them, it shall 
 come to pass, that as he hath cried unto us and we 
 would not hear, so we shall cry unto him again, and 
 he will not answer. 
 
 4. And said, Yctfurtij dai/n, and Niiieirh shall he 
 overthrown. The matter of the prophet's sermon is 
 altogether of judgment. For the execution whereof 
 (1.) the time prefined is but forty days ; (2.) the 
 measure or quantity of the judgment, an overthrow ; 
 (3.) the subject of the overthrow, Nineveh, together 
 with an imiilication of the long-sufl'erance of almighty 
 God, specified in a particle of remainder and longer 
 adjournment ; in the fourth place, yet forty days, as 
 much as to say, I have spared you long enough before, 
 but I will spare you thus much longer. 
 
 The only matter of qncslion herein, is how it may 
 stand with the constanc}- and truth of the eternal God 
 to pronounce a judgment against a place which 
 taketh not effect within an hundred years. For 
 either he was ignorant of his own time, which we can- 
 not imagine of an omniscient God, or his mind was 
 altered, which is unprobable to suspect. For ' is the 
 strength of Israel as man that he should lie '? or as 
 the Son of man that he should repent ?' Numb, xxiii. 
 Is he not 'yesterday, andto-d.iy, and the same for ever?' 
 Heb.xiii., 'that was, that is, and that is tocome,'l\cv.i. 
 I mean not only in substance, but in will and inten- 
 tion. ' Doth he use lightness ?' Are the words that he 
 speaketh ' yea and nay ?' 2 Cor. i. Doth he both 
 afiiim and deny too ? Are not all his promises, are 
 not all his threateniugs, are not all his mercies, are 
 not all his judgments, are not all his words, are not 
 all the tittles and iotas of his words, yea and amen, 
 so firmly ratified that they cannot be broken ? Doubt- 
 less it shall stand immutable when the heaven and 
 earth ' shall be changed, and wax old like a garment,' 
 J'.'i/o Dens ct noil miitor, ' I am a God that am not 
 changed,' Mai. iii. 
 
 (1.) The schoolmen in this respect have a wise dis- 
 
Ver. 4.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXlir. 
 
 tinction.=:- It is one thing to change the will, another 
 to will a change, or to be willing that a change should 
 be. God will have the law and the ceremonies at one 
 time, gospel without ceremonies at another. This 
 was his will from everlasting, coubtant and unmovable, 
 that in their several courses both should be. Though 
 there be a change in the matter and subject, there is 
 not a change in him that disposeth it. Oar will is, 
 in winter to use the fire, in summer, a cold and an 
 open air; the thing is changed according to the season, 
 but our will whereby we have decreed and determined 
 in ourselves so to do, remaincth the same. 
 
 (2.) Sometimes the decrees and purposes of God 
 consist of two parts, the one whereof God revoaleth 
 at the first, and the other he concealeth awhile and 
 keepeth in his own knowledge. As in the action 
 enjoined to Abraham, the purpose of God was two- 
 fold : first, to try his obedience; secondly, to save the 
 child. A man may impute it to inconstancy to bid 
 and unbid, but that the will of the Lord was not 
 pleuarily understood in the first part. That is it which 
 Gregory expresseth in apt terms : God changeth his 
 sentence pronounced sometimes, but never his counsel 
 intended. f 
 
 (3.) Sometimes things are decreed and spoken of 
 according to the inferior cause, which by the highest 
 and overruling cause are otherwise disposed of. One 
 might have said, and said truly both ways, Lazarus 
 shall rise again, and Lazarus shall not rise. If we 
 esteem it by the power and finger of God, it shall be ; 
 but if we leave it to nature aud to the arm of tlesh, it 
 shall never be. The prophet Isaiah told Hezekiali 
 the king, chap, xxxviii., ' Put thy house in order, for 
 thou shalt die.' Considering the weakness of his 
 body, and the extremity of his disease, he had reason 
 to warrant the same ; but if he had told him contra- 
 riwise, according to that which came to pass, thou 
 shalt not die, looking to the might and mercy of 
 God, who received the prayers of the king, he had 
 said as truly. 
 
 (4.) But the best definition is, that in most of these 
 threatenings there is a condition annexed unto them, 
 either expressed or understood, which is as the hinges 
 to the door, and turneth forwards or backwards the 
 whole matter. In Jeremiah it is expressed, chap, 
 xviii., ' I will speak suddenly against a nation, or 
 against a kingdom, to pluck it up, to root it out, and 
 to destroy it; but if this nation, against whom I have 
 pronounced, turn from their wickedness, I will repent 
 of the plague which I thought to bring upon them.' 
 So likewise for his mercy : ' I will speak suddenly 
 concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to 
 build it, and to pliint it; but if it do evil in my sight, 
 and hear not my voice, I will repent of the gcod I 
 
 * AliuJ niutare vol; fatem. Aliud velle mutalionem. — 
 Aquin. i. qxi. xix. art. vii. 
 
 t Mutat seutcnliam, non mutat consilium.' — Mor., lib. xx. 
 cap. xxiii. 
 
 thought to do for them.' Gen. xx. it is suppressed, 
 where God telleth Abimelech withholding Abraham's 
 wife, ' Thou art a dead man, because of the woman 
 which thou hast taken.' The event fell out otherwise, 
 and Abimelech purged himself with God ; ' with an up- 
 right mind and innocent hands have I done this.' 
 There is no question but God inclosed a condition 
 within his speech, thou art but a dead man if thou 
 restore not the woman,Vithout touching her body and 
 dishonouring her husband. Thus we may answer the 
 scruple by all these ways: (1.) Yet forty daj-s, and 
 Nineveh shall be overthrown ; and yet forty and forty 
 years, and Nineveh shall not be overthrown. Why '? 
 Because Nineveh is changed, and the unchangeable 
 will of God ever was, that if Nineveh shewed a change 
 it should be spared. (2.) There were two parts of 
 God's purpose — the one disclosed touching the sub- 
 version of Nineveh, the other of her conversion — kept 
 within the heart of God ; whereupon ho changed the 
 sentence pronounced, but not the counsel whereto the 
 sentence was referred. (3.) If you consider Nineveh 
 in the inferior cause, that is, in the deservings of 
 Nineveh, it shall fall to the ground ; but if you take 
 it in the superior cause, in the goodness and clemency 
 of Almiglity God, Nineveh shall escape. (4.) Lastly, 
 the judgment was pronounced with a condition, re- 
 served in the mind of the Judge : Nineveh shall be 
 overthrown, if it repent not. Now, he that speaketh 
 with condition, may change his mind witliout suspi- 
 cion of lightness, as Paul promised the Corinthians 
 to come by them in his way towards ]\Iacedonia, and 
 did it not, 2 Cor. i. ; for he evermore added in his 
 soul that condition which no man must exclude : ' If it 
 stand with the pleasure of God, and he hinder me not,' 
 James iv. Philip threatened the Lacedemonians that 
 if he invaded their country he would utterly extinguish 
 them. They wrote him none other answer but this, if; 
 meaning, that it was a condition well put in, because 
 he was never likely to come amongst them. The old 
 verse is, 
 
 Si nisi non esset, perfectum quidlibet essot. 
 
 If it were not for conditions and exceptions, everything 
 would be perfect. But nothing more imperfect than 
 Nineveh, if this secret condition of the goodness of 
 God at the second hand had not been. Arius ]\Ion- 
 tanus hath an exposition by himself, ' Yet forty days, 
 and Nineveh shall be turned,' not overturned, et 
 Nineveh versa, non eversa ; that is, Nineveh shall bo 
 changed either to the better or to the worse ; Nineveh 
 shall either amend her ways or sec an end of her hap- 
 piness. Nineveh in such extremity cannot stand at a 
 stay, no more than the sicknesses of the body when 
 they are come to the highest degree. But to leave 
 his singular opinion, we have specially to mark in 
 this fearful sentence and doom of Nineveh, that the 
 thoughts of God were rather for peace and reconcilia- 
 tion than to overthrow it. Here are Esau's hands. 
 
216 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 but Jacob's voice; hard speech, rough countenance, 
 a strong tempest of words, but an hidden spirit of 
 tenderness and loving-kindness ; who linew rif,'ht well 
 that unless they were touched to the quick, till their 
 blood were drawn out, they would not be moved. 
 Else what did he mean (if he meant not mercy) to 
 send a prophet unto them, who might have sent his 
 angel from heaven as against the host of Sennacherib, 
 presently to have destroyed them ? Or why prefixed 
 he a time, and gave them a respite of forty days, who 
 in the motion of an eye could have laid them in the 
 dust, and slain them with the least breath of his angry 
 lips ? But come we to the particulars. 
 
 1. The time that was lent them before their over- 
 throw is forty days : neither too long, lest they might 
 presume, and put off from day to day ; neither too 
 short, lest they might despair of mercy, by thinking 
 themselves over much straitened. But as Solomon 
 bounded his estate in a middle and convenient sort, 
 between 'poverty and riches,' Prov. sxx., little and 
 much ; ' lest if he were too full, ho might deny his 
 Maker, and ask, Who is the Lord '?' or if he were too 
 empty, 'he might steal, and take the name of God in 
 vain ;' so is the time of this people temperately mea- 
 sured unto them between long and short, that neither 
 abundance of days may make them forget God, nor 
 scarcity drive them from the hope of their wished sal- 
 vation. Ancient wounds (saith Jerome) are not cured 
 in haste, the plaster must long lie upon them ; and the 
 old festered sins of Nineveh could not be done away 
 •with a day's repentance.* 
 
 2. The measure and quantity of their judgment is 
 an overthrow. ' Nineveh shall be destroyed.' She 
 might have been jjlagucd many ways, and yet have 
 stood upon her pillars and foundations ; plagued with 
 the want of ram, as Samaria in the days of Ahab ; with 
 scarcity of bread, with pestilence, with siege of ene- 
 mies, with the tyranny and exaction of her own kings 
 and governors ; but these are all too light in the ejes 
 of God, and nothing will satisfy his justice but her 
 final subversion. ' If the grape-gatherers come to a 
 vine,' saith Jeremiah, chap, xlix., ' will they not leave 
 some grapes ? If thieves come by night, they will 
 but steal till they have enough.' But Nineveh must 
 be gathered and preyed upon by the insatiable judg- 
 ment of God, till it hath left her nothing. Some of 
 the Hebrews think that Nineveh should have been 
 destroyed by fire from heaven, as Sodom and Go- 
 moiTah were ; others suppose by the sword of a 
 foreign enemy. If by the i'ormer of these two, what 
 a fearful thing was it, that instead of the fatness of 
 the clouds, the gi-eater and the smaller rain, the sweet 
 dews of heaven, comfortable showers, which God hath 
 engendered in the air, and divided by pipes to fall 
 upon the earth in their seasons, their ground should 
 be — watered ? nay, — withered, and the fruits of the 
 
 * Tarn antiquoe vuhicra diu apposito einplastro curanda 
 erant. — In /tunc loc. 
 
 earth — cherished ? nay, — consumed ; their temples and 
 buildings resolved into cinders ; yea, their veiy skins 
 and bones molten from their backs with the heat of 
 God's vengeance ! The other in effect is not much 
 behind, though in manner and kind difi'erent, when 
 so forcible and fierce an enemy cometh, that ' destruc- 
 tions shall not need to arise up the second time,' 
 Nahum i. ; where neither the aged hath reverence for 
 his gi'ey hair, nor the suckling release for the inno- 
 cency of his age ; where neither matron nor ^•irgin, 
 priest nor senator, shall be privileged from slaughter ; 
 when ' mom-ning shall be in their streets, and they 
 shall say in all their highways, Alas, alas,' Amos v. ; 
 or as it is in the fourth of Jeremiah, ' Woe is me, for 
 my soul faiuteth because of the murderers ;' when there 
 shall be no man left to cari-y news to the next city ; 
 none to say to his friend, ' Leave thy i^itherless children 
 to me, and I will preserve them alive ; and let thy 
 widows trust in me.' Finally, when ' the blood of men 
 shall be poured out as dust, and their flesh as dung,' 
 Jer. xlix., and all the beasts of the field, together with 
 the fowls of the air, shall be called to a sacrifice of 
 dead corpses, Zeph. i. 
 
 8. The subject of that overthrow is iV/((«y7i. Nineveh, 
 in state and magnificence as the stars of God ; Nineveh, 
 that excellent city, which had her name from God him- 
 self, civitas Deo ; Nineveh, of such antiquity, that 
 from the flood of Noah she had stood upright; Nineveh, 
 that over-awed Babylon, destroyed Samaria, brought 
 Jerusalem under tribute, and was the rod of God's 
 anger to smite the nations with ; Nineveh, that glorious 
 city which ' dwelt in confidence, and said in her heart, 
 I am, and there is none besides me ;' Nineveh must 
 be subverted; Nineveh, built with so much labour and 
 ambition by infinite numbers of men, exquisite arti- 
 ficers, unmeasurable charges ; Nineveh, with her walls 
 fom- hundred miles about, their height and their 
 breadth wondered at, with her thousand and five 
 hundred turrets, so glorious to the eye ; Nineveh must 
 be subveiied. Her wealthy, insolent, imperious in- 
 habitants, not only those of Assyria, but the choice of 
 all the countries round about, father, son, nephew, 
 old and young, all must be destroyed. It is not the 
 loss of their king alone that is here threatened, nor 
 decay of merchants and men of war, nor the rooting 
 out of the noblest families in Nineveh, nor the funerals 
 of pri\ato houses ; it is the fall and overthrow without 
 restraint of the whole city. Thus pride, when it 
 cometh to the highest, I saj' not in the sous of men 
 and women, but in the ver}' son of the morning, and 
 the angels of heaven, and not only in common and 
 singular persons, but in societies, cities, kingdoms, 
 monarchies, shall be brought down. 
 
 4. Notwithstanding, write it in tables, and let 
 it be a monument for the last day, how gracious the 
 Lord is towards ungi-acious sinners. Nineveh is 
 threatened to be overthrown, and hath yet forty days 
 stinted to repent her in. But who can number the 
 
Ver. f).] 
 
 LECTURE XXXIV. 
 
 217 
 
 years wliicli Nineveh bath enjoyed aforetime ? Yet 
 God is content to sustain the loss and profusion of 
 all those ; and as he added in mercy fifteen years 
 to the life of Hezekiah, so to the life and being of 
 Nineveh forty days. The particle of remainder, yet 
 forty days, doth wonderfully set forth the bounty of 
 God, that albeit ten generations bad passed before, 
 and ten more succeeded without fruit, yet he would 
 spare them thus much longer to try their amendment. 
 
 The people of the Jews endured sufficiently in the 
 wilderness, when he protested in the psalm, ' Forty 
 years long was I grieved with this generation,' Ps. xcv. ; 
 not only provoked, ofl'ended, discontented, but rfrieved 
 at his very soul, who could have grieved all the veins 
 of their hearts, and taught them the price of angering 
 so dreadful a majestj- as his is. In the prophecy of 
 Jeremiah, chap, xxxii., be repeateth their disobedience 
 from further antiquity : 'The cbikb'en of Israel and the 
 children of Judah have surely done evil before me from 
 their j'outh ; and this city bath been unto mo a pro- 
 vocation of anger from the day that they first built it.' 
 But I need not labour to prove the patience of God, 
 ■when the worst servant in his house coiifesseth it : 
 Mat. xxiv.. My master is ' gone into a liir counti-y,' and 
 will not return in haste ; yea, when the atheist and 
 scorner himself acknowledgeth no less. For if they 
 were not acquainted with his patience and Icng-sufl'er- 
 ance, they would never have called it ' slackness,' 
 2 Pet. iii., nor asked in derision for ' the promise of 
 his coming,' nor taken advantage of impiety, because 
 all things had stood in their state from the days of 
 their fathers, nor put the evil day far from them, and 
 slandered the footsteps of God's anointed Son. 
 
 The time of this life is as the forty days of Nineveh, 
 a time of repentance, teinjius i-it>r tciiij.iis pci'iiiteiitier. 
 To some, it is forty years, as it was to Israel in the 
 desert ; to some not hours ; to others not minutes ; but 
 their spmt departetb ii-om them, as Jacob went from 
 Laban, and the Israelites from the land of Egj^t, 
 without leave-taking, carrying away their jewels and 
 treasures, and whatsoever in this life is most dear unto 
 them. Oh, happy are they to whom this favour is lent 
 which was shewed to Nineveh : yet forty davs for thy 
 repentance. But thrice most ■m-etched on the other 
 side whom the angel of God hath answered, ' Time 
 shall be no more' unto thee ; the night is come wherein 
 thou canst not work, the vision is ended, the prophecy 
 fulfilled, the doors shut up, thy gracious visitation past ; 
 who iu the closing of an eye are pulled from the land 
 of the living, and their place is no more kno^TJ. Let 
 me tell you for conclusion, that which was spoken to 
 
 Nineveh in this place under condition, was afterwards 
 simply pronounced by Nabum, aud Nineveh was 
 destroyed indeed. Tobias before his death heard of 
 the faU of Nineveh, Tob. xiv. ; and the monarchy that 
 said within itself, Here will I dwell, was translated 
 into Babylon. He that endured Jerusalem so long, 
 was afterward so obstinate against it, that if Moses 
 and Samuel had stood before him to ask her pardon, 
 be would not have been entreated ; he that forbare 
 that froward and stubborn generation forty years long, 
 afterwards sware in his -m-ath that they should not 
 enter into his rest. And as he hath spared, and 
 spared, and spared, so he will 'overturn, and overturn, 
 and overturn,' Ezek. xxxi. ; and as he hath added yet 
 more hours, and yet more years, and yet forty days, 
 so he will add yet more plagues, and yet more punish- 
 ments, and yet more vengeance. According to his 
 fearful commination, Lev. xxvi., ' I will yet plague 
 you seven times more, and yet seven times more,' and 
 still with further repetition ; as there is no end of our 
 sins, so there is no end of his anger. This were the 
 preaching fit for these times. Blessings must sleep 
 awhile, mercy go aside, peace returu to the God of 
 peace, and not be spoken of. That reverent, religious, 
 honest estimation which was of God in former times, 
 ' there is mercy with thee, Lord, and therefore shalt 
 thou be feared,' is now abandoned, and put to flight. 
 This rather must be our doctrine : There is judgment 
 with thee, Lord ; with thee, Lord, there is ruin 
 and subversion ; with thee are plagues, Lord ; with 
 thee there is battle, and famine, and snares, and cap- 
 tivity, and storm, and ttmpest; there is fire and brim- 
 stone with thee, O Lord, therefore thou shalt be feared. 
 Happy are we if either love or fear will draw us to 
 repentance ; if our marble and flinty hearts will be 
 softened with any rain that falleth ; if our stiff and non- 
 sinewed necks will bow with any yoke, either the sweet 
 yoke of the gospel of Christ, or the bea-^7 and unsup- 
 portable yoke of the law and judgment. But if Nineveh 
 continue as it bath begun, Nineveh shall be overthrowm. 
 I am not a prophet, nor the son of a prophet, to set 
 the time, either of forty or fifty days or years, more 
 or less. He sitteth above to whom it is best known, 
 and is coming in the clouds to determine that question. 
 But mercy and justice, I know, are two sisters ; and 
 as the one hath had her day, so the other shall not 
 miss hers ; and the Lord liath two arms, two cups, 
 two recompenses ; aud ' doubtless there is a reward for 
 the righteous ;' and doubtless there is also a plague for 
 obstinate and impenitent sinners. 
 
 T 
 
 LECTURE XXXIV. 
 
 So t!ic people of Nineveh lielievnl the Lord, and proclaimed a fast, d'C. — J0N.4.H III. 5. 
 
 iHE third part of the four whereinto the chapter I Nineveh, continued without interruption from_ the 
 divideth itself, containeth the repentance of | beginning of the fifth verse to the end of the ninth, 
 
218 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IIL 
 
 where it is joyfully embraced bj- the mercy ar;cl pardon 
 of God towards her, which was the last part. The 
 fii'st of these five, which we are piresentlj' to deal with, 
 is the general table and contents of that which the 
 other four deduce into special branches ; as Ezekiel first 
 portrayed the siege of Jerusalem upon a brick, chap. 
 iy., to give the people of the Jews an image of that 
 misery which afterwards they should find distinctly 
 and at large accomplished ; for whatsoever we hear in 
 the lineal succession of all the rest, touching their 
 faith, fasts, sackcloth, proclamations, without respect 
 of person or age, we have broached unto us in this 
 procemial sentence. Then' ordering and disposing of 
 this weighty business of repentance, with every office 
 and service belonging unto it, is so comely, convenient, 
 and with such art, as if David were to appoint the 
 Levites and priests of the temple their courses again, 
 and to settle the singers and porters in their several 
 ministrations, he could not have shewed more wisdom 
 and skilfulness. For such are the duties tendered to 
 God by this people of Nineveh, as were these officers 
 of the temple: some principal, others accessory; some 
 moral, others ceremonial ; some for substance, others 
 rather for show, and to set out the work ; some to the 
 soul belonging, others to the body and outward man ; 
 and in all these, the first have the first places, the 
 second and inferior such as are fit for them. Faith 
 goeth before works, and in work fasting gocth before 
 sackcloth, and in the persons the greatest goeth before 
 the less, and in the doing of all this, the proclamation 
 of the king and council goeth before the execution of 
 the people. The army that Solomon spake of. Cant. 
 vi., was never better sot, nor almost the stars of heaven 
 better ordered, than this conversion of Nineveh. First, 
 they 'behoved God; ' for the apostle's rule admitteth 
 no exception, ' Without faith it is impossible to please 
 God ; for he that cometh to God must believe that 
 God is ;' and not only his being, but in his nature 
 and property, ' that he is also a rewarder of them that 
 seek him,' Hcb. xi. This is the first stone of their 
 building, the first round of the ladder of Jacob, whereby 
 thej- climb to the presence of God. From faith, which 
 is an action of the mind, they go to the works of the 
 body, ' fasting and sackcloth ;' for faith cried within 
 them, as Rachel cried to Jacob, ' Give me children, or 
 I die.' Faith is hardly received and credited to be 
 faith unless it bo testified ; for that is tlu; touchstone 
 that the apostle tiieth us by, ' Shew me thy faith by 
 thy works.' So first Ihey quicken the soul (for faith 
 is the life of it), ,ind then they kill the body by taking 
 away the food' thereof, wherein the life of the body 
 consisteth, and bui-yiiig it in a shroud of sackcloth. 
 In their works they begin W'ith fasting, as it were the 
 greater things of the law, and end with sackcloth as the 
 less. For as J erome noteth, fasting is rather to be chosen 
 without sackcloth, than sackcloth without fasting ;* 
 
 * Jtjuiiium niagis eligcuduni ub.sruio sacco, quam saccus 
 sine jejunio ; ideo jejuuiuin ante saccum. 
 
 therefore is fasting put before sackcloth. But if 
 we shall adjoin from the eighth verse, their ' turn- 
 ing from their evil ways, and from the wickedness 
 of their hands' (which some expound of restitution), 
 we shall see that they went from fasting and sackclotii 
 to that which was more than both. The persons 
 are as rightly placed ; for they humble themselves 
 ' from the greatest of them to the least of them,' which 
 declareth not only an universid consent, that there was 
 but one heart, one soul, one faith, one fast, one attu-e 
 amongst them aU, but that the king began, the people 
 were led by him, and that old men gave example to 
 the young, parents to their children, major atas 
 iiicipit, ad minorem perveiiit.* Lastly, according to 
 the words of the psalm, ' I believed, therefore have I 
 spoken,' no sooner had they hold of faith in their 
 hearts, but their tongues are presently exercised, nay, 
 their pens set on work, not only to speak, but to 
 speak publicly; to speak upon the housetops, by open 
 proclamation, that all might understand ; and it is 
 probable enough from the seventh verse, that till the 
 proclamation was heard, for order and obedience sake, 
 they did nothing. More particularly, (1.) the racUcal 
 and fundamental action wheremth they begin is 
 faith; (2.) the object of that faith, God; (8.) the 
 effects and fruits of their faith : abstinence from tw-o 
 vices, the slander and reproach whereof Asia was 
 famously subject unto ; (4.) their generality in that 
 abstinence ; (5.) their warrant and commission for 
 so doing by the edict of the king, I reserve to 
 another place. 
 
 (1.) So the people of Nineveh believed God. When 
 Ahijah the prophet told Jeroboam, 1 Kings xiv., that 
 God should raise up a king in Israel to destroy his 
 house, not to leave him in hope that the time was far 
 off removed, he correcteth himself with sudden and 
 quick demand, and maketh the answer unto it: 
 ' What ? yea, even now.' Did I say he should ? nay, 
 it is already done. So soon as the word was gone 
 from the mouth of Jonah, 'Yet forty days, and Nine- 
 veh shall be destroyed,' without pausing and resting 
 upon the matter, 'they believed God.' What! yea, 
 even now. It was so speedily done that almost it was 
 less than imagination. It is vcr}- strange that a Gen- 
 tile nation, which were ever 'aliens from the common- 
 wealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of 
 promise," should so soon be caught within these nets. 
 For when prophets preach the mercies or judgments of 
 God, so fat are the ears, and incapable the hearts of 
 the incredulous world (much more when God is a 
 stranger amongst them), that they may preach among 
 the rest as Isaiah did : chap, liii., ' Who hath believed 
 our report '? or to whom is the arm of the Lord re- 
 vealed '?' either the gospel, which is his power to sal- 
 vation to them that believe ; or the law, which is his 
 rod of iron to crush them in pieces that transgress it. 
 Eathcr, as it is inllabakkuk, chap, i., they will ' Be- 
 * Jer. 
 
Ver. 5.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXIV. 
 
 211> 
 
 bold among the heathen, and regard, and wonder, and 
 marvel ;' they will lend their eyes to gaze, and their 
 tongues to talk, but withal they will despise and 
 lightly esteem all that is said unto them. ' Be- 
 hold, ye despisers, and wonder ' at your unbelief, you 
 that wonder so much and yet despise, ' for I will 
 work a work in your days, saith the Lord, ye will not 
 believe it, though it be told you.' The Lord will 
 work it, prophets declare it, and j-et the people believe 
 not. Nay, iheir manner of deriding and insulting at 
 the judgments of God is, ' Let him make speed, let 
 him hasten his work, that we may see it ; and let the 
 counsel of the holy one draw near and come, that we 
 may know it,' Isa. v. And sometimes they plainly 
 deny the Lord and all his judgments, saying, Jer. v., 
 ' It is not he ; neither shall the plague come upon us ; 
 neither shall we see sword or famine : and as for his 
 prophets, they are but wind, and the word is not in 
 them.' Moses and Aaron preached unto Pharaoh, Exod. 
 v., not only in the name of the Lord, and with kind ex- 
 hortations, ' Let my people go,' nor only by threats 
 and sentences of judgment, but by apparent plagues, 
 the efl'eetuailest preachers that might be, by the 
 tongues of frogs, lice, flies, grasshoppers, of murrain, 
 botches, darkness, hailstones, blood, and death itself. 
 Could not all these move him ? No ; but the first 
 time ' he returned into his house, and hardened his 
 heart,' Exod vii. ; and the second, ' When he saw he 
 had rest, he hardened his heart again,' Exod. viii. ; 
 and the third time ' his heart remained obstinate ;' and 
 likewise the fourth, though Moses gave him warning, 
 ' let not Pharaoh from henceforth deceive me any 
 more ;' and so he continued to his dying day, build- 
 ing up hardness of heart as high as ever Babel was 
 intended, even up into heaven, by denying and defy- 
 ing the God thereof, till he quite overthrew him in the 
 Red Sea. What shall we say to this, but as the 
 apostle doth ? 1 Thes. iii., ' All men have not faith.' 
 God sent his patriarchs in the aucienter ages of the 
 world and found not faith ; sent his prophets in a later 
 generation and found not faith ; last of all, sent his 
 Son, a ' man approved ' to the world, and approving 
 his doctrine ' with great works, and wonders, and 
 signs,' Acts ii., and found not faith ; ' and when the 
 Son of man cometh again, shall he find faith on the 
 earth ?' Luke xviii. So contrary it is to the nature of 
 man to believe anything that custom and experience 
 hath not inured him with, or may be comprehended 
 by discourse of reason. Yet this people of Nineveh 
 having received, you hear, but one prophet, and from 
 that one prophet one sentence, and but in one part of 
 the city scattered and sown amongst them, presently 
 believed, as if the Lord from heaven had thrust his 
 finger into their ears and hearts, and by a miracle set 
 them open. 
 
 It rather seemeth to have been faith of credulity 
 which is here mentioned, yielding assent to the truth 
 of the prophecy, than faith of affiance and confidence, 
 
 Jidcs flducie, taking hold of mercj'. That is, they first 
 apprehend God in the faithfulness of his word ; they 
 know him to be ' a God that cannot lie,' Titus i. ; they 
 suspect not the prophet, distrust not the message, 
 assuring themselves as certainly as that they live, 
 that the judgment shall fall upon them without the 
 judge's dispensation. Notwithstanding, there to have 
 stayed, without tasting some sweetness of the mercy 
 of God, had been little to their heart's ease. ' The 
 devils believe and tremble,' James ii. They are ' re- 
 served to the judgment of the great day,' Epist. of 
 Jude ; and they keep a calendar that they are reserved, 
 for they neither see nor hear of Jesus of Nazareth, 
 the judge of the quick and dead, angels and men, 
 death and hell, but they are inwardly afilicted, and 
 ask ' why he is come to vex them before the time.* 
 And surely to believe the truth of God in his justice, 
 without aspect and apiplication of mercy to temper it, 
 and to consider nothinginthatinfinite supreme majesty, 
 but that he is fo/tis idtor dominus, ' the Lord a strong 
 revenger,' et reddens rctribuet, ' he that recompenseth, 
 will surely recompense,' Jer. Ii. ; and to take hold of 
 no word from his mouth, but Kineeeh shall be destroyed, 
 this were enough to make them desperate, una saUis 
 nidlaiii siieraie saluteni, to cause them to stone his 
 prophet, to set their city on fire, as Zimri did the 
 palace, and to die cursing and blaspheming the name 
 of the Lord of hosts. But there is no question, but 
 either by the preaching of Jonah, who might miugle 
 a little sweet with their sour; or by the goodness of God 
 in delivering Jonah, which many of the Rabbins 
 think they had heard of ; or by the light of nature, 
 some particles and sparkles whereof might yet remain 
 in them, because tliey came from Asshur, Asshur 
 from Shem, and Shem had the knowledge of God ; or 
 by some other means (the Spirit of God especially 
 having a work to work, and ready to help their in- 
 firmities), they conceived some hope of the bounty 
 and graciousness of the Lord, and thereupon humbled 
 themselves in fasting and prayer upon trust to re- 
 ceive it. 
 
 2. They believed God, not Jonah, although in mean- 
 ing it is all one ; they believed God as the author, 
 Jonah as the minister ; God in Jonah, or Jonah from 
 God, and for God's sake ; therefore, Rabbi Esdras 
 saith, they believed God, that is the word of God, 
 which God sent, Jonah pronounced. As it is said of 
 the Israelites, Exodus the fourteenth, joining both 
 together, that ' they believed God and his servant 
 Moses.' And 2 Cor. v. there is a like saying : ' Now 
 therefore, are we ambassadors for Christ, as if God 
 did beseech you through us,' ka. ; we fur Christ, and 
 God throuijh us. Therefore, to shew that the con- 
 tempt of the servant redoundeth to the Lord, God 
 telleth Samuel, 1 Sam. viii., ' They have not cast thee 
 away, but they have cast me away;' and Christ his 
 disciples, Luke x., 'He that heareth you, heareth me ; 
 and he that despisesh you, despiseth me, and him 
 
220 
 
 KIKG ON JONAil. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 that sent me ;' and Mat. x., ' He that receiveth a pro- 
 phet in the name of a prophet, and a disciple in the 
 name of a disciple' (not in the name of an Israelite or 
 Samaritan, brother or stranger, but under that rela- 
 tion), ' shall not lose his reward.' An admirable and 
 gracious dispensation from God, to speak unto man, 
 not in his own person and bj' the voice of his thunders 
 and lightnings, or with the sound of a trumpet ex- 
 ceeding loud, as he did upon the mount, Exod. xx., 
 for then we should run away, and cry unto Lloses or 
 any other servant of God, ' Talk thou with us, and we 
 will hear thee, but let not God talk with us, lest we 
 die,' but by prophets and disciples of our own nature ; 
 flesh of our flesh, and bones of our bones ; and as the 
 Scripture witnesseth of Elias, James v., men ' sub- 
 ject to the same passions ' whereto we are, according 
 to the word of Moses, Deut. xviii. : ' A prophet will 
 the Lord thy God raise up unto thee, like unto me, 
 from amongst you, even of thy brethren,' bringing 
 neither shape nor language other than I have done. 
 And that prophet shall raise up others of the like con- 
 dition, for the perfecting of the saints till the world's 
 end. In which borrowing and using of the tongues 
 of , men, he doth not beg but command, imperans iioii 
 mendicans hoc facit; nor wanteth himself, but bene- 
 fiteth us, h}(hilgentia est noii iud'ujentia, nor yet seck- 
 eth strength to his own word, but congruence and pro- 
 portion to our infirmities, non efjicaciam qiurrit scd 
 conf/riientiom,* for we were not able to bear the glory 
 of that majesty, if it did not hide, in some sort, and 
 temper itself under these earthly instruments. But 
 now we may say (renouncing their idolatry), as they 
 did in Lystra of Paul and ]5arnabas, when we take 
 the counsels of God from the lips of our brethren, 
 ' God is come down amongst us in the likeness of 
 men,' Acts xiv. It is ho that speaketh from above, 
 and blcsscth and curseth, bindeth and looseth, ex- 
 hortoth and dehorteth by the mouth of man. And 
 surely for this respect and relation's sake between 
 God and his ministers, whom it hath pleased fhim] of 
 his mercy to dignify in some sort with the representa- 
 tion of his own person upon earth, the world hath 
 ever hold them in very reverent estimation, insomuch 
 that Paul told the Galatians, although he preached 
 the gospel unto them ' through infirmity of the ilosh,' 
 Gal iv., without the honour, ostentation, and pomp of 
 the world, rather as one that studicid to bring his 
 person into contempt, yet so far was it off that they 
 despised or abhorred his infirmities, that they rather 
 'received him as an angel of God, yea, as Christ 
 Jesus.' And he ' bare them record, that if it had 
 been possible ' (nature and the law of God not for- 
 bidding), ' they would have plucked out their eyes to 
 have bestowed upon him.' Chrysostom, upon the 
 second to Timothy, thinkoth no recompense equal 
 to their dangers ; and that it is not more than de- 
 served if they should lay down their lives for their 
 * Hern. .'■ct. f> in ("ant. 
 
 pastors' sake,* because they do it daily for them, 
 although not in this life, for lack of persecution to try 
 it, yet by exposing their souls to the peril of eternal 
 death. I bear you record, to use the apostle's words, 
 that in former times, when you had Uijiieos sacerdotes, 
 wooden priests, priests of Babylon to be yonr leaders 
 and guides, and not only Balaam the prophet of Moab, 
 but lialaam's asses, who never opened their mouths but 
 it was a miracle to hear them ; you gave tliera the 
 honour of angels and of Christ Jesus himself. You 
 then bestowed your earrings and frontlets, as Israel 
 did upon a golden calf, upon those leaden calves, I 
 mean your lands and revenues, to maintain the con- 
 vents of monks, cages of ignorant and unlearned buz- 
 zards. Then you committed idolatry with stocks and 
 stones, and to every friar that drew you aside were 
 ready to submit yourself, jiater mens cs lu, you are my 
 father. Then religion ate up policy, the church 
 devoured the commonwealth, cloisters were fuller of 
 treasures than king's courts, all the wealth and fat- 
 ness of the land was swallowed down into the bellies 
 of friars and nunneries ; and as the king of Persia con- 
 tinued his feast to his princes and servants ' an hun- 
 dred and fourscore days,' Esther i., so if these had 
 continueil their eating and drinking the substance of 
 the world to this day, their appetite would have lasted. 
 Then had j'ou priests without learning, zeal without 
 knowledge, devotion without discretion, and liberality 
 without moderation. But there is ' a time to win 
 and a time to lose, a time to gather and a time to 
 scatter,' a time to eat and a time to cast up ; for now 
 policy hath eaten up religion, the commonwealth the 
 church, and men spoil their gods, as God expostulat- 
 eth, Mai. iii., against all equity and conscience. His 
 tithes and otVerings are translated to strangers, they 
 eat the material bread of the prophets, who never 
 give them spiritual food, and they that serve not at 
 the altar live by it, when they that serve indeed can- 
 not live. Antigonus asked Cleanthes, a learned philo- 
 sopher and painful student at his book, ' Cleanthes, 
 dost thou yet grind :'' ' I grind,' saith he, ' and that 
 for sustenance sake.'f AVherein they noted a great 
 indignity, that those hands should be used at the 
 mill wherewith he wrote of the sun and stars, qiiibtis 
 nil! ma)iih]i<t, &c.| It gricveth me to sponk what shifts 
 they are driven unto, who are able to labour in the 
 word and to do the work of right good evangelists, 
 idijue ritir sii.ftriitaiidir cdiinci, not to grow rich thereby, 
 but to put meat into their mouths and the mouths of 
 their families. 
 
 I conclude with the exhortation of the apostle, 
 1 Thos. v., ' Now we beseech you, brethren, that you 
 know them which labour amongst you, and are over 
 you in the Lord, and admonish you; that ye have them 
 in singular, or abundant, or more than abundant love, 
 
 * Ifomil. 2. Qiiantiinilibot obssequii ticforas, &c. 
 t -Mcilia ailliuc Clcaiitlio ? molo ; idquc vitK sustentandaj 
 causa. J Plutarch. 
 
Vee. 5.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXr\'. 
 
 221 
 
 hiTio izrEj/ffffoD, for tlioir works' sake.' From an 
 abundant spirit be cravetb abundant abundance of 
 love, emptying bis soni of words, tbat if it were pos- 
 sible, he might stir their hearts. In this sparingly 
 sparing generation of ours, what words might serve to 
 warm their frozen devotion, whom neither painfulness 
 in labouring, nor pre-eminence in overseeing, nor 
 vigilancy in admonishing, can cause to know and dis- 
 cern ; no, nor keep from contemning ; or so ex- 
 ceedingly to love ; no, nor withdraw from exceed- 
 ingly hating these labourers, rulers, watchmen of 
 theirs, but even for their work's sake, because they 
 are ministers, most debase and despite them '? They 
 knew Christ among the Jews to be the carpenter's son, 
 and such to be his brethren and sisters ; so these 
 they are content to know, not in the worthiness of 
 their calling, giving countenance to their place and 
 maintenance to their service, but in the baseness of 
 their birth and kindred, poorness of their livings and 
 pensions, and whatsoever may make to add unto them 
 further disgrace. 
 
 3. And proclauned a fast, and put on sackcloth. 
 Fasting and sackcloth, saith Jerome, are the armour 
 of repentance: Anna penitciiticc sacciis et jejunium. 
 She Cometh not to God with a full belly and meat 
 between the teeth, nor in gorgeous attire of silver and 
 gold, or of needlework; but with the thinnest face and 
 coarsest apparel that she can provide, she is so much 
 the apter to apply her suit, and to entreat God : 
 Iiianis center et luctiiosu^ ludjilna iinibitiositis Dcnm 
 deprecantur* Not that the emptiness of the stomach 
 or roughness of the garment do so much content him, 
 which are but outward signs of an inward cause fi'om 
 ■whence they proceed ; for when the soul is touched 
 indeed, and feeleth the smart of her sins, because it 
 hungereth and thirsteth after the righteousness of 
 God, therefore it cannot think on feeding the outward 
 man, but commandeth it abstinence for a time even 
 from necessary eating ; and because it longeth to be 
 clothed with the salvation of God, therefore it chargeth 
 her flesh and blood, not to take care for wonted 
 attiring, but to change their accustomed ornaments 
 into sackcloth and ashes. f Meantime the pleasure 
 that God hath is in the sorrow of the heart and in 
 the humility of the mind, which the humiliation of 
 the body giveth him assurance of. The practice of 
 David, Ps. xxxv., is, methinketh, a very good pattern, 
 both to shew the order of repentance, and to assign 
 the place that fasting and sackcloth have therein : 
 ' When they were sick I clothed myself with sackcloth, 
 and humbled my soul with fasting, and my prayer 
 was turned upon my bosom. I behaved myself as 
 to my friend or brother, and made lamentation as 
 one that bewaileth his mother.' 1. There must be 
 some misery, as the sickness of friends, maladies of 
 our own souls, or the public sores of the whole land. 
 2. Upon that misery ensueth an inward and hearty 
 * Hieron. -j- Majroris iusiguia. — TuK. 
 
 compassion, as in a case that dearly afl'ecteth us. 
 3. Upon that compassion, grief, which mercy is 
 never sundered from. 4. Upon that grief, a neglect 
 of bodily duties, and neither leisure to till it with 
 meats and drinks, nor care to trim it with ornaments. 
 5. Upon the neglect of the body do the exercises of 
 the soul, prayer and the like, ofi'er themselves. And, 
 G. Prayer with her other companions at length come 
 laden home with the sheaves of comfort and bliss, 
 from the plentifullest fields. So that sackcloth and 
 fasting, as they are the witnesses of sorrow or some 
 like passion, so they are helps also and occasions to 
 more acceptable works than they are themselves ; 
 neither lie they next to the favour of God, but they 
 thrust prayer and faith between them, and home to 
 beg remission. I mean not to prevent my text by 
 shewing the nature, original, kinds, and use of fasting 
 amongst both heathens and Christians, which some 
 later verses of this chapter do challenge to themselves. 
 Only I observe for this present, that both those sins 
 wherewith the people of Asia did most especially 
 abound, and these in Nineveh perhaps more especially 
 than the rest, they laboured forthwith to reform, that 
 is, the delicacy of meats and drinks, and intem- 
 perancy in clothing. The rich man in the Gospel, 
 Luke xvi., is noted for both these, as handmiiids that 
 waited upon his riches. And Nineveh, the richest 
 lady under heaven, was not clear from them. To rid 
 themselves of these baits and allurements, 1, they 
 fast from meat, drink, sleep, ointments, delights, and 
 recreations of all sorts ; for that is truly to fast, not 
 only to forsake and forget ordinary food, but to im- 
 prison and shut up the body from all the pleasures of 
 life,* to pull down the strength and pride thereof, and 
 for neighbourhood's sake to afflict the soul with it, 
 and in efl'ect to give it strait commandment. Touch 
 not, taste not, handle not anything wherein thy wonted 
 joys consisted. 2. They proclaim a fast ; they leave 
 it not indifl'erent and arbitrary to the will of every 
 private citizen to do what he best fancied ; they bind 
 them by a law and decree to do as the rest did, lest 
 there might have been some in the city carrying their 
 epicurism and looseness of life to their grave : ' Let 
 us eat and drink, for' within forty days 'we shall die.' 
 3. They put on sackcloth. Perhaps not sackcloth in 
 kind, which all the shops in Nineveh could not supply 
 them with, but the vilest and simplest weeds that 
 they might devise. Their purple and prince-like 
 furniture, wherein they esteemed not warmth, but the 
 colour and dye,f and ware them for their price more 
 than necessity ; J their wanton, disdainful, superfluous 
 sails of pride and vain-glory they lay aside, and but 
 for open uucivility, they would strip themselves to the 
 bare skin, and repent naked. 4. From the greatest 
 to the least. They spare no caUing, prince nor peer, 
 
 * Non solum ab escis sed a cunctis illecebris abstinere. — 
 Hieron. f Non calor sed color. — Ber. 
 
 % Pretium affectatur in vestibus, non necessitas. — Id. 
 
222 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 noble nor vulgar person. They spare no age, old nor 
 young. The aged that wont with his staff, and the 
 suckling that drew the breast, are all charged alike, 
 even those who for bodily infirmities were unable 
 enough to bear it. 
 
 The two daughters of the horse-leech which suck 
 the blood of our land, wasting the substance and com- 
 modity thereof in vain, — in some the eifects of their 
 wealth, in others the efficients of their beggary, — are 
 the vices of these Assyrians, which directly and pur- 
 posedly they cross in this work of repentance. For 
 what hath undone both gentlemen and mean men in 
 our country so much, and brought some to shame, as 
 their back and belly, pride and profusion ? What 
 means shall we use to crush these vipers amongst 
 you ? Decb.iiming will not serve ; denouncing of the 
 judgments of God we have found unprofitable, by 
 over-long experience. Have wo not beaten your ears 
 (I mistake, the air and the wind) a tbous:ind times 
 with faithful and earnest detection of those monsters, 
 pride and prodigality, strangeness of apparel, excess 
 of meats and drinks, and have we not gained thereby 
 as if we bad jjrcached but fables ? Nineveh is fallen 
 long since, because she returned to that wallowing 
 which here she repented her of. But Nineveh shall 
 rise again, and stand upright against us, and condemn 
 us face to face, for she repented in hunger and thirst, 
 we in satiety, gluttony, surfeiting, drunkenness ; for 
 either we never repent at all, or these are the stomachs 
 which we bring in repentance. And Nineveh repented 
 in sackcloth and ashes, stuff of the coarsest woof and 
 workmanship, and of the simplest fashion that their 
 wits could invent ; we in our silks and velvets, of 
 French, Italian, Jewish, Turkish, Barbarian, hellish 
 devices ; for either we never repent at all, or these 
 are the guises and shows we bring in repentance. 
 These, these are the stomachs we go with, I say not 
 to our beds, to stretch ourselves and to take our ease 
 till we have gotten our appetites again ; and these are 
 the weeds wo carry, I say not to the theatres, to be 
 stared upon, nor to the king's court where soft raiment 
 is more tolerable to be worn ; but with these stomachs 
 and these weeds we go to the temjile of the Lord, his 
 house of praying and preaching, and as boldly present 
 ourselves therewith, as il' the favour of God were 
 soonest won by such intempcrancies. Whether v<o be 
 a people defiled and corrupted as these in Nineveh 
 were, we are not so shameless to dissemble ;* and 
 whether prophets have been amongst us, as Jonah 
 was in Nineveh, lot their wearied tongues and sorrow- 
 ful souls for their lost labour witness another day ; 
 and whether the judgments of God, some we have 
 already felt, and some wo have cause to fear, though 
 not so grievous as they did, we need none other mes- 
 sengers to report than our eyes standing in our beads 
 and beholding some part of them accomplished ; and 
 lastly, we would think it a great wrong unto us to be 
 * Qu. ' wo are so shameless not to dissemble "? — Ed. 
 
 charged with iinbelicf. We say we believe God as 
 frankly and confidently as ever the men of Nineveh 
 did. Thus far we will be equal with Nineveh. But 
 shew me your faith by your works, as they did in 
 Nineveh. If your sins have deserved a judgment, and 
 judgment hath been sounded by prophets, besides the 
 preaching of experience, and prophets, you say, are 
 believed, because you receive them as those that speak 
 in the name of the Lord, I say again, shew me your 
 fiith by your works, as that city did. When did you 
 fast, I name not bread and water, but from superfluous 
 sustenance ? When did you pull one dish from your 
 tables, or one morsel from your bowels ? Naj', do 
 you not daily add, and invent for pleasure, even till 
 the creatures of God which die for your lives cry out 
 upon you : We desire not to be spared, but not to bo 
 abused ; we refuse not to serve your necessity, but 
 your riot ; kill to eat, but to eat dcliciously and in- 
 temperately, kill us not ? * Or when did yon change 
 one suit or thread of your raiment in sign of suppliant 
 and contrite spirits ; shall I say by proclamation, no, 
 nor by the secret and single decree of any private 
 heart, or from' the greatest to the least ? No ; for 
 greatness will not stoop but at greater judgments. 
 The Lord doth bruise but the heel of the body when 
 the poor are smitten ; unless be reach the head, the 
 rich and mighty amongst us feel it not. Brethren, 
 there must be some end of these things ; our eating 
 and drinking, not to live, bnt as if we would die with 
 fulness, and wearing of pride like a chain to our 
 nocks and a mantle to our whole bodies ; or if Moses 
 and Samuel were amongst us, they would be weary of 
 their preaching. Yea, there must be some end ; or 
 if Moses and Samuel, with all the angels in heaven, 
 were amongst us, to bestow both their preachings and 
 prayers that we might be saved, they should save but 
 their own souls, and neither us nor our sons and 
 daughters. This is an year of temptation, whereof I 
 may say, as Moses did in Deuteronomy, chap, siii., 
 of a strange prophet : Ttnlat ros Doiiniius vcslcy, ' The 
 Lord your God proveth you whether you love him or no;' 
 whether j'ou can be content for his sake to leave super- 
 fluities a while, and to lay aside vanity, and convert 
 your hearts ami hands to the works of mercy. In the 
 timeliest time of your hai'vest ho covered the heavens 
 with a sack, to teach you the way to sackcloth ; and 
 sent leanness upon the earth, to teach you frugality 
 and thriftiucss in the use of his blessings. Many the 
 poorer of our land would be glad, with the disciples of 
 Christ, to rub an ear of corn between their hands for 
 relief of their hunger, if they could come by it. Their 
 bowels sound like shawms for want of food, and their 
 teeth are clean, when your burns and garners are filled 
 to the top, tour presses run over, and your bellies are 
 satisfied with more than the flour of wheat. Oh, take 
 
 * Necossitatem liauil ilcprecor sed injuriam. Nccpssitati 
 subscrvire hauii rccuso, sci! Inxiii, ut voscaris jugula.utlautiiis 
 et jucundiils vcscaris baud jugula. — J'lut. de esu cam. 
 
Veil C] 
 
 LECTURE XXXV. 
 
 223 
 
 somewhat from j'our bellies and backs, if you liave 
 any love to that bidden manna, the meat that perish- 
 etb not, the fruits of the tree of life in the midst of 
 the paradise of God ; if any desire to those white 
 garments washed in the blood of Christ, and rather 
 to shine hereafter as the stars in the firmament than 
 as filowvvorms upon the earth in this present life, take 
 from your bc'llios and backs, both in regard of your 
 own souls, to witness humility and sobriety before 
 
 God and man, and for your poor brethren's sake;, that 
 they may be fed and clothed. It is Christ that hun- 
 gereth, and Christ that must satisfy you ; Christ that 
 craveth, and Christ that must give unto you ; Christ 
 that lieth at your gates, and Christ that must advance 
 you to glory. He is the advocate to the poor, and 
 the judge of the rich ; ho hath the sentence of blessing 
 and cursing in his mouth ; and to those that are plen- 
 tiful givers, he shall render a plentiful recompense. 
 
 LECTURE XXXV. 
 For word came unto the l;ii\ij tif Ninei-ch ; and he rose finiit his ihroiie, &c. — Jonah III. 6. 
 
 ri"1HE first of those five verses, wherein the repent- 
 JL ance of Nineveh is laid down, is nothing else, I 
 told you, but a general comprehension of that which 
 is afterward repeated and repolished with more par- 
 ticular declaration. Therein they lay their foundation 
 low and sure ; for the first stone of their building, that 
 beareth up all the rest, is fiith, plainly and expressly 
 mentioned; which, if it had been suppressed by silence, 
 as one that seeth the branches and fruits of a tree, 
 knoweth there is a root that carrieth them, though it 
 bo bm-icd in the mould of the ground ; or the members 
 of the body of man, stirring and moving themselves 
 to their several functions, knoweth there is a heart that 
 ruleth them, though it dwell secretl}' within the bosom ; 
 so, though the name of faith had not here been heard 
 of, he that had seen such branches and members of 
 religious devotion and humiliation in the people of 
 Nineveh, might easily have guessed that there was a 
 root and heart of faith from whence they proceeded. 
 To this they adjoin fasting and sackcloth, not only as 
 arguments and outward professions of their inward 
 contrition or grief ; but as adminicles, helps, and 
 commendations besides, to that effectual prayer of 
 theirs which afterwards they poured forth. The belly, 
 they say, hath no ears, venter non hahet aiires; and we 
 may as truly say. It hath no tongue or spirit to call 
 upon God ; and sumptuous garments are cither the 
 banner of pride and nest of riotousness,* as the 
 emperor of Piome termed them, or tokens at least of 
 a mind at rest and no way disquieted ; therefore they 
 cry in the second of Wisdom, Let us fill om-selves 
 with costly wine and ointments, and let us crown our- 
 selves with rose-buds. And Amos complaiuoth of 
 them in the sixth of his prophecy, that ' put the evil 
 day far from them, and approach to the feet of ini- 
 quity, that they eat the lambs of the flock, and the 
 calves out of the stall ; drink their wine in bowls, and 
 anoint themselves with the chief ointment : but no 
 man is sorry for the affliction of Joseph ;' for it is not 
 likely that the affliction of others should move their 
 hearts, who arc so occupied and possessed before with 
 fulness of pleasures. 
 
 For the better explication hereof, it shall not be 
 * Vexillum superbia; nidusque luxuria\ — Auaust. 
 
 impertinent to consider and apply the behaviour of 
 Bcuhadad, 1 Ivings xx. He had received an overthrow 
 of the children of Israel, one year in the mountains, 
 the next at Aphek. An hundred thousand footmen 
 were slain in the field in one day ; seven and twenty 
 thousand perished with the fall of a wall in the city, 
 besides the danger of the king, who is afraid of his 
 own life, and ' runneth from chamber to chamber to 
 hide himself.' Upon this misery wherewith they were 
 touched, one danger being past, another imminent, his 
 servants come unto him with these words, ' Behold 
 now, we have heard say, that the kings of Israel are 
 merciful kings : we pray thee, therefore, let us put 
 sackcloth about our loins, and ropes about our heads, 
 and go out to the king of Israel : it may be that he 
 will save thy life.' The}- did so, an.l came to the 
 king, and said, ' Thy servant Benhadad saith, I pray 
 thee, let me live.' Benhadad, of late a puissant king, 
 having two and thirty kings in his armj', is now con- 
 tent with the name of a servant. 
 
 First, then, you see there is a persuasion of mercy 
 in the kings of Israel ; so there must be a persuasion 
 of mercy in the God of heaven, which the Niuevites 
 were not void of. Secondly, that persuasion was un- 
 perfect, mingled with fear, standing upon terms of 
 doubt : ' it nimj be he will save thy lite ;' so hkewise 
 said the king of Nineveh, ' Who knoweth if the Lord 
 will repent ? ' Thirdly, upon this persuasion, such as 
 it is, the Syrians go and entreat the king of Israel ; 
 upon the like do the inhabitants of Nineveh cry unto 
 God. Lastly, to testify their humility, and to move 
 him to pity, they ' put sackcloth about their loins, 
 and ropes about their heads ;' so do the people of 
 Nineveh sit in sackcloth and ashes, to bewray their 
 contrite spirits. Now as Ai-am put ropes about their 
 heads, to shew that for their own parts they had 
 deserved nothing — but their lives and deaths were in 
 the king's hands, either to save or hang them — so to 
 fast, or wear sackcloth, with any intention to merit, 
 or satisfy the anger of God, is to abuse the ends of 
 both these services. Aquinas * reciteth tlu'ee ends of 
 
 * 22 Qacest. 147. art. i. conclus. — Sine Baccho ot Cerere 
 friget Venus ; applied by Jerome. Cibum rerum dosider 
 abiliura non comederam. 
 
2-2i 
 
 KIXG ON JONAH. 
 
 [CUAP. III. 
 
 a fast : first, to repress and subdue the insolency 
 of the flesh ; he proveth it from the second to the 
 Corinthians chap, sixth, where the apostle joineth 
 fasting and chastity together ; the one the cause, 
 the other the cflect that foUowoth it. Secondly, 
 To elevate the mind and make it more capable 
 of heavenly revelation ; as Daniel in the tenth of 
 his prophecy, after his fasting three weeks from 
 pleasant bread, ilesh and wine, beheld a vision. 
 Thirdly, to satisfy and appease the anger of God for 
 sins, which we can in no case admit. The proof he 
 bringeth is from the second of Joel, where we are 
 willed to ' turn unto the Lord with all oar heart, with 
 fasting, and mourning, and weeping ; to rend our 
 hearts, and not our garments,' &c. What then ? It 
 is the manner and usage, we grant, of suppliant 
 petitioners to abstain from meats, and to tear their 
 garments from their backs, not with purpose to satisfy , 
 the ^vrath of God, but rather to execute wrath and ) 
 vengeance upon themselves, and by macerating their 
 bodies, and stripping them of their best ornaments, 
 to shew how unworthy they are of the blessings of 
 God, whom by their heinous iniquities they have so 
 offended. For it is not fasting and sackcloth that 
 pleaseth him so much, nor rending the garments, nor 
 looking under the brow, nor hanging down the head 
 like a bulrush, nor shaving the head and the beard, 
 nor casting dust upon the face, nor sitting in ashes, 
 nor filUng the air with bowlings and outcries ; but 
 inward and hearty conversion to God, acknowledg- 
 ment of our grievous provocations, confession of our 
 own unworthiness by these outward castigations, un- 
 feigned repentance, vacation to prayer, and a fearful 
 apprehension of his ancient and accustomed mercies. 
 Therefore it followcth in Joel : ' For the Lord is 
 gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great 
 kindness, and rcpenteth him of the evil ;' as much as 
 to say, when you have sorrowed sufficiently for your 
 sins, and signified that sorrow with abstinence and 
 tears, take comfort at the length again, not in your 
 own satisfactions, but in the remembrance and views 
 of God's everlasting mercies. 
 
 For nord came ttnto the kiiif/ 'if Ni}iei't'li. Some 
 think that the matter herein contained is distinguished 
 from that which went before in the fifth verse, and 
 that the rulers and warders of the several parts of the 
 city which Jonah had passed through, had proclaimed 
 a fast to the jjeople, before the preaching of the pro- 
 phet came to the king's ears. Hereupon the}' infer, 
 that in matters appertaining to God, we must not tany 
 the leisure of princes, their license be obtained, for 
 princes (they say) are slowest to believe, and farthest 
 from humbling themselves before the majesty of God, 
 ■when his anger is kindled. I take it to be otherwise, 
 and I am not left alone in that opinion ; for most agi-eo 
 that the former verse is but an index or table to that 
 that followeth, wherein the repentance of Nineveh is 
 first rough hewn, and afterwards revised and gone 
 
 over again with more special explication. For thus it 
 hangeth together : if you will know what the people 
 of Nineveh did upon this strange and imexpected news. 
 They doubted nothing either of the word, or of his 
 calling that brought it; but from the greatest to the 
 least, old and j'oung, princes and inferiors, all orders 
 and states of men, they both believed the report, and 
 became spectacles to God, and men, and angels, of 
 admirable contrition, condemning themselves in those 
 two things especially whereof the whole world might 
 justly have condemned them, luxuriousness of mea's 
 and drinks, and costliness of garments ; but if you 
 will know their order of proceeding more particularly, 
 thus it was : 1, ' Word came imto the king,' as to the 
 excellent power and authority amongst them ; 2, the 
 king ' calleth a council ' of the princes and peers, as 
 being the pillars of his government ; for ' where there 
 arc many counsellors there is strength,' Prov. xv. ; 
 3, the king and his council ' make an act,' touching 
 fasting and prayer, and renouncement of sin ; 4, they 
 ' cause it to be proclaimed ' in manner and form as 
 afterw'ard followeth ; 5, for encouragement and ex- 
 ample to the rest, the king is the first man that 
 humbleth himself; so that in truth their sovereign 
 and liege lord is first made privy to their service 
 intended. Wherein, for mine own part (simply to 
 speak my mind, as one that must give account what 
 I have built upon my Master's foundation, w^hether 
 gold, silver, hay, stubble, or the like, for both my 
 works and my words must be tried by fii'e), though I 
 make no question, if the prince should be backward 
 and careless in the worship of God, but God must 
 be served ; and so I would wish it ; yet in a common 
 case, concerning the weal and welfare of the whole 
 commonwealth, where it lieth upon all sorts of men 
 alike, to do some extraordinary worship to God (as 
 the cause of Nineveh here required), I hold it a point 
 of disorder and confusion, that the foot should run 
 without the head, the i)Cople and inferiors do anything 
 in public, whereunto the knowledge and authorisc- 
 ment of the prince is not first had : ' Give unto Cassar 
 the things that belong to Ciesar,' and give him this, 
 for one amongst the rest, if Caisar be willing and 
 ready to join with thee in the honour of God ; leave 
 him not out. I would not open this gate of liberty 
 to any subject or people in the world, with whom 
 Christ and his kingdom are harboured, that in a 
 connnon danger of a country, when God is to bo 
 pacified, and the land purged in general, the private 
 members thereof may enter into the action, without 
 the warrant of the ])rince both to command and 
 direct the same. If such were the king as Darius 
 was, Daniel vi., and such his rulers and officers as 
 would make a decree to defraud God of his worship, 
 ' that whosoever should make a petition to any, either 
 God or man, in thirty days, save only to the king, 
 should bo cast into the den of the lions,' then bo thou 
 also as Daniel was, ' outer into thine house, and open 
 
Ver. C] 
 
 LECTURE XXXV. 
 
 thy win.lows towards Jerusalem, and pra}* ;' or enter 
 into the house of God, and set open the doors, and 
 pray ; or go mto the corners of the streets, or into the 
 market-place, or climb up to the house tops, and pray; 
 staj- not till the king or his council release thee there- 
 to ; and if every hair of thy head were a life, redeem 
 thy duty to God, with adventure and loss thereof, 
 rather than neglect it; and if thou hap to be alone 
 in that action, as Elias was, yet forego it not. But if 
 such be the king as Josias was, or the like, and such 
 Lis princes and officers as make decrees for the wor- 
 ship of God, and are more wise than thyself, to know 
 the danger of the state, and as zealous to prevent it, 
 whatsoever thou doest in private betwixt thyself and 
 thino own spirit, th3-self and thine own household, yet 
 gather no open assembly, sanctifj' no public fast, call 
 not to sackcloth and mourning before the magistrate 
 have decreed it. It may be a presumption of thine 
 own zeal, an aflectation of singularity, a commending 
 and preaching of thyself unto the people ; but sure I 
 am, it is a censure by consequence, and a judgment 
 underhand against the rest of the brethren, that they 
 are over-cold in religion, a prejudice against the magis- 
 trate that he is too slack, a breach of obedience to the 
 powers that God hath ordained, and the mother of 
 anarchy and confusion, which, within a Christian com- 
 monwealth, must carefully be shunned. In many 
 the dangers of our land, both at home and abroad, 
 many the members and subjects thereof — as if our 
 country had no more orators, and there were none to 
 stand in the gap but themselves — have assembled 
 together, either in towns or in hamlets, and some- 
 times in a private house, to fast and pray before the 
 Lord. Their humbling of themselves in such sort, 
 confessing of sins, oiTering of their hearts in devout 
 supplication, singing of psalms, prophesying in course 
 from morning till evening, as they are plausible exer- 
 cises in the sight of men, so I will not say the con- 
 trary, but full of godliness and Christianity. But 
 (under correction of better knowledge and judgment), 
 I think, that obedience and love had been better than 
 all this sacrifice, and that thus to minish the authority 
 of the magistrate, by preventing his decree, and con- 
 trolling as it were his government, and to give sen- 
 tence against all the children of the land besides, of 
 negligence and unmindfulness in God's atfairs, may 
 more offend, than their service or devotion can do good 
 otherwise. Much more seemly it were, that, as the 
 apostle eshorteth the Corinthians, ' Not the one to 
 prevent the other when they come to the supper of 
 the Lord,' 1 Cor. xi., which is a sacrament of com- 
 munion and fellowship, so in a calamity of the realm, 
 ■when all the joints thereof are disquieted, and have 
 need to be salved and holpen by the saving health of 
 God, that all might concur, and agree for seeking that 
 remedy ; that the people might stay for the magis- 
 trates, magistrates lead the people, the prophets 
 preach and denounce, the king and his council enact, 
 
 and all put in practice ; that a whole burnt-offering 
 might be made unto the Lord, from the highest to 
 the lowest, a solemn dedication of every person and 
 state that the land hath. And as Jerusalem was 
 commended for her building, so we for our prayin" 
 and fasting: a people at unity within ourselves, where 
 neither the greatest nor the least are excluded. 
 
 But of the nature of a public fast hereafter. Mean- 
 while the dangerous conclusions that have, and m-'ght 
 have ensued out of this maxim, to wit, that in 
 matters belonging to God, we are not bound to expect 
 or respect the magistrate, make me the more wary 
 and scrupulous in handling this point. For I like 
 not in any case, that the least advantage and scope in 
 the earth be given to the people, against his lawful 
 and Christian governor. It is as fire to flax, an easy 
 and welcome persuasion to busy and catching natures. 
 The least exception once taken against their want of 
 religion, piety, justice, or the like, is so far followed, 
 that not only the prince, in the end, but the whole 
 people rueth it. The Anabaptist in Germany no 
 sooner entertained this fancy in his brain, that a god- 
 less magistrate may be made away, but forthwith ho 
 granted to himself that all the magistrates of Germany 
 are of that kind, and casteth in his head how he may lay 
 his hands upon the Lord's anointed. He beareth the 
 j world in hand, that God hath had speech with him, 
 and given him a charge to destroy the wicked, and 
 to constitute a new world, consisting of righteous 
 and innocent. The ordinaiy preachings of Munster 
 were these : * God hath warranted me face to face ; 
 i he that cannot lie hath commanded me to attempt 
 I the change by these means, even by killing the 
 magistrates ! Phifer, his lewd companion, did but 
 dream in the night time, of the killing of many mice, 
 and presently expounded his dream of murdering the 
 nobles ! So, likewise, let a papist from Eome or Ehoiras 
 give forth that a prince, which is an apostate, or 
 excommunicate by the church for heresy or schism, 
 and openly denounced to be such, may be deposed 
 from his seat, seignories, title to the crown, claim of 
 subjects' allegiance, how many traitorous hearts, slan- 
 derous and mutinous books, libels, speeches, decla- 
 mations, defamations, rebellious, violent, hostile con- 
 spiracies hath it brought forth ? how ready hath the 
 lion been to take ears for horns ? that is, a prejudicate 
 opinion of men maliciously bent to interpret the 
 service of God heresy, and departing out of Babylon, 
 schism ; and falling away from antichrist, flat apos- 
 tasy. The Brownist in England of late, imagining to 
 himself that, in the disorders of the church, reforma- 
 tion may be made without the leisure and leave of 
 the prince, if God had not slackened that heat, would 
 have followed his conceit per sa.ra, per ujnes, through 
 all the dangers and difficulties that are ; would have 
 trodden order, obedience, conscience, religion, duty 
 to God and man under his feet, rather than have missed 
 * Joan Sleid. Com. 5. Ipsemet mibi coram promisit, &c. 
 
226 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 his purpose. But the mercy of God assisting us, wc 
 have found it true which Cyprian sometimes observed, 
 that schismatics are ever hottest in their first begin- 
 ninfts, but cannot take increase.* 
 
 To conclude ; this fact of the people of Nineveh in 
 this their religious intendment of public repentance and 
 conversion to God, even for that order and obedience' 
 sake, which the}' hold towards their king, is the rather 
 to be commended ; and may be an image to all other 
 kingdoms and churches on the earth, how to demean 
 themselves in the like businesses ; not to neglect 
 their rulers and governors, not to suspect them of 
 carelessneps in their charges, not to impair their 
 credit and dignity in the opinions of men, with un- 
 charitable and hasty surmises, not to usurp their au- 
 thority in the practice or publication of unusual acts ; 
 but to give them this prerogative, not only for policy, 
 but even for conscience' sake, that as they are the 
 heads of the body, and set over the rest, so in all such 
 weighty affairs as this whereof I speak, they think 
 their knowledge, advice, and association, most fit to be 
 required. 
 
 And icord came to the Iciiuj of Ninereh. If we con- 
 sider the words in particular, we shall find them to 
 have marvellous force : 1. Word came ; not only the 
 bruit, fame, report, tidings, or hearsay of it, but a 
 word of a far dillVrent kind, a burden, a judgment, a 
 powerful, terrif^yiiig, threatening word, a dreadful 
 alarm of the wrath of God, a word that hath a deed 
 in it, and is not only j^ronounced, but done, or not 
 far from doing ; such a word as we read of in the 
 second of Luke, when the shepherds said one to an- 
 other, ' Let us go into Bethlehem, and see this word 
 that is done,' verhuin hoc qnnd faclum eat ; this singu- 
 lar, miraculous, extraordinary word, the like whereof 
 we never heard uttered. 2. To the khui oft\biereh ; not 
 to a viceroy, a petit and tributary king, a king of a 
 molehill, or of a little isle, a king under awe and sub- 
 jection to some higher kingdom ; but to the king of 
 Nineveh, the successor of Nimrod, the monarch of 
 the earth, tlie terror and scourge of the world far and 
 near, the mightiest, majesticallest, proudest king that 
 the sun at that day looked upon ; for what is the rea- 
 son that the history, having mentioned Nineveh so 
 often before (' go to Nineveh,' and he ' went to Nine- 
 veh,' and ' Nineveh shall be overthrown,' and ' the 
 men of Nineveh liclieve God'), dolh yet ridd the name 
 of the city, as if without this addition it could not be 
 understood what king were meant, hut that the mind 
 of the Holy Ghost therein was, to note the unlikeliest 
 king to strike sails, and to yield his sceptre to the 
 King of kings of all the countries and kingdoms that 
 the world had. Yet this potent and insolent king of 
 Nineveh, though he had built his nest as the eagles of 
 the sky, for earthly provision and pro-eminencp, as 
 soon as he hoard the tidings of the word, what did ho ? 
 
 * Scliismatici somfer intfr initia sua fervent, incre- 
 ment a verb liabcrf non possiuit. — iv. Epist 2. 
 
 3. He arose, as if he had felt his seat shaken under 
 him, and tossed with an earthquake, so he raiseth 
 himself, starteth from his ease and tranquillity, tbink- 
 eth it no time to sit and deliberate, and ask questions, 
 to examine circumstances, to convent the disturber of 
 Nineveh before him, and to take an account of his 
 preaching ; but if ever he hasted and bestirred his 
 joints, and called his senses and wits, his princes and 
 people together to work a work, now to do it. 4. He 
 rose from his throne, not fi'om his bed, whereon he 
 took his ease, nor from his board, whereat he ate and 
 drank, but from his seat of honour and principality, 
 his royal, magnificent, monarchical throne, where he 
 sat as king, and commanded, and took state upon him. 
 From thence he arose, to do his obeisance to the Lord 
 of all lords, '• hose throne is the heaven of heavens, 
 and all the thrones of the earth but his footstools. 
 5. More than this, as if the wV of majesty, his vesture 
 of purple and gold, his kingly attire, had been a bur- 
 den to his back, and as unseemly to be worn as ever 
 the botch or scab was to the Egyptians, he doth not 
 only despise or refuse, and not reckon of it, but he 
 putteth it of}', nay, he castelh it off] and throweth it 
 down, and biddoth it farewell for ever, as not becom- 
 ing him ; as if he had rated and proved it in this man- 
 ner : Have I worn thee for pomp and pride, and given 
 countenance unto mj' beggarly and base weeds, in 
 comparison of him who is clothed with zeal as with a 
 cloak, and with righteousness as with an habergeon ? 
 Lie aside, I mistook thy nature ; thou art but the paint- 
 ing of a grave, or whiting of a rotten wall, the cover 
 and case to a lump of mortal flesh ; vain and unpro- 
 fitable ornament, I am weary of thy service, thou hast 
 made me honourable in the sight of men, tliou canst 
 work mo no reverence or estimation before the Lord 
 of hosts. C. It had been enough to have proceeded 
 thus far, to have stripped him into his weektyand ordi- 
 nary attire ; to have gone like a common man, as Ahab 
 in the first of Kings, changed his apparel, tliat his 
 enemies might not know him. First, the king of Nine- 
 veh doeth not so ; but he that had silver and gold as 
 the dust in the street, and precious stones as the gravel 
 in the river Tigris, to have wrapped his body in, and to 
 have glistered against the rays of the sun, as Horod in 
 his shining gown, forgetteth the wardrobe of the em- 
 pire, and goeth to the beggar's press, humbleth him- 
 self like a bondman. One that had ground at the mill 
 could not have taken a garment of a baser condition ; 
 he piitteth on sackclotli, nay, he covercth himself uitk 
 sackclolh. Sackcloth is all the apparel heweareth, sack- 
 cloth is the diadem to bis head, sacki loth tlie m mtle 
 to his back ; from tlie crown of the head to the plant 
 of his foot there is nothing but sackcloth. The king 
 hatli wound his body in sackcloth, as a corpse made 
 ready for the burial, and fitter to lie in the ground 
 than to live and breathe u]inn the face of the earth. 
 7. Lastly, when he hath all done, he lieth not on an 
 heap of violets and roses, as the Sibaritos were wont 
 
Ver. G. 
 
 LECTURE XXXV. 
 
 227 
 
 to do, nor upon a couch beantifiecl and docked with 
 the tapestry of Egj'pt ; neither goeth he into the temple 
 of Nineveh to cleave to the dust of the pavemnnt, nor 
 shutteth himself into his closet, to grovel upon the 
 floor thereof, but he slttelh, dwelleth, abideth in an 
 heap of ashes. Sackcloth was the ground, ashes is the 
 garnish, lace, and welt to all his garments. A won- 
 derful alteration : from a king of the earth to a worm 
 of the earth, from a robe to sackcloth, from a throne 
 to a dunghill, from sitting in state to lying in ashes, 
 from the pomp of a monarch to the image of a caitilT. 
 He whom all the reverence of the world attended upon, 
 to whom the knee was bowed, the head uncovered, the 
 body prostrated, who had as many saIut;itions as the 
 firmament stars, — ' God save the king,' ' Long live the 
 emperor,' — throweth away his crown, his sceptre, his 
 majesty, with all the signs and solemnities thereto be- 
 longing, and iu efiect rebuketh himself, ' AVhy art thou 
 proud, earth and ashes ? Humble thy spirit, see thy 
 mortality, tremble before the presence of that God 
 ■who sendeth terror into the hearts, and confusion into 
 the faces of all earthly potentates. 
 
 To make an end (for I have ever for the most part, 
 against my meaning and purpose, oflended j'ou with 
 prolixity of speech), I have briefly two instructions to 
 commend unto you : the one to the magistrates in 
 particular, that they serve God as beseemeth magis- 
 trates. It is not the sword, sceptre, and robe, nor 
 the highest room, and other pre-eminence, that maketh 
 a magistrate ; but as he doth make laws, so he must 
 take laws (contraiy to the mind of lawless Caracalla, 
 impemtores Icffe.i dare, non accipere), and be a rule both 
 to others and himself, as the king of Nineveh, in this 
 pi'esent example, is first and foremost in the service 
 of God. The other, in general to all sorts of men ; 
 the king of Nineveh, you hear, from whom the silver 
 and gold and riches of the earth are provided — -for who 
 should enjoy these rather than princes ? — goeth from his 
 throne and putteth on sackcloth about him, as one 
 that must give account to the highest God, like those 
 of the meanest condition — ' I have said, Ye are gods : 
 but ye shall die like vulgar men,' Ps. Ixxxii., — and 
 sitteth in ashes, as one not forgetting his first founda- 
 tion, that as he was bred of the ashes, so to ashes he 
 must return. My brethren, let not the pomp of the 
 ■world deceive you ; whether it stand in authority, or 
 opulency, or voluptuousness of life, I say, let it not 
 deceive you. As the fresh rivers run into the salt 
 sea, so shall all the the honours of the iivorld end in 
 baseness, all the pleasures of the world end in bitter- 
 ness, all the treasures of the world in emptiness, all 
 the garments of the world in nakedness, and finally, 
 all the viands and delicates of the world in loathsome- 
 ness and rottenness. Throw away your robes and 
 costly caparisons, you kings and queens of the earth 
 
 (you that are such, not by the ordinance of God, but 
 by your own usurpation, that take such honour upon 
 you not being called thereto, but bear the bravery of 
 princes, the royalty of Solomon, upon your backs), 
 throw away your robes, lest he give you a rent that 
 gave you a garment, and clothe you with worse than 
 leprosy, that hath hitherto clothed yott with honour 
 and beauty. But why do I spend my time in so im- 
 pertinent and tmprofitable exhortation '? Fashion 
 brought them in (these disguisements, I mean), and 
 fashion must bear them out, or nothing will do it. 
 Fashion is the best preacher and orator of our age. I 
 would to God our preaching were in fashion too, for 
 then, I am sure, it would win both men and women. 
 We use all the fashions therein that our commission 
 can extend unto ; we preach season and not season, we 
 bring forth old and new, we give milk and strong 
 meat, we come in a spirit of gentleness, and with a 
 rod ; we entreat, we threaten, we preach mercy, we 
 preach judgment : all these fashions we use, and yet 
 without success. But the fashion of the world 
 preacheth and persuadeth with more effect. Fashion 
 brought in silks and velvets at one time, and fashion 
 brought in russets and greys at another ; fashion 
 brought in deep rnfl's and shallow rufls, thick ruff's 
 and thin ruffs, double ruft's and no rufls ; fashion 
 brought iu the farthingale, and carried out the farthin- 
 gale, and hath again revived the farthingale from 
 death, and placed it behind, like a rudder and stern 
 to the body, in some so big that the vessel is scarce 
 able to bear it. Thus, whilst we fashion oitrselves after 
 this world, and every garish device therein, or rather 
 aft r the devil himself (for these are Satamc iiir/ciiia* 
 the inventions of Satan, not of man), it is to be 
 feared that when God shall come to judge the quick 
 and the dead, he will not know those who have so de- 
 faced and multiplied that simple fashion which he 
 created, opus hoc meinn non est, nee hico imaijo mea:\ 
 This is not my workmanship, nor this the similitude I 
 first made. The Lord is king, let all the kings of the 
 earth ascribe glory unto him ; he rideth upon the 
 cherubims, let all their chariots and chairs of estate 
 stoop before him ; he hath put on glorious apparel, 
 let all their glistering and counterfeit ornaments be 
 ashamed at his presence. Oh let us all, from the 
 highest to the lowest, fall down and kneel before the 
 Lord our maker ; let us lie low before the footstool 
 of his excellency, and with all submission, both of 
 body and spirit, acknowledge his hand and power over 
 us. He is our God, and will thus be served; our 
 Lord, and will thus be honoured ; our Father, and 
 will thus bo followed ; otir judge and dreadful re- 
 venger, and will thus be feared. 
 
 * TeituU. t Cyprian. 
 
228 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 LECTURE XXXVI. 
 
 And he prodaimed and said through Nineveh, by the counsel of his king and nohlcs, saying, Let neither man, &c.- 
 
 Jonah III. 7. 
 
 IN the particular explication of the repentance of 
 Nineveh, begun in the sixth verse, I observed 
 principally both the order of their dealing, that with- 
 out the knowledge and warrant of their king thej- 
 attempt nothing in private, and the example, or 
 precedency of the king therein for his own part, 
 which was as if he had thus pronounced against him- 
 self : A judgment is come forth against all the sinners 
 of Nineveh, and I am first ; and the only way to miti- 
 gate the anger of God is repentance, and I will be 
 first therein also.* The repentance of the king was 
 in effect the repentance of the whole city, as it is 
 noted of the ruler, John iv., when he heard the words 
 of comfort, ' Go thy ways, thy son liveth,' he first 
 believed himself; afterwards, when he better knew 
 the time, and other circumstances, then ' he believed, 
 and his whole household.' You have heard already' 
 in what life the repentaucc of the king is described, 
 for whatsoever he had, making for honour and princely- 
 hood, that he forsook ; and whatsoever there was on 
 the other side, to degrade and discountenance himself 
 in the eyes of his subjects, that he admitted and en- 
 dured. He ' rose from his throne, and threw ofi" his 
 robe ;' as much as to say. He laid down all his author- 
 ity, state, excellency, and forgat himself to be a king, 
 and the monarch of the country ; and more than that, 
 ' covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.' So 
 far from being a king, that he seemed in his own sight 
 to be less than nothing. The throne and the robe 
 with other royal pre-eminences, as the sceptre, the crown, 
 and gorgeous attire in difl'erencc from other men, have 
 ever preferred unto the eyes of the world an image of 
 that glory and honour wherewith the kings of the 
 earth are invested. It appeareth in the book of 
 Genesis, what majesty the Egj^itian kings had, by 
 that second degree of honour which Pharaoh awarded 
 unto Joseph : Gen. xli., ' He put a ring upon his 
 finger, and arrayed him in garments of fine linen, and 
 hung a golden chain about his neck, &c. : placed him 
 upon the best chariot save one, &c. ; and they cried 
 Ahretli before him. He only reserved unto himself the 
 king's throne.' Likewise we may read what honour 
 belonged unto the kings of Chaldrea, and of the Medes 
 and Persians, in the books of Esther and Daniel ; and 
 of the throne of Solomon, with all his other port and 
 prosperity, wondered at so much by thejquecn of Sheba, 
 in the first of Kings, chap, x., and other places. And 
 there is no question but the kings of Nineveh, being 
 grown and swollen in pride, were not far behind these. 
 The stranger it is unto me that this golden cup of 
 
 * Ego primus ; 
 
 Scilicet in vulgiis manant excnipla regentum. 
 
 honour and aulhoritj- made him not drunk, and drave 
 him from all sense of his earthliness and mortality ; 
 it is so usual an intoxication to the rulers beneath, 
 making them forget that God which sitteth above them. 
 AVe have seen what the king of Nineveh hath done 
 in his own person ; now we must also attend what he 
 did with the multitude, and in common ; for he is not 
 content to mourn, or pray, or fast, or repent alone, or 
 alone to be freed and delivered from the curse of God 
 hanging over them ; but he is careful of his people 
 too, by giving the best example he can ; he is both 
 carlo and lanipas,* a coal burning unto himself, and a 
 lamp shining unto other men. The ointment runneth 
 down from the head by the beard to the border of the 
 garment. Repentance, I mean, dcscendeth from the 
 king, by the council and nobility, to the me.anest soul 
 of the city. First, he calleth his council together ; 
 secondly, they make an. act ; thirdly, they cause it to 
 be published ; fourthly, that act was only for repentance, 
 and the service of God. Who ever heard the like, 
 I say not in Israel, where prophets, and apostles, and 
 Christ himself preached ; but even in paradise, the 
 garden of the Lord, who ever heard the like to this 
 that was done in Nineveh ? The Lord hath but one 
 pair of men in paradise, and preached but one word 
 unto them, himself by his own mouth, and they 
 obeyed him not; but in the city of Nineveh, barbarous, 
 wild, and barren Nineveh, where all the plants were 
 unnatural, and it could not be hoped that the fruit 
 should be other than sour and unsavoury to him that 
 gathered it, they all turned saints at the preaching of 
 one Jonah. As one reported at Eome, after his long 
 voyage, that he had seen in England, a goodly king, 
 pulchrum rcgem ; in France, a goodly kingdom, jnd- 
 chrum regnum ; in Spain, a goodly council, pulchrum 
 scnatum ; so behold all these together in Nineveh : a 
 good king, a good council, a good nobility, a good 
 people ; the whole city good. The king commandeth, 
 the princes consent, the people obey, all jointly exe- 
 cute, as if all Nineveh were but a single man, and bad 
 but one head and one heart amongst them. It was 
 undoubtedly the unction of God's Spirit, and not their 
 natural gift, that caused such tractable and tender 
 hearts. Prophets niaypreach long enough, as the drops 
 of rain fall upon marble stones, but if the (iod of peace 
 and unity join not two in one, and tie the tongue of 
 the preacher to the ears and conscience of his hearer, 
 not by a chain of iron or brass, but by the bond of 
 his Holy Spirit, and wrap a blessing and power in his 
 words, to subdue the soul of man, and bring it in sub- 
 jection to the will of God ; it can never be eflected. 
 ♦ Gregor. in Kzoc. liom. i. 
 
Ver. 7.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXVI. 
 
 229 
 
 1. By the order and course of the things themselves, 
 though not of the words, the first thing that the lung 
 did was the assembling of his princes and counsellors, 
 as appeareth manifestly by the parenthesis that fol- 
 loweth {' by the counsel of the king and his nobles'). 
 Thus the king doth nothing without his council, nor 
 the council without the king, but both together. No 
 man is ignorant that the greatest offices have need of 
 the greatest supportation, and that a king must have 
 many eyes, ears, and bands, as Xenophon wrote in his 
 institution of Cyrus ; that is, many subordinate coun- 
 sellors, ministers, and assistants, by whom to discharge 
 the burden of his. place. When Jethro saw Moses, 
 his son-in-law. Exodus xviii., sitting himself alone 
 and judging the people, from'morning unto even, he did 
 not less than reprove him for it : ' What is this that 
 thou doest to the people ? why sittest thou thyself 
 alone ? The thing]which thou doest is not well : thou 
 both weariest thyself greatly, and thy people that is 
 with thee ;' and he caused him to appoint ' rulers 
 over thousands, rulers over hundreds, rulers over 
 fifties, and rulers over tens, to judge the people at all 
 seasons in their smaller causes.' Moses confessed as 
 much, Deuteronomy the first, as Jethro complained 
 of, ' I am not able to bear you myself alone.' It was 
 a saying of Seleucus, one of the kings of Sj'ria, that if 
 men did considerately know how troublesome it were 
 onl}' to read and write so many letters of so weighty 
 aflairs, if the crown were thrown at their foot they 
 would not piik it up.* Anacharsis, one of the sages 
 of Greece, thought it the only felicity of a king to be 
 onlj' wise, si solus sit scqjiciis, and not to need the help of 
 other men ; but who was ever so wise to attain to that 
 happiness '? I will not deny, but he that can counsel 
 himself in all things is very absolutely wise, Ai/rog //,sv 
 rravdoKSToi ; but it is a second degree of wisdom not to re- 
 ject such counsels and directions as are given unto him, 
 'O; il iiTovTi -iriirjrai.f And therefore worthily was it 
 spoken by Antoninus the emperor : With much more 
 reason it standeth that I should be ruled by the advice 
 of so many and such my friends, than that such and 
 so many should yield to my will alone, aquius est ut 
 eyo tot taUumijiic amicorum consHium sequar, quam 
 tot tctlesque amid meam unius voluntiitem. We read 
 that Ahasuerus, the king of the Persians, Esther the 
 first, did nothing in the remove of Yashti the queen, 
 without the advice of the seven princes which saw the 
 king's face, and sat first in the kingdom. Solomon, 
 1 Kings X., had his ancient council; it was scnatus, in- 
 deed, because it consisted of grave and old men, ac- 
 cording to the proverb. Spears are fit to be handled 
 by young men, councils by the aged. J But Rehoboam, 
 his young son, provideth counsellors like himself, 
 
 * Si satis norint homines quam molestum sit tantarum 
 rerum tam numerosas epistolas tantum legere aut scribt-ie, 
 diadcma abjectum nemo acciperet. 
 
 t Hesiod. 
 
 X Consilia senum, hastas juvenum sunt. 
 
 young in years, and young in discretion ; which, how- 
 soever they were friends to Eehoboam, they were not 
 friends to the king ; though haply they loved his 
 person well, they were enemies to his kingdom. 
 
 2. As it is meet that the king should have peers to 
 consult with, so it is a blessed combination and knot, 
 when all their consultations and acts are referred (1) 
 to the glory of God (for that is the first and great 
 commandment), then to the peace and safety of the 
 weal public. For as the law of God (saith Cyprian) 
 is the stern that must guide all counsels, consiliorum 
 guhernacuhmi'lex rf(ri»a, [and be of counsel unto them, 
 so if it be not also the haven where all their counsels 
 arrive, and both the beginning and ending of their 
 decrees, their success will bo according. The qualities 
 of those whom the superior magistrate should associ- 
 ate to himself, in administering his government, are 
 numbered, in the 18th of Exodus and 1st of Deuter- 
 onomy, to be these seven : 1, they must be ' men of 
 courage;' 2, 'fearing God;' 3, 'men of truth;' 
 4, ' hating filthy lucre ; ' 5, ' the chief of the tribes; ' 
 6, ' wise ; ' lastly, ' known men,' such as had experience 
 of the people, and the people of them. Without these 
 conditions and respects, they were very unfit helpers. 
 For what were a magistrate without courage, but a 
 lion without his heart ? or com'age without the fear of 
 God, but armed injustice? or what fear of the true 
 God where his truth is neglected ? or how can truth 
 consist with occupation of filthy gain ? or if their 
 persons and parentage be in contempt, how shall the 
 people regard them ? or if they have not wisdom to 
 rule, what are they else but an eye w-ithout seeing, or 
 as if the day and the night should be governed with- 
 out sun and moon ? Lastly, as arts are made by ex- 
 periments, so they must be tried and approved before- 
 hand by the sight of their virtues. Otherwise, to 
 meet at any time, and to lay their heads together for 
 the dishonouring of God and defacing of his religion, 
 and so to intend policy that his worship is not cared 
 for, and his fear lieth at the threshold of their coun- 
 sel-house, not admitted amongst them, is to make 
 themselves such counsellors as Alecto called in Claudian, 
 Concilium deforms vocat, glomerantur in unum 
 InnumeriE pestes Erebi. 
 Untoward and unfashioned counsellors, so fixr from 
 being the pillars and props of the commonwealth, 
 that they are rather mischiefs and plagues which hell 
 hath cast up. 
 
 3. Now, as it is meet that the king and his nobles 
 should come together to decree wholesome constitu- 
 tions, so it is as meet to publish them abroad, that 
 the subjects may know what their duty is. The 
 statutes of a kingdom must not be locked up in 
 cofl'ers, as the books of the Sybils in Rome, nor as 
 the sentences of Pythagoras, which no man might 
 write, be kept from the knowledge of the vulgar sort. 
 In 1 Sam. xiv., Saul had charged his people by 
 oath not to taste anything till night, upon an eager 
 
230 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 intention he had to pursue the Philistines. Jonathan 
 his son heard not of it, and ' as he went through a 
 wood, being faint with hunger, reached forth the end 
 of his rod, and dipped it in an honeycomb, and put it to 
 his mouth.' You know what danger it brought him 
 unto — ' I tasted a Uttle honey with the end of my 
 rod, and lo, I must die.' Therefore it is not amiss to 
 publish such decrees, if for uo other cause, yet to safe- 
 guard the people from the danger which by their 
 ignorance they might incur. Besides, the glory of 
 God is proclaimed by such proclamations, as Nebuchad- 
 nezzar, Dan iii., ' made a decree that every people, 
 nation, and language, that spake any blasphemy 
 against the God of Shadrach, Meshech, and Abednego, 
 should be drawn in pieces,' and that it might be known 
 abroad, he caused it to be published : ' Nebuchad- 
 nezzar, king, unto all people, nations, and languages 
 that dwell in all the world,' &c. The like did Darius 
 in the sixth of that book : fu-st, he made an act ' that 
 all should tremble before the God of Daniel in the 
 dominions of his kingdoms' ; and aftenvards, for the 
 promulgation of it, ' wTote to all people, nations, and 
 languages in the world what the act was.' 
 
 4. Let neither man nor beast, &c. The matter 
 enacted and proclaimed is, in one word, repentance, 
 wherein they were blessed from heaven with as great a 
 measure of wisdom as the sons of men were capable 
 of, when they were to bethink themselves, and to beat 
 their brains wherewith to WTCstle with the judgment 
 of God, that they made theii- choice of repentance. 
 Repentance, an act of all acts ; if they had spent their 
 days in consulting, this one instead of infinite thou- 
 sands, to save their lives. An enemy did approach 
 unto them, a spiritual enemy from the higher places 
 — justice, I mean, from the throne of God — whose 
 forces were invisible, and could not be repelled with 
 sword and target. What gate or fortress should they 
 then use to shut out justice, but only repentance ? 
 Their city had been laid in the dust, their candle put 
 out, their monarchy translated, their carcases bad 
 rotted in dung, their souls been drowned in perdition 
 without repentance. 
 
 The gi'oimd and provocation of tliis their repent- 
 ance is in the ninth verse : ' Who knoweth if God 
 will turn and repent ?' &c. Faith in the mercies of 
 God, this is the star that goeth before the face of 
 repentance, the pillar of fire that guideth it in the 
 night of her sorrows, and giveth her light, and telleth 
 her how to walk, that she stumble not. For who 
 ■would ever repent, if he had not hope that his sins 
 might be pardoned ? and therefore Ambrose* notcth, 
 alluding unto Peter's denials, that men do never truly 
 repent, but when Christ looketh back upon them. For 
 Peter denied the first time, and wept not, because 
 Christ looked not back ; denied a second time, and 
 wept not, because Christ looked not back ; but denied 
 a thu-d time, and wept bitterly, because his Master 
 * In Luc. 1. X. cap. xxii. 
 
 looked back upon him. And he looked not back so 
 much with his outward and bodily eye, as with the 
 eye of his clemency, non oculo exteriore, sed oculo 
 demenlicc. The substantial parts of repentance are in 
 the latter part of the eighth verse, turning from their 
 evil ways, and from the wickedness that was in their 
 hands : then- diet and preparation to repentance, 
 fasting ; the habit and livery wherein they come, 
 sackcloth ; the libel or petition which they offer, 
 prayer and strong cit. You see the members of their 
 decree : lii-st, the ground of repentance, faith ; secondly, 
 the substance of repentance, newness of life ; thii'dly, 
 the body or countenance of repentance, spare and 
 thin ; fourthly, the garments of repentance, peniten- 
 tial and base ; fifthly, the voice of repentance, suppli- 
 ant and lamentable. More generally it hath two 
 parts, the one by negation, denying something to the 
 people of Nineveh, in this 7th verse ; the other by 
 affirmation, prescribing and enjoining what they should 
 do, in the eighth. The negative and former part con- 
 taineth only a fast, ' let neither man nor beast, bullock 
 nor sheep, taste anything;' the antiquity whereof 
 maketh it venerable,! and the perpetuity unto this 
 day, and to the end of the world, highly graceth it. It 
 is no new invention ; some have derived it from para- 
 dise, and made it as ancient as the first man, hoiniid 
 jir'nno cixm-um, for the forbidding of the tree of know- 
 ledge, they say, was a law of abstinence. The exer- 
 cise of nature, the law, the gospel of Christ, the prac- 
 tice of gentility itself, if I name but Nineveh alone, it 
 were sulficient to prove it ; but the stories of gentility 
 make it more plain. Ceres had her fast, Jupiter his, 
 and Priamus in Homer bewaileth the death of Hector 
 with fasting and in dust. Patriarchs used it, prophets 
 forsook jt not. Christ and his disciples departed not 
 from it, and the true children of the bridechamber con- 
 tinue it at this day : they mourn because the bridegroom 
 is taken from them, and till his return in the clouds of 
 the air, they shall ever mourn. But there are fasts of 
 diverse kinds : (1) there is a spiritual fast from sin, im- 
 proper as ti'auslated, but that which especialh"pleaseth 
 God. It is mentioned, Isa. Iviii., and Zech. vii. This 
 is ' the great general ^■a.si,'' marjnum et ijeneralejejiin'mm, 
 and a Lent of abstinence which we must all keep, con- 
 sisting in the hohuess of om- lives. f Nineveh fasted 
 this fast, but it fasted also otherwise. (2.) There is a 
 corporal fast from eating and drinking, and such other 
 refections as nature taketh pleasure in; and this is 
 either natural, prescribed by physic for health's sake, 
 or above nature and mu-auulous, such as the fast of 
 Moses and Elins and the Son of God, for forty days ; 
 or civil and politic, as the prohibition of Saul, men- 
 tioned bei'ore, which Jonathan was angry with, because 
 the people waxed faint; and Saul had no religious 
 respects therein, but au earnest purpose of heart of 
 
 * Jcjunii caiiitiem cliligenter perscrutnro. 
 t In lidc secnlo quasi quadrngesiinam abstinentias ccle- 
 branius (hnii bene vivimus. — August. 
 
Ver. 7.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXVI. 
 
 231 
 
 sparing no time from chasing the Philistines, 1 Sam. 
 xiv. (3) It is sometimes a fast of necessity, which 
 we cannot avoid, as in the time of dearth. Aquinas 
 calleth it yjuniiim jijunii, a fast of a fast, because the 
 earth forbearcth her fruits, we forbear our food, and 
 would eat if we had it ; and in this sense Basil calleth 
 fasting the companion to poor men, paiipcnim coiivira 
 et coiUubenialis jejunium ; the other is, jcjiiiiium 
 jejiinantis, the fast of him that fasteth ; that is, a 
 voluntary and free fast. Lastly, there is a Christian 
 and rehgious fast, either common and ordinary, using 
 frugality in meats and drinks at all times, according to 
 the warning of our Saviour : ' See that your hearts be 
 not overcome at any time with surfeiting and drunken- 
 ness,' Luke xxi. ; or special and extraordinary, above 
 the custom, but not beyond the natm'e of man, for 
 then the law of fasts is broken ; let the flesh be tamed 
 (saith Jerome) and not killed.* For he otfcrcth an 
 offeriugof robbery, and bereaveth both God and man of 
 his due, who afflicteth his body overmuch, with im- 
 moderate subtraction either of food or rest. Now the 
 latter of these two is either private to one or few, as to 
 David and the friends of Job ; or public, as this of 
 the people of Nineveh, for it is said, first, to have 
 been proclaimed ; secondly, throughout Nineveh. 
 
 In this fast of the Ninevites, there are many things 
 to be considered ; first, it was timely ; sccniuthj, 
 orderly; thinUi/, ximxeraal; foil rthli;, exact; Jijllih/, 
 not hypocritical. 
 
 (1.) The time which they took fur fasting (I mean 
 not time in the common acceptation and sense thereof, 
 consisting of space and motion, as when they began to 
 fast, and how long they endured, what days of the 
 month or week they made choice of ; this my text ex- 
 presseth not), I mean the season of the time, the 
 fitness and opportunity for such an action, was in a 
 sudden terror of utter destruction. Austin, in an 
 epistle to Hesychius,t distinguishetlnthese two, Xoovou; 
 xal -/.ai^ov;, times and seasons ; so doth the apostle iu 
 the first to the Thessalonians, and fifth, which the 
 Latins have rendered teiiipora and inoiiiciita, times and 
 moments of times ; wherein there is weight and worth 
 not to be omitted. The former signifieth but space 
 or leisure alone, which passeth to fools and wise men 
 alike ; the latter, convenience or inconvenience for the 
 doing of any thing. So long as there shall be a sun 
 in the fii-mament which hath his course, there shall 
 be a time for the handling of our actions, but perhaps 
 not a season. As a man that gathereth his grapes at 
 the fii-st knotting thereof, gathereth them in time ; but 
 if he tarry the vintage, then he gathereth them in 
 season. Now the fittest and convenientest for a last, 
 if you consider the fact of the Ninevites, and peruse 
 all the examples that are written in the book of God, 
 is ever some extremity, when the anger of God is 
 thoroughly kindled, and threateneth a wound to the 
 
 * Dometur caro sed non interimatur, holncaustum do 
 rapina offera. f Epist. Ixxviii. 
 
 whole bodj'. Methinketh that it should be iu these 
 public fasts, as the schoolmen write of their solemn 
 penance,* which is seldom granted by Origcn, and by 
 the canonists but once. The reason is given by the 
 master ot the sentences : Ne mediciiia vUesceret, lest 
 the medicine should grow in contempt by the common 
 use of it. I have heard of a nation of men (I will not 
 say that tlieir ueighbom-hood hath a little infected 
 England), who, when their king hath intended a feast 
 for the honom* of his country, and entertainment of 
 foreign ambassadors, they on the other side have pro- 
 claimed a fast, as if God had sent them an embassage 
 of the last judgment. I cannot deny them time ; but 
 surely they took not a seiifioii for so doing. 
 
 (2.) I will prove the matter iu hand in the nest 
 circumstance, and join them both together ; whoreia 
 I observed, secondly, that it was an orderly fest, be- 
 cause the king and his council had first decreed it. 
 I touched it a little by occasion of the former sentence, 
 the words directly leading me thereunto. If any 
 remain as yet unsatisfied, fii'st, for mine own purga- 
 tion, know ye that I speak not as the lord of your 
 iaith : but as one that hath obtained mercy to be 
 faithful in my calling, I shewed you mine opinion and 
 judgment ; secondly, for the thing itself, search the 
 Scriptures, for they bare witness of the truth, whether 
 these public, religious, extraordinary fasts had not 
 always their authority and emanation from public 
 persons. In the twentieth of the book of Judges, the 
 chosen soldiers of Israel, which were taken by lot out 
 of all their tribes, to fight against Benjamin in the 
 quarrel of the Levite, whose wife was shamefully 
 abused and mmxlered, thej* held a public fast from 
 morning luitil evening, ver. 2(5 ; the cause was a 
 slaughter which they had received of forty thousand 
 men, and a conscience they made of fighting against 
 Benjamin their brethren, ver. 2. The authors of the 
 fast are ' the rulers of the people,' who iu the original 
 are called the corners and heads of the people, aiir/uU 
 vd e.vtreiiiitnlcs iKipiili. In 1 Samuel vii., they fast 
 publicly ; ' They drew water,' saith the text, even 
 rivers of tears, ' and poured them out before the Lord.' 
 The appointment is from Samuel, who judged Israel 
 in Mispeh, and the cause their idolatry committed to 
 strange gods, and the absence of the ark from them 
 full twenty years. In 2 Chron. xx., there is a fast 
 proclaimed throughout all Judah ; Jehoshaphat the king 
 proclaimed it. The cause was the sudden coming of 
 a great multitude from Ammon, and Moab, and Ai'am, 
 to invade his kingdom. Ezra viii. there is likewise 
 a public fast summoned in their return towards Jeru- 
 salem ; Ezra the high priest ordaineth it. The 
 reason is, that God would direct them in their way, 
 and preserve themselves, their children, and goods in 
 safety. Another, Esther iv., which Esther gave Mor- 
 decai in charge for. Now Mordccai was the man on 
 whom the hearts of all the Jews in Shushan depended 
 
 * DiftVrt a publica ct fit cum pompa. — Lib. iv. Dislin. 14. 
 
232 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 at tliat time. The cause, that God would assist 
 Esther, who, with the hazard of her head, when her 
 people were near their utter estii-pation, adventm-ed 
 herself to speak to the king in his inner court, being 
 not called before him. Another, Jer. xxsvi., in the 
 days of wicked Jehoiakim, who cut the book of the 
 Lord with a penknife, and caused it to be burnt. 
 It was certainly proclaimed by order from some that 
 might command ; for who else could assemble together 
 all the people in Jerusalem, and all the rest that came 
 from the cities of Judah, without special authority ? 
 Yea, Jezebel herself, 1 Kings xxi. 8, though the 
 daughter of Belial, was not ignorant what the manner 
 of those times was. She proclaimed a fast in Jezreel, 
 where Naboth dwelt, to rob him of his vineyard, and 
 to betray his life ; but first, she sent letters in the 
 king's name ; and secondly, sealed them with the king's 
 seal ; and lastly, directed them to the elders and nobles 
 of Jezreel, that they might put them into execution. 
 But the phrases used in Joel do sufHciently determine 
 the nature of this action : ' Blow a trumpet in Sion, 
 sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly; gather the 
 people, sanctify the congregation, gather the elders, 
 and all the inhabitants of the land, assemble the 
 children, and those that suck the breasts ; let the bride- 
 gi-oom and the bride go forth of their chamber.' Now 
 what is a sanctified fast but that which is publicly 
 called and established, either by God himself. Lev. 
 xxiii., or by the magistrate, bishop, or prophet ?* Or 
 who hath authority to draw the people from their 
 work, to gather the'aged and sucklings, and all the 
 inhabitants of the country together, to appoint an holy 
 day unto the Lord, to be spent in prayers and sacri- 
 fices, but only those governors ? As in a receipt of 
 physio, the inga-edients may all be good ; yet it is not 
 so warrantable unto us, neither are we willing to meddle 
 therewith, unless a professor of physic, by his art and 
 authority, prescribe it ; so in a public fast privately 
 convened. I said before that all the exercises were 
 Christian and religious, their prayer, preaching, sing- 
 ing, and distributing to the poor ; but as our Saviour 
 told the rich young man in the Gospel, ' There is one 
 thing wanting unto thee ; if thou wilt be perfect, sell 
 all that thou hast,' &c., so there is one thing wanting 
 unto these; and to give them their full perfection, we 
 must suffer the rulers of the commonwealth to appoint 
 them. Chrysostom calleth fasting a kind of physic ; 
 but physic may be profitable a thousand times, and 
 yet bo hurtful at a time, for want of skill to use it ;t 
 therefore he would never have it done, but amrpua 
 cum lege, with all the laws that agree unto it; "and 
 every circumstance of time, quantity, state of the 
 
 * Sanctificatuin jcjuiiimn.qiiod puUiceiiidicituriJor Dcuni, 
 vel jiCT niagistratuni, epi.sctjiuni, proiilietam.— P. Mart. 
 Jonatlinn sanctificare vertit jjer decernere. 
 
 t Medccina est jcjunium, scd itifidicina, licot niillics 
 utilis sit, per uteutis imperitiam lit iiiutilis.— //o7«i7. iii. ad. 
 Fop. Ant. 
 
 body, with the like, precisely observed.* He applieth 
 the apostle's similitude : ' No man striving for a 
 mastery is crowned, unless he strive lawfully,' and so 
 it may fall out, that amidst the pains and afflictions 
 of fasting, we may leese the crown of it.f Zonaras hath 
 a rule to the same purpose, treating likewise of fasts ; 
 Good is never good, except it be done in good sort;J 
 and Cyprian, in like manner. It proveth not well, 
 which is done of headiness and without order. 
 
 (3.) The third thing in the fast of Nineveh is the 
 universality of it ; fur it was not only pubUc and open, 
 but included almost whatsoever breathed amongst 
 them. It concerned, first, men (which is here indefi- 
 nitely put), signifying the whole kind, from the man of 
 greyest hairs, to the tenderest infant ; and as you heard 
 before, from the greatest to the smallest ; secondly, 
 beasts, yea, all sorts of beasts, great and small, oxen, 
 horses, sheep, goats, and whatsoever cattle they had 
 of anj- service. 
 
 (4.) Fourthly, it was very strict, for they are for- 
 bidden to feed, I say not to glut themselves, but they 
 might not so much as taste; perhaps not delicate 
 meats ? No, nor anything. It had been enough to have 
 kept them from eating, but neither might they drink, 
 I say not wines and curious electuaries, but not so 
 much as water, which their rivers and wells aflbrded 
 them. 
 
 (5.) Fifthly, it was serious and unfeigned, not false 
 and sophistical, as the manner of hypocrites is. It 
 appeareth by that that followeth, ' in returning from 
 then- evil ways, and forsaking that wickedness which 
 was in their hands,' so that, by this their behaviour, 
 they seem to intend thus much : We acknowledge be- 
 fore thy majesty (Lord of hosts), we thy unworlhiest 
 creatures that ever thy hands have formed, viler than 
 the sackcloth we wear (for if there had been baser 
 stufl' in the world, we would not have refused it), and 
 fouler in thj- sight, than the ashes we are besprent 
 with ; we acknowledge before thy majesty, our king, 
 princes, and senators, our sons and daughters, old 
 and young, even from the ground of our heart, that 
 thou art a righteous Lord, and we an unrighteous 
 nation, not worthy our meat, drink, clothing, or any 
 other thy benefits, yea, worthy to fall upon the sharpest 
 edge of thy severest judgments ; we have endangered 
 ourselves, wives and children, infants and dumb 
 beasts, life and goods, city and people, to thy heaviest 
 ire ; and in acknowledgment thereof, and sign of our 
 humble subjection, as guilty within ourselves, and 
 condemned in our own consciences, whatsoever thou 
 hast given us to enjoy, outward or inward, nearer or 
 further off, for conifort, for pleasure, for service, or 
 any other use, either in our families at home, or 
 in our folds and stalls abroad, we resign into thy 
 
 •>' Nosse oportet et tempus, &o. 
 
 f Inter jpjunii laborem a jejunii corona cxcidemus. — Ihid. 
 \ Ou y.aXh ro xaX'ji, oVai' «.)5 xaXif yitriTUi — Can. 
 Ixvi. Ap. 
 
Vkr. 7.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXVI. 
 
 2.33 
 
 hands, as having no right unto it ; we lay it down at 
 the feet of thy justice, and beseech thee for thine own 
 name's sake to take mercy upon us. 
 
 Let ncitlicr man nor beast, &c. But what mean the 
 king and council of Nineveh by so mad a decree ? 
 Have they a pm-pose to regain favour of God ; and 
 think they to do it by trifles and vanities ? Ai-e they 
 so simple and unsensible to put unsensible beasts 
 to repentance ? Hath God care of bullocks and 
 sheep ; or have bullocks and sheep care of God '? Do 
 they not live and die (without repentance, shall I 
 say ?), yea, without rehgion, and without reason also ? 
 Did they fear; nay, did the}' ever know God, that they 
 should be threatened ? Have they ever sinned, or 
 shall they ever come to judgment, that they are taught 
 here to humble themselves, and to be godly, as it 
 were, and to join with the people of Nineveh in their 
 public repentance ? Oh pardon repentance a greater 
 absurdity than this : her unspeakable gi'iefs and com- 
 punctions within, kno^vn unto God, and to no mortal 
 creatm-es besides that feeleth them not, send forth un- 
 reasonable actions sometimes, to common judgment. 
 Her spirit is so dull and lumpish with sorrow, that 
 she cannot abide the recreation of any creature when 
 she is in heaviness ; she wisheth and endeavoureth by 
 her uttermost provocations, that not only men, but 
 boasts, nay, trees, and stones, might moiu'n with her, 
 and that the hght of heaven would accompanj- her in 
 her doleful passions. She thiuketh that no smi should 
 shine, because she taketh no pleasure in the bright- 
 ness thereof; that the lilies of the field should be 
 clothed in black, because she is so apparelled ; that 
 the infant should not draw the breast, nor the beast 
 take his food, because she hath no appetite. Neither 
 doth she do this of an en-\aous affection (that be far 
 from the meaning of humble and meek repentance) ; 
 but feeling the weight of sin, and always chewing the 
 cud, that God is ofl'ended with it, she runneth from 
 all pleasure of the world as from a serpent, she panteth 
 and sobbeth day and night, she weareth her hands 
 with wringing and her breast with smiting upon it. 
 The pavement is the cabin that pleaseth her best, 
 anguish her bread, her di'ink salt tears, till she get 
 some comfort from the God of peace. And fearing 
 withal a decay and dechnation within herself, that 
 she shall be wearied too soon of well doing, that her 
 sorrows will end, and her tears be dried up before they 
 have washed her sufficiently, except they be nourished, 
 she saith within herself. Oh that the world would 
 mourn with me, to keep me in practice of mourning ; 
 if I but saw others weep, mine eyes would ever run ; 
 if I but heard the suckling cry for milk, and beasts 
 roar for food, because they want it, how would it cause 
 me to send up my cries for the favom' of God, because 
 I have it not ? This is one reason of then- decree : 
 let neither man nor beast taste anything. For these 
 outward, but grievous, objects, sights, and sounds of 
 misery in others, carry word to our souls how general 
 
 the misery is, and move our inward affections to con- 
 tinue in repentance. Chrysostom addeth some other 
 reasons :* that they make their beasts to fast, as at 
 the funerals of rich men, not onh' the friends and 
 servants of the deceased, but their very horses are 
 clad in black, and led in the train with them, both to 
 note the greatness of their loss, and to move the lookers 
 on to take compassion. He hath yet a further conceit, 
 that they did therein as the prophets were wont to do, 
 who seeing a scourge come fi'om the Lord, and finding 
 no confidence in themselves, nor way to excuse Iheu" 
 iniquities ; not knowing whither to tiee for patronage, 
 nor daring for very shame in then- own names to crave 
 pardon for their sins, betake them to the brute beasts, 
 and tell God of their woeful plight, as if by the com- 
 memoration of their miseries he would sooner be per- 
 suaded.] Thus did Jeremiah in his prophecy, chap, 
 xiv., the ' hind calved in the field, and forsook it be- 
 cause there was no grass ;' and thus did Joel in his 
 chap, i., ' How did the beasts mourn ! the herds of 
 cattle pined away because they had no pasture, and 
 the flocks of sheep were destroyed ;' and for this cause 
 also they put their infants to fast, that the innocent 
 age might speak unto God in behalf of the riper 
 sinners. 
 
 I now conclude. The repentance of Nineveh made 
 them hard-hearted, unmerciful, and uncompassiouate 
 to themselves, and to their beasts, harmless and inno- 
 cent creatures, to debar them of their meat and di'ink, 
 and because they understood not the anger of God by 
 preaching, to make them understand it by famine. J 
 Where is the repentance of our times ? Whither is it 
 fled? or where hath it hid herself? Our laad and 
 our sea may say, repentance is not in me. Repent- 
 ance, the gift of God, the joy of angels, the salve of 
 sins, the haven of sinners, I say again, what is become 
 of it ? It is not for the angels of heaven to repent, 
 because they sin not ; nor for the devils of hell, for 
 their judgment is sealed; it is only for the sons of 
 men, and we only know it not. The people of Nine- 
 veh sinned, and would not eat ; sinned, and would 
 not drink ; sinned, and would not be clothed ; nay, 
 sinned, and would not give leave to theii' beasts to 
 feed. We sin, and yet we eat ; nay, we sin in eating; 
 we do not otAj taste, and feed, which are here for- 
 bidden, but we taste and feed deliciously ; we are 
 wanton with the gifts of God, and abuse them to sur- 
 feit. We sin, and yet we drink ; nay, we di-iuk, and 
 sin in drinking ; for we drink intemperatoly ; I say 
 not w'ater, which is here forbidden, but wine, and wine 
 in excess, and wine with all the helps that may be to 
 make us more exceed. And we sin and clothe om-- 
 selves ; rather we clothe oiu'selves and sin, by clothing 
 
 * Honiil. iii. ad pop. Antioch. 
 
 t Et calamitatis magnitudinem ostentantea, et omnes ad 
 miseri^ordiam allicientes. 
 
 I Non licet brutis sermoue irarn Dei discere, discaut fame. 
 — Chrysost. ut supra. 
 
234 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 ns, for we clothe om-selves superfluously ; I say not 
 with sackcloth, but with that which might beseem 
 Solomon if he were now king in Jerusalem. And we 
 feed not only cm-selves, but our oxen in our meadows 
 and stalls, to feed our unprofitable carcases, and our 
 horses in om- stables, to bear our unprofitable carcases, 
 when the poor in our streets, and at our gates, feed 
 upon empty air for lack of sustenance. I ask again, 
 in the height of our sins, what is become of repent- 
 ance ? Repentance, which God preached in paradise; 
 for he shewed our forefathers their sin, and gave them 
 the promise ; which Noah proclaimed to the old 
 world, Lot to Sodom, Moses to Egj-pt, prophets in 
 their sundry generations to Israel and Judah, Joha 
 Baptist, the day star and morning of the gospel, Christ, 
 the Suu of righteousness, and all his apostles, the 
 shiuing lamps of the new world ; what else did they 
 preach to the people that then was ? Of faith and 
 repentance were their sermons. ' Eepent and beheve 
 the gospel ;' ' Repent, for the Idngdom of God is at 
 hand ;' these and such like were their texts, and these 
 shall be our preachings and themes till we see some 
 number and measure of cm- unruly transgressions. 
 If we believe not, we are already judged ; and if we 
 repent not, the kingdom of God is coming upon us. 
 But the sceptre will be changed and the government 
 wholly altered. Then was the kingdom of grace, now 
 of glory and justice ; then was tlie saving, now the 
 judging of souls ; then came it in the tongues of men, 
 now in the trumpet of an archangel ; then with tidings 
 of great joy to the whole world, now with terror and 
 amazement to all the kindreds thereof; then with 
 ' glory to God on high, and peace upon the earth,' 
 
 now with t-tc, lur, i-tr, habitatonbus terra:, ' thiice woe 
 to them that dwell upon the earth;' then to gather 
 the lost sheep of Israel into the sheepfold, now to 
 sever the goats from the sheep ; then to embrace both 
 Jew and Gentile, now to divide between servaut and 
 servant at the same mill, between man and wife in the 
 same bed, between Jacob and Esau in the same womb, 
 and to pronounce the one of them blessed, the other 
 accm-sed. Repent, therefore, for this kingdom of God 
 is at hand, to deface all kingdoms, to root up the na- 
 tions, to consume the earth with her works, and her 
 people with their sins, and to feed them with the food 
 of judgment and water of gall, who eat and drink up 
 iniquity like their daily repast. It belongeth to us all 
 to repent. We were all conceived in sin, and in 
 iniquity have our mothers brought us forth. Con- 
 cupiscence hath been the nurse whose milk we have 
 drawn from time to time ; and as we have gro\A'n in 
 years ourselves, so hath corruj^tion grown with us. 
 What remaineth, but to repent ? to change our 
 Morian's skin, to put off oiu- stained coats, and to wash 
 our feet from their filthiness, as Job spake ; and not 
 only our feet, but our heads also, as Peter spake in 
 the Gospel, to renew both bodies and souls, and to 
 serve Jiim in holiness and righteousness, who long 
 time hath served himself under the bm'den of om- sins. 
 So God shall answer repentance with repentance. He 
 shall be son-y iu his heart that ever he passed that 
 sentence against us : ' It repenteth me to have made 
 man.' And if he have thought upon any plagues to 
 smite us withal, it shall also repent him that ever he 
 devised them. 
 
 LECTURE XXXVII. 
 But let man and hcasl put on stuhdotli, <h: — Jonah III. 8. 
 
 OF the two general parts wherein the repentance of 
 Nineveh stood, the negative being ended in 
 the former verse, containing the diet of repentance, 
 wc are now to proceed to the affii-mative, delivered 
 the most part in this eighth, wherein, 1, the habit 
 and attire of repentance, sackcloth; 2, the tenor of 
 her speech, might;/ cryinrf ; 3, her very substance and 
 soul, the chanijc of lije, are expressed. We moved a 
 question why beasts should lie called to communion 
 of fasting, and those other afflictions exercised by the 
 Ninevites. Some think tluy are put by translation of 
 fipecch, so that the distribution of man and beast 
 signifieth not two disparate kiiid.s of creatures, but in 
 the same kind, men of sundry conditions ; wise and 
 unwise, prudent and simple, reasonable and unreason- 
 able, prndentes ctnmpUccs, rationah'dcs et irralionahiles, 
 so doth Jerome expound them. Howbcit there is no 
 question but the most foolish arc also men, and therefore 
 included in the former member of the division. Of with- 
 
 holding food from the beasts there is less doubt ; but 
 that they should clothe them in sackcloth, and place 
 them in the number of those that cry mightily unto 
 the Lord, seemeth more unsensible ; for they have 
 neither understanding, nor speech, and their bodies 
 are wet with the dew of heaven, as Nebuchadnezzar's 
 was, Dan. iv., and their hides are those natural endow- 
 ments which God hath provided for them. 
 
 1 . Sackcloth . Touching the sackcloth, it is not neces- 
 sary to inquire whether they were all covered with it, 
 yea or no ; haply but their horses and mules, which were 
 in greatest price, and wherein they most gloried, whoso 
 manner aforetime was to be clothed in sumptuous 
 trappings ; of such it is likely enough that their orna- 
 ments were changed, and it maj' be their whole herds 
 and flocks, to make the greater spectacle and solemnity 
 of dolefulness. For it is no more unprofitable iu these 
 funerals of their city, when she was going as it were 
 to her grave, that these beasts should also accompany 
 
Ver. 8.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXVII. 
 
 235 
 
 her in mouruing steeds,* with the rest of her people 
 and children, than, that at the funerals of nohlemcn, 
 not only their kinsmen and friends, nor their houses 
 and hearses alone, but their horses which they used for 
 service, should also be drawn into the fellowship of 
 their sorrowing. And we read, Judith iv., when the 
 approach of Holofernes was feared, that the children 
 of Israel cried every man to God with gi-eat fervency, 
 and their souls with great affection ; and that both 
 they, and theh- wives, and their children, and their 
 cattle, and every stranger and hireling, and their 
 bought servants put sackcloth upon their loins. And 
 to make the greater show of sorrow, they sprinkled 
 ashes upon thek heads, and spread out their sackcloth 
 before the face of the Lord, and they put sackcloth 
 also about their altar. 
 
 2. Their crijinf/, Lyi-a cxpoundcth to have lieen 
 after their kind ; f they roared and lirayed for want of 
 food, which natural moan of theirs was their crying. 
 It is said, Psalm cxlvii., that ' God giveth food to the 
 beasts, and to the young ravens which cry upon him ;' 
 likewise. Job xxsviii. : ' Who prepareth meat for the 
 crows, when their young cry unto the Lord for it ? ' 
 By these, and bj' the like Scriptures, you may know 
 what the cry of the beasts was. That which David 
 speaketh of the heavens and fu-mauieut day and night, 
 Psalm xix., that they ' declare the glory of God, and 
 shew forth his handiworks," lest any should mistake, 
 ho explaineth in the third verse, ' They have neither 
 speech nor language, yet without these is their voice 
 heard :' so we may say of those beasts, that though they 
 cried not imto the Lord, as the men did, yet they cried 
 after their usage. E. Jarchi hath a conceit that thej' 
 tied their dams and foals asunder, and said before 
 the Lord of the world. Unless thou take pity on us we 
 vrill not pity these. J I will not think them so unwise 
 to have conditioned with God, but I will easily admit 
 that they might part the old and the young, and do 
 all that was to be done, to fill the air with lamentable 
 outciyiug. To acquit the king and his council, from 
 folly or distraction of their wits, in this so lumsual and 
 unreasonable an act, I shewed you the manner and 
 nature of sorrow before : how gladly it seeketh com- 
 panions : est aliquid, sucios habuisse doloris. It is no 
 httle comfort in discomforts not to be left alone in 
 lamenting, and to see all things turned into mourning, 
 that are near about us. For as we desire nothing 
 more than heaviness of spirit in such a case, and the 
 cheerfulness of anything is as welcome unto us as 
 prickles to our eyes ; so we bless that creature, what- 
 soever it is, that will help to feed us in our melan- 
 choly humours. We wish foimtains of water in the 
 heads both of men and beasts, to be a pattern for our 
 
 * Qu. ' weeds '?— Ed. 
 
 t Clamabant suo runre. Deficiente [lastu mugiebaut. 
 ^ui mugitus dicebalur ail Deum clamare. 
 
 J Dixerunt coram Domino mundi, nisi tu nostri misereare, 
 nos horum non miserebimur. 
 
 imitation, and to draw us forward in our well-pleasing 
 pensiveness. And as in the contraiy afl'ection, when 
 the name of God was highly to be magnified, and 
 there was just cause to exult and triumph ; David 
 contented not himself with the secret of his own spirit, 
 or with awaking his lute and harp to praise the Lord, 
 but he desired the harmony of heaven and earth to be 
 added unto it. So did the children of Babylon in their 
 song, ' all j-e works of the Lord, bless ye the Lord, 
 praise him and magnify him for ever,' Ps. cxlviii. So 
 did the prophets in then- wi'itings : Isa. xliv., ' Piejoice 
 heavens ; shout, ye lower parts of the earth ; burst 
 forth into praise, ye mountains, ye forests, and every 
 tree therein '. Even so is the nature of grief, never 
 so well pleased as when all the pleasures of the world 
 are exiled. She calleth heaven above to weep, the 
 earth beneath to lament, beasts to pine away, 
 rocks to cleave in twain, the mountains to give none 
 other echo but lamentations, the rivers to run with 
 tears, and all the fruits of the earth to be changed 
 into wormwood and bitterness. 
 
 And as it moveth the affection, so it instructeth om- 
 understanding also. It putteth us in mind of the huge- 
 ness and horrors of sins, how dangerous the con- 
 tagion thereof is, to touch not ourselves, but all the 
 creatm'es of God that belong unto us. It is for our 
 sins' sake that the ' whole creature,' E,om. viii., 'is 
 subject under vanity,' that is, a flitting and unstable 
 condition ; and not only under vanity, but ' under 
 corruption ;' yea, under ' a bondage and thraldom of 
 corruption, not of itself, but from him that hath sub- 
 jected it ' (which is either God offended with sin, or 
 man that provoked him) ; and it ' groaneth with us, 
 and travaileth together in birth, and putteth out the 
 head to look and watch for the revelation of the Son 
 of God,' because that is the time when her service 
 shall be ended: Genesis iii., besides the curse of the 
 serpent, the curse of Eve, the curse of Adam in his 
 own person, ' In the sweat of thy face thou shalt eat 
 thy bread ;' that is, all callings of hfe shall be laborious 
 and painful unto thee, ' and thou shalt eat the hei'b 
 of the field,' common and waste, not the fruits of the 
 garden as thou didst before : ' and thistles and briers 
 shall the earth bring forth unto thee,' though thou 
 spend thy labour to the contrary. It is added in the 
 same place, maledicta esto terra propter te, the earth 
 which thou treadest upon, and which is fi'ee from 
 deserving the curse, the earth which was made before 
 thee, and thou made of the earth, ' cm'sed be that 
 earth for thy sake.' Likewise Genesis the sixth, when 
 the Lord saw the wickedness of man, how greatly it 
 was increased, ' then it repented the Lord that ever 
 he had made man, and he was sorry in his heart ;' 
 therefore he said, ' I will destroy from off the earth 
 the man whom I have created ' (he stayeth not there), 
 but ' from man to beast, from creeping things to the 
 fowl of the heaven : for I repent that I have made 
 them,' not only the man, but these that were created 
 
236 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. Ill, 
 
 for man's use. Behold the ungraciousness of sinful 
 man. We were made the lords and rulers of the 
 earth, both of the fruits, and of the people and living 
 creatm'es thereof; we have ' dominion over all the 
 works of God's hands ; all things are put in subjection 
 under our feet ; all sheep and oxen, yea, and the 
 beasts of the field ; the birds of the air, and fishes of 
 the sea, and whatsoever walketh through the paths of the 
 sea,' Ps. viii. ; but we have changed our government 
 into tyi-anny, and are not content with the rule, unless 
 we seek the spoil, nor with the use and commodity, 
 unless we work the ruin and wreck of our poor bond- 
 servants. Quid mcruist isofcs ' (saith Pythagoras in 
 the jjoet), what have our harmless sheep and oxen 
 deserved at our hands, thus to be misused '? But w^e, 
 the nocent wretches of the world, workers of all 
 iniquity, deserving not rods but scorpions, cause 
 innoconcy itself to be scourged for our transgressions. 
 But that the providence of God restraineth them, it is 
 a marvel that they break not their league, and shako oif 
 their yoke of obedience towards us, and with their 
 horns and hoofs, and other natural artillery, make 
 war upon us as their um-ighteous lords, whom it 
 sufficeth not to have used their service alone, unless 
 we plunge them besides into such undeserved ven- 
 geance. 
 
 Again, the punishing of their beasts was to add 
 something to their own punishment ; for when these 
 are not fed and nourished, and kept in heart, not only 
 the beast, but the owner himself smartoth for it.- 
 Undoubtedly it is a blessing to men, that ' their oxen 
 are strong to labour,' their horses swift to the race, 
 their asses and camels meet for their burthens ; that 
 ' their bullock engcndereth without failing, their cow 
 calvcth without casting, their sheep bring forth thou- 
 sands and ten thousands in their streets ; ' and it is a 
 curse on the other side to be bereft of these com- 
 modities, as in the fifth plague of Egypt. Now, then, 
 a part of the wealth and substance of Nineveh, con- 
 sisting in these beasts, by reason of the service they 
 enjoyed, and profit they reaped thorebj-, doth not the 
 afflicting of them redound to their masters ; and do they 
 not lose themselves, by weakening the bodies of their 
 cattle through lack of food, whereby not only their 
 labour, but also their fruit and increase, is hindered ? 
 
 Laslh', Some took a jiride in some kind of beasts, 
 namely their horses which I mentioned before, and 
 not only fed them with the best, to keep them fat and 
 shining, but clothed them with the richest. AVe read 
 of Nero the emperor of Rome, that he shod bis 
 mules with silver; and of Poppaia Sabina, that she shod 
 her horses with gold. Bernard telieth Eugenius the 
 Pope, that Peter rode not upon a white warlike horse, 
 clad in trappings of gold.f And it is not unlikely but 
 the kings of Nineveh did offend in the sumptuousncss 
 
 * Cum liajc juinenta siiit lioniini lUita in adjiituriuni, 
 eorum afflictio in liomiiiea rcdumlat. 
 t Non sic Petrus, &c. — Ve Consul. 
 
 of their horses, as much as the emperors or popes of 
 liome. In these it was not amiss that their glory and 
 pomp should bo abated, howsoever it fared with the 
 rest, and that their bellies should be pinched with 
 hunger, which were pampered before, and their backs 
 clothed with sackcloth, which were wont to be magni- 
 fied with such costly furniture. These, and such other 
 reasons of their act as might be alleged, I let pass, 
 and come to the handling of the words themselves. 
 
 But let man and beast put on sackcloth. The fii'st 
 member commandeth the habit that their repentance 
 must be clothed with. It was the manner of those 
 times, especially in the east parts, if either they lost 
 a friend or child by death (as Jacob his son. Gen. 
 xxx\'ii.) ; but rather fur the loss of the favour of God, 
 and commonly when thej' repented their sins, and 
 sometimes when they prayed, not only to refuse their 
 best garments, as the children of Israel, Exod, xx.xiii., 
 when the Lord told them that he would not go him- 
 self, but send an angel with them, ' they sorrowed 
 exceedinglj', and no man put on his best raiment;' 
 and sometimes to cut their clothes, as Joshua vii. ; 
 sometimes to rend them from their backs, as Joel ii. ; 
 but instead thereof, to take unto themselves the un- 
 comfortablest weeds and fashions that might be de- 
 vised. For besides theii' wearing of sackcloth, they 
 would ' sit upon the ground, and in ashes,' as the 
 friends of Job, chap, ii., and not only sit, but ' wallow 
 in dust and ashes,' as the daughter of Jerusalem is 
 willed to do, Jer. vi. ; and ' clasp the hands upon the 
 head, and sprinkle ashes upon it,' as Tamar did, 
 2 Sam. xii., and shave their hair, as their manner is 
 described, Amos viii. ; and finally, ' Take up an h(nvl- 
 ing, and make an exquisite lamentation ; as one that 
 should mourn for her only sun,' ver. 6. In all which 
 and such like outward observances, I like the judgment 
 of a learned divine, that they are neither commanded 
 by God, nor by God forbidden, and are not so proparly 
 works as passions, non tani opera qudni passione.i ;* 
 not sought, or afl'ected, or studied for ; but such as in 
 sorrow, or fear, or the like perturbations, offer them- 
 selves, and are consequent of thcii' own accord as helps 
 to express unto the world om' inward dispositions. 
 So, when we pray unto God, we bow the knees of our 
 bodies, lie upon our faces, cast up our eyes to heaven, 
 smite u)K)n uur breasts, with the like ceremonies ; in 
 all which, prayer is the substance and work intended, 
 and these, though we think not of them, come as a 
 kind of furuitm-e and formality (if I may so speak), to 
 sot it forth. The sadness of the spmt draweth the 
 whole body into participation of the grief, making it 
 careless of the food, and negligent in the attire that 
 belongeth unto it. And if ever they be alone (these 
 shadows and duud) shows, I mean, of sackcloth and 
 mourning), without their body of inward contrition 
 (as they fasted in Isaiah from meat, and were proud 
 of their fast, Isa. Iviii., ' Why have we fasted and thou 
 * Ponierau. 
 
Vek. 8. 
 
 LECTURE XXXVII. 
 
 237 
 
 rogardest it not ;' but ' not from strife and oppression ;' 
 and tlie prophets iu Zechariah ' ware a rough garment,' 
 Zech. xiii., but it to was deceive with), then is our 
 thanks with God the same that he gave to Israel in the 
 place before mentioned : ' Is this the fast that I have 
 chosen, that a man should afflict his soul for a day, 
 and bow down his head like a bulrush, and lie in 
 sackcloth and ashes ; wilt^thou call this a fasting, or 
 an acceptable day unto the Lord ?' Or is not this 
 rather the fasting that I have chosen, instead of for- 
 saking thy meat, ' to deal thy bread to the hungrj-,' 
 and for sackcloth about thy loins to ' cover thy naked 
 brethren, and not to hide thine eyes from thine own 
 flesh '?' And as of sackcloth and fasting, so vre may 
 likewise say of ci-ying, which was the voice of repent- 
 ance. For was it the neighing of horses, lowing of 
 oxen and bullocks, lamentations of men, ejulation of 
 women and children, mingling heaven and earth 
 together with a confusion of outcries, that could 
 enforce the Lord above to give them audience ? 
 Doubtless no ; for the prayer of this people (a shield 
 against the judgment of God, which nature itself 
 thriist into the hands of the mariners before ; and 
 here of the Ninevites, yea, that obstinate king of 
 Egypt, which set his face .against heaven, and con- 
 fronted the God thereof, was glad to fly unto it : Exod. 
 viii., 'Pray unto the Lord for me and my people, 
 that this plague may depart ;' and Simon the sor- 
 cerer, who deceived the world with his enchantments, 
 thought it the only charm whereby the grace of God 
 might be procured, Acts viii.), though it be reported of 
 by as special notice as prayer may be honoured with ; 
 1. For the manner of it, it was vehement and forcible: 
 they cried; 2, for the ground, inward and intentional: 
 tliey cried mighti/i/, and from the bottom of their 
 heart ; 8, for the object, right and substantiah they 
 cried upon God ; yet if their words and works, purpose 
 and performance, had not kissed each other ; if with 
 their lips alone they had honoured God without their 
 hearts, or with their hearts alone without their hands, 
 as we have to consider in the next words, they had 
 soon been answered, as a people better favoured than 
 themselves were ; Isaiiih the first, ' Though you 
 stretch out your hands, I will hide mine eyes from 
 you : and though you make manj' prayers, I will not 
 hear you. The Gentiles, Matthew the sixth, ' used 
 long speech and much babbhng,' and thought to be 
 heard for that cause ; but they lived as Gentiles. The 
 Scribes and the Pharisees in the same place prayed 
 also, not as the Gentiles, to unknown gods, but to the 
 God of the Hebrews, they cried ' Lord, Lord,' with 
 often inclamation ; yea, they ' stood and prayed,' not 
 only in their houses, but ' in the synagogues and 
 corners of the streets, to appear to men,' and no 
 doubt to be heard of men, and they used likewise 
 ' long prayers,' Luke the twentieth, as the Gentiles 
 did, yet they were but hypocrites, and the portion of 
 hypocrites was reserved for them. And this is your 
 
 meed ; look for it, hypocrites, as you look for summer 
 when you see the blooming of the fig-tree, when you 
 pray as if you dreamed without your senses, your 
 lips walking, and your eyes aspiring into heaven without 
 devotion ; you, whose heart lieth within your bosom 
 as a secret thief, calling to your tongue, and hands, 
 and bodily members, and saying, Give me credit in 
 the eyes of men, make some show of piety at the 
 least, recite the prayers of the church though you 
 pray not, and use the gestures of the saints of Christ 
 though j'ou mean them not ; your part is with those 
 hypocrites, and with Simon Magus; your lying tongues 
 the Lord shall root out of their tabernacles ; j'our 
 deceitful eyes shall sink into the holes of your heads, 
 the sacrifices of your forged and faithless consciences 
 stink iu his nostrils ; your prayers are an abomina- 
 tion unto him, and that ever you have taken his fear- 
 ful name within your lips shall tura to your sorer 
 condemnation. The complement and perfection of all 
 that went before, the soul of their corporeal fasting, 
 sackcloth, crying, which is their spiritual fast from 
 sin, and instead of putting on sackcloth, putting on 
 the new man, followeth to be examined in the next 
 part of the mandate, wherein the substantial parts of 
 repentance are contained. 
 
 Yen, let every man tnr)i from his evil ivtnj, &c. For 
 what is repentance in efl'ect, but a returning to that 
 integrity and uprightness of life from whence thou art 
 departed ? Therefore, saith the edict, Bevertitor qids- 
 que, ' let every man return.' There is terminus a quo, 
 and terminus ad quern, in this sanctified motion, some- 
 what which we must forsake and relinquish, some- 
 what which we must recover and procure again. 
 There must be a death to sin, and a resurrection to 
 justice : for as Eusebius calleth repentance a type 
 of the resurrection, so may we the resurrection a type 
 of repentance. There must be an aversion from sin, 
 and a conversion to God ; a mortification of old Adam, 
 with all his concupiscences, and a vivification of the 
 new man. Joel expresseth both these parts, chap. ii. 
 First, ' rend your hearts,' What ! shall we smooth 
 them ? anoint them ? flatter them ? bind them up ? 
 No ; we must irall them in pieces, rack them upon 
 tenter-hooks, tear them with gripes and convulsions ; 
 we must not suft'er siu to hide itself in any corner 
 thereof, which is not produced to light and thoroughly 
 examined, and then ' turn unto the Lord your God,' 
 &c. God, by bis prophet Isaiah, giveth likewise his 
 people a charge concerning both these, chap. i. : 
 ' Wash you, make you clean ; take away the evil of 
 your works from before mine eyes ; cease to do evil.' 
 Afterward followeth the second : ' Learn to do well ; 
 seek judgment, relieve the oppressed,' with other 
 effects of a new life. And who was ever a better ex- 
 pounder of repentance than he who went before the 
 face of the Lord, and both preached the doctrine with 
 his lips, and with his hands administered the baptism 
 of repentance ? Albeit the text that he used unto 
 
238 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 them were MsravosTrE, which signifieth a change of the 
 mind and the inward powers thereof, yet he added by 
 way of explication, Mat. iii., ' Bring forth fruits 
 worthy of amendment of Hfe.' And when the people 
 asked him, Luke the third, ' What shall we do then '? 
 he ans\Yered them, ' He that hath two coats, let him 
 part with him that hath none ; and he that hath meat, 
 let him do likewise.' This much in effect. The 
 repentance that I preach unto yon, doth not only 
 forbid cruelty in pulling clothes from the back and 
 meat from the teeth of others, but it also enjoiiieth 
 the works of mercy. Chrysostom, in his third homily 
 to the people of Antioch, demanding what it was that 
 preserved the Ninevites from the inevitable wrath of 
 God, thus reasoneth with himself: Was it their 
 fasting and sackcloth alone ? We cannot say it, but 
 the change of their whole life. How know we ? By 
 the very words of the prophet : ver. 10, 'And God 
 saw their works.' What kind of works ? that they 
 fasted and wore sackcloth ? Neither of both. For the 
 prophet, suppressing all this, inferreth that they re- 
 turned from their evil ways. I speak not this, saith 
 he, to bring fasting into contempt, but rather to 
 honour it : for the honour of a fast is not abstinence 
 from meats, but avoidance of sin.* And he that de- 
 fincth a fast by the only forbearing of food, is the man 
 that most disgraceth it. Dost thou fast ? Shew me 
 thy fasting by thy works. Thou wilt ask, what kind 
 of works? If thou seest a poor man, take mercy on 
 him ; if thine enemy, reconcile thyself; if thy friend 
 deserving praise, envy him not ; if a beautiful woman, 
 make a covenant with thine eyes not to be taken in 
 her beauty ; and let not only thy mouth and thy 
 bowels fust, but thine eyes, thine ears, thy feet, thy 
 hands, and all thy bodily members. Let thy hands 
 fast from robbeiy, thy feet from bearing thee to 
 unlawful spectacles, thine ears from sucking in 
 slanderous tales, thine eyes from receiving in wan- 
 tonness. For what availeth it to abstain from eating 
 and drinking, if meantime we eat and devour up our 
 brethren ? 
 
 The matter of this edict is very notable, and in so 
 few words, as much as wisdom and religion might 
 contain. First, it requireth of every man a change of 
 life, for the word is a particle of distribution, and es- 
 cepteth neither the age, sex, nor estate of any person. 
 Maximilian the emperor, comparing himself and the 
 kings of Si'.ain and France together, had a witty and 
 pleasant saying, that there were but| three kings in the 
 time vherein he lived, ?«• lioniiiiiiiii, re.r asiiionm, 
 rexrepim: the Spanish, a king of men, because he 
 used them ingeruously and liberally as men ; the 
 French, of asses, for the immoderate exactions which 
 he took of them ; himself, a king of kings, for they 
 would do no more than their own pleasure was. But 
 the king of Nineveh was a king of subjects. Behold 
 
 * Honor jejunii, non cibonun abstiiicntia, seil pecca- 
 tonnii fuga. 
 
 a general decree enacted for repentance, and there is 
 not one soul in Nineveh that starteth back. 
 
 Secondly, It requireth of every man not only to go 
 from his wickedness, but to return to that justice 
 from whence he has fallen, and to renew the imago 
 of holiness decayed in him. It is a good degree of 
 repentance to bewail those sins which we have com- 
 mitted, and not to commit those sins which we have 
 bewailed.* But it is not enough in repentance ; for 
 he that is not a gatherer with Christ is a scatterer, 
 and as great displeasure we reap in the omission of 
 duty as in commission of iniquity. John Baptist did 
 not tell them in his sermon of repentance, that every 
 tree which brought forth evil fruit should be hewn 
 down, though that were implied, but ' if it brought 
 not forth good fruit,' it was in danger of the same 
 judgment, Neither did our Saviour tell his disciples, 
 that except their injustice were less than the injustice 
 of the Scribes and Pharisees, they should not enter 
 into the kingdom of heaven ; but except their justice 
 were more. He that buried his talent in the ground 
 had a purpose not to oflend, but he had no purpose 
 of doing good. This, then, is the meauiug and sen- 
 tence of the decree : we are fallen from labour to 
 idleness, from meekness to pride, from temperance to 
 riot, from mercy to oppression, from justice to vio- 
 lence ; let us not only leave and forego these vices, 
 but let us return to their contrary virtues. 
 
 Thirdly, It requireth of every man to return from 
 his evil ways, his ancient and accustomed sins wherein 
 he had travelled and traded himself, and made it his 
 walk a long time ; therein they implied this secret 
 confession. We are not fallen hy ignorance and mis- 
 chance, as those that labour to rise again, neither hath 
 our foot slipped along by the frailty and infirmity of 
 our flesh, but we have wilfully and wittingly brought 
 ourselves into an habit of viciousness. We are not 
 sinners of yesterday, and novices in the school of 
 Satan ; but we have long trodden the paths of injustice, 
 and wearied ourselves in the ways of wickedness. 
 
 Four! Ill ij, It requireth of every man to return from 
 tin: iricln'iliies/s that is in his hands, not in his heart 
 alone ; that is, not only from his proper sins, whicij 
 harmed no more than his own conscience, but from 
 his violence, rapine, extortion, which were his open 
 transgressions, noisome and hurtful unto other men. 
 For there are some sins, private and domestical, the 
 sting and smarting whereof for the most part dieth 
 within the soul, and plagueth but the person of him 
 that comniitteth it. Wo commonly say of a prodigal 
 man, That he is no man's foe but his own, and envy 
 eateth but the marrow of his bones that envietb, not 
 his that is envied. And pride is but thine own vanity, 
 and sloth an ignominy belonging to thyself. But 
 some, their nature is such, that wheresoever they have 
 their dwelling, Ihcy arc the hammers and mallets to 
 the whole country that lieth about them. These ai'e 
 
 t riangero commissa. Plangonda non committere. 
 
Ver. 8.J 
 
 LECTURE XXXVII, 
 
 239 
 
 the unrighteousnesses which before I specified in 
 part, and are therefore called the wickedness of the 
 hands, though other parts of the soul and body are 
 not innocent, because the band is the chief instrument 
 and weapon whereby they are wrought. Curtius * 
 writeth of the elephant, that he taketh an armed man 
 with his hand, and delivereth him to his master that 
 sitteth upon him. He meaneth the boss of the ele- 
 phant, which he useth, as men their bauds, to do that 
 service. And Achilles asked Pulamedes, going to the 
 battle of Troy, why he went without a servant. Pala- 
 medes shewed him his hands, and asked him again 
 whether he thought not those instead of servants. f 
 It is the strength, agilitj', serviceableucss of the hands, 
 by reason of the aptness they have to so many and 
 sundrj' otEces, which chargeth them with unrighteous- 
 ness common to other parts, j But the chief thing to 
 be considered, and wherewith I will conclude, is the 
 especial hold that the king and the council taketh, 
 omitting other sins, namely, of this forcible and hand- 
 strong violence. Other things we leave to your own 
 consciences; commune with your hearts about them, 
 and purge yourselves. We are not the searchers of 
 the heart and reins, we know not the faults that lie in 
 darkness, but that which is open to the world, for 
 which we are hateful to God and man, the worm that 
 hath bred of our greatness and wealthiness, the 
 daughter of the monarchy, a familiar to kings' courts, 
 and not a stranger to the bourse of merchants, fraudu- 
 lencj' and forgery in contracts, bribery in justice, 
 cruelty in common life, overbearing of right by might, 
 grinding the poor like corn between the millstones of 
 oppression, and eating them up like bread, pushing at 
 the weak sheep with side and shoulder, and leaving 
 neither flesh nor arm, vineyard nor house, free from 
 invasion : this we namely forbid, and precisely give in 
 charge that it be amended. I would our usurers would 
 mark this, that of all those grievous oli'enccs whereof 
 Nineveh bad laboured a long time, the rest are held 
 asleep, and their names spared, as not worthy in com- 
 parison to come in speech with their far superior 
 iniquity ; only ' the wickedness of their hands,' which 
 is not least in biting the poor, is remembered and 
 reported in special words. Speak I of usurers ? 
 There are none ; neither is there a sun in the sky. For 
 mine own part, I know them not, for they have taken 
 neither horse nor bullock of me : 
 
 Namque mcos nee ecjuos milii nee rapuere juvcncos.g 
 
 But for my brethren's sake, both in the city and coun- 
 try, I wish that their bellies |1 and bonds were all 
 heaped together in the market-place and set on fire, 
 as they were sometimes at Athens, that we might all 
 joy and say, as Alcihiades then did, We never saw a 
 
 * Lib. iv. Manu arma virosque corripit. 
 
 t Nonne liae illonim vice sunt? 
 
 j M alius orgaTium organovum. 
 
 \ Plutar. de vitando sere alieno, I] Qu. 'bills'? — Fd, 
 
 clearer fire, ititiiqiiam villi iijiiem iiKiiuron. But be- 
 cause we cannot ease our hearts so soon of them, nor 
 by such means, I will tell them fur their own comfort 
 what they shall trust to amongst other things : that al- 
 though they labour in the fire to get riches, etsi ror- 
 sura sua iynem assidue nuliiant, yet the time shall 
 come when there shall nothing remain unto them but 
 this, that they shall be able to know and recount with 
 themselves how many debtors they have quite undone, 
 quot dcbitores pessiim dedere. As for their treasures of 
 iniquity, let them plainly understand that they put 
 them into a bottomless bag which could bold nothing. 
 Ill-gotten goods never descend to the third heir, per- 
 haps, nor to the second, nor first, nor to benefit him- 
 self who thiuketh he bath most handfast. ' She 
 gathered it of the hire of an harlot, and it shall return 
 to the wages of an harlot,'' Micab i. They gathered 
 their wealth by usury, and usury or somewhat else 
 shall consume it. Gnipho the usurer, as Lucian rc- 
 porteth, lieth in hell, bemoaning his hard estate, that 
 Rhodochares, an incestuous unthrift, should waste his 
 goods ; so may these. But I leave their judgment to 
 God to whom it belongeth, for vengeance is his, and 
 be will surely repay. Yet dare I give sentence against 
 them as far as the laws of the ancient Romans did : 
 wherein, because a thief was bound to make restitu- 
 tion of double, the usurer of fourfold. Their meaning is 
 plain enough, that they esteemed usury a double 
 theft, and that at the least is my judgment. And, 
 therefore, as Alexander Severus made an act, that 
 none should salute the emperor who knew himself to 
 be a thief, so let our usurers take themselves warned 
 and discharged, so long as their hearts accuse them of 
 their double and treble theft, from saluting Christians, 
 and much more from eating, drinking, conversing, 
 most of all from praying, fasting, communicating with 
 Christians. 
 
 This city, of all other parts of the province, is not 
 otherwise unfit to receive exhortation from this wick- 
 edness of the hands. Here are tlie thrones of David, 
 the seats of judgment in both kind of laws. Eccle- 
 siastes said of the one, chap, iii., ' I have seen under 
 the sun the place of judgment, where was wickedness ; 
 and the place of justice, where was iniquity.' And 
 Bernard to Eugenius of the other, A great abuse ; no 
 man looketh to the mouth of the judge, all to his 
 hands. These are they that do all the pope's busi- 
 ness.* You see how active and stirring the hands are. 
 Surely, as Anaxagoras thought man to be the wisest 
 of all creatures, because he only had hands, whereby 
 he is able to speak, if need be, and to express all signs, 
 inaiius scrmo r/entii(iii, so I do think him the wickedest of 
 all creatures, because he onlj' hath bands ; and no 
 tiger or vulture under heaven more hurtful with his 
 claws or talons, than man with his excellent member 
 when he is disposed to use it to bad purposes. But 
 to return from those wicked hands, the Pope's fiictors; 
 * Omne papale negotium illas agunt. — 4. De consid. 
 
2i0 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 fClIAr. III. 
 
 as Paul, albeit he knew nothing by himself, yet was 
 he not justified thereby, so, though I know nothing 
 by either of these two places which I speak of, yet 
 have I not freed my soul nor discharged my duty, un- 
 less I admonish them both of that which may bo. I 
 trust they will pardon my charitable jealousy over 
 them, the same reasons of mightiness and authority 
 agreeing to them which were found in Nineveh, 
 Micah ii. For what is the reason that men first 
 imagine iniquity, and afterwards contrive wickedness 
 in their beds ; and when the morning is light, put it 
 in practice, but because their hand hath power. First, 
 they covet fields, and then take them by violence ; 
 and houses, and take them away: so they oppress a 
 man and his house, even a man and his heritage. 
 When a malicious will and a mighty hand, concupis- 
 cence and violence, meet, you see how a family and 
 posterity is overthrown by it. 
 
 Whatsoever either violence or fraud be meant by 
 the wickedness of the hands, the Hebrews agree that 
 the meaning of the king and his council was to call 
 for restitution. In the observation whereof, as E. 
 Kimchi aiErmeth, their forefathers of godly memory 
 were so carefully careful not to ofl'ond, that they made 
 this decree, If any had wrongfully taken a beam or 
 rafter, and used it in the buiLling of a great tower, he 
 was to pluck down the whole tower again, and restore 
 that piece to his owner.* Habakkuk doth not much 
 dissent from them: chap, ii., 'For the stone shall 
 cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the timber 
 shall answer it. Woe unto him that buildcth a town 
 in blood, and eroctcth a city with iniquity.' It shall 
 be lietter for them to pull down towers, and towns, 
 and cities, and countries to the ground, rather than 
 to suffer such screech-owls of woe to sing in the cham- 
 bers thereof. St Augustine to Macedonius is as per- 
 emptory in terms as ever the oppressor was in his 
 violence, that if the goods of another man, the taking 
 away whereof was unjust, may be restored, and is not, 
 repentance is never truly done, but counterfeited ; but 
 where it is truly done, the sin shall never be par- 
 doned till the spoil be restored ; but, as I said before, 
 when it may be restored.! Wherein thou mayest 
 deceive thyself; for though thou canst not restore in 
 identity the same for the same, yet thou mayest re- 
 store in equality so much for so much, which was the 
 meaning of Augustine. Fulgentius noteth upon the 
 words of Matthew, ' Every tree which bringeth not 
 good fruit,' &c. If barrenness shall be cast into the 
 fire, what doth rapine and robbery deserve ? If judg- 
 ment shall be without mercy to him that sheweth not 
 
 * Is qui tignum rapuit et construenda! maf;n!B arci adhi- 
 buit, totam arcem subvertero debet, et tignum domino suo 
 restituero. 
 
 f Si res aliena propter quam ppccatum est, roiUli potest ei 
 non rcdditur, poonitentia mm aj,'itur .sed siniulatur. Si autom 
 vcracitor agitur, non dmiittulur peccatum, nisi restituatur 
 ablatum. Sed ul dixi, cum restitui potest. — Epht. liv. 
 
 mercy, what judgment shall be to him that doth also 
 shew cruelty^?* And Ilabanus noteth no less upon 
 that complaint of Christ, Mat. xxv., ' I was hungry, 
 and thou gavest mo no bread.' What shall he receive 
 for taking away other men's, who shall ever burn in 
 hell fire for not giving his own ?-|- ' I was hungry, and 
 thou gavest me no bread.' Nay, I was hungry, and 
 that little bread that I had thou tookest from me. ' I 
 was naked, and thou gavest me no clothing,' Nay, 
 that simple coat and cloak that I had, thou spoiledst 
 me of. I had but one vineyard, and thou deceivedst 
 me of it. These in their judgments and conclusions 
 went not so far touching the necessity of restitution, 
 but Nehemiah avowed it as deeply by actual demon- 
 stration ; for he shook the lap of his garment, and 
 wished that the Lord would even so shake out all those 
 that restored not. But if so excellent a governor, in 
 so different a case, the houses and lands of the people 
 being laid to gage themselves, and money received 
 upon them, v/ere so angry in his mind for the cry of 
 the poor, that he rebuked the princes and rulers for 
 their sakes, and set a great assembly against them, 
 and put them to silence, telling them, that, for the re- 
 proach of the heathen, they ought to have walked in 
 the fear of the Lord (which now they did not), and 
 praying them to give back the pledges again, and to 
 remit some part also of the debt; and not content with 
 their word, binding them by oath before the priests 
 to perform it, nor with their oath, but sealing it for 
 more assurance with that fearful sacrament of empty- 
 ing his garments, himself cursing them to their faces, 
 if they brake promise, and all the congregation crying 
 Amen. What shall we then say of them, or with what 
 reasons shall we urge them, or what bonds shall we 
 take for their restitution, who have taken the houses 
 and fields, and of their brethren, not as pledges but 
 preys ; not voluntarily yielded, but violently wrung 
 out, without cither money or recompense to those 
 whom they have displaced ? If they lose the ac- 
 cepted time, they will come and restore hereafter, as 
 Judas did. He brought the thirty pieces of silver 
 again, but it was too late. Let them rather learn of 
 famous Zaccheus, whose praise is in the Gospel, 
 Luke xix., and the singularity of whose fact maketh 
 it almost a miracle. He was the chief receiver of the 
 tribute, and he was rich withal, and if the country be- 
 lied him not, a man of a sinful life. I will not say 
 that his oflice made him rich, and his riches an evil 
 man (but oflicers that grow rich in haste hardly 
 escape that degradation) ; howsoever it were, little 
 Zaccheus, but as gi'oat in example as ever we read of, 
 a chief receiver and a chief restorer, rich in substance, 
 and rich in good works, and in the midst of his sin- 
 ful life a renouncer of his sinfulness, no sooner ho 
 
 * Si sterilitas in igncm miltitur, rapacitas quid mero- 
 tur? &c. 
 
 t Quid rcoipict qui aliena tulit, si semper ardobit qui sua 
 non dedit ? 
 
Ver. 9.J 
 
 LECTURE XXXVIII. 
 
 2tl 
 
 received Christ into bis house, and much more into his 
 conscience, but as if he bad Iain in his dregs of extor- 
 tion before, be now stood up, and not caring to be 
 heard of men, nor hunting after earthly commenda- 
 tion, spake unto the Lord : Behold, Lord, with a ready 
 and cheerful heart (ofl'ering his service and sacrifice 
 before the face of his Saviour), not the crumbs of my 
 table, nor morsels of my meat, but half of my goods, 
 a frank and bountiful present, and I take them to be 
 mine own, honestly and lawfully gotten ; I give with 
 as free a mind as ever thou gavest to me ; not to my 
 friends and kindred, or to the rich of the world, who are 
 able to make me recompense, but to tlie poor ; and if 
 ever I defrauded, much more if ever I defeated by might, 
 any man, stranger or home-born, I say not of his main 
 estate, but of any his smallest portion, uor by open de- 
 tected wrong, but by secret concealed cavillation, I 
 restore it, principal and damage ; for I restore it four- 
 fold. What followed, but that he emptied his house 
 , of the transitory treasures of this world, and instead 
 thereof let in salvation into it : ' This day is salva- 
 tion come to this house ;' not only to the private soul, 
 but to the house of Zaccheus through his means. I 
 scarcely think that these ravenous and greedy times 
 can yield a man so innocent as to say with Samuel, 
 ' Whose ox or ass have I taken ? or whom have I 
 ■wronged ?' At the least, let him say with Zaccheus, 
 I say not in the former part of his speech, ' Half of 
 my goods I give to the poor' (for that were heresy to 
 be held, and false doctrine to be preached in this illi- 
 
 beral age), bu^ in the latter clause, ' If I have injured 
 any man,' though ' I restore not fourfold,' yet I restore 
 him his own. Otherwise our houses and consciences 
 will be so full of houses, fields, vineyards, olives, sil- 
 ver, gold, unrighteous pledges, that there will bo no 
 room for the peace and consolation of God to dwell 
 with them. Therefore, wash your hands and hearts 
 from this leprosy, my brethren, that you may be re- 
 ceived into the host of the Lord, and dwell with his 
 first-born ; and either forsake your violence, or con- 
 vert it another way. Let the kingdoms and com- 
 modities of the earth alone, and learn that ' the kina- 
 dom of heaven suflereth violence,' Mat. xi., and must 
 be won by force. See if you can extort this spoil 
 from him that kcepeth it. Spare no invention of wit, 
 intention of will, contention of sinews, strength of 
 hands, to get this kingdom. Beg it, buy it, steal it, 
 assault it, use any means. This, this is the only 
 oppression and violence that we can allow you, and in 
 this only thing. Be not modest and courteous to- 
 wards any man in this heavenly price. Hither if you 
 bring not tooth and nail, and resisting unto blood, 
 and hating your lives unto the death, you are not 
 worthy of it. It suflereth violence, Bid^srai, itself (it 
 is so proposed and conditioned), and tlioy are men of 
 violence, Biasral, that by violence must attain unto it, 
 ' Agxa^ouiT/. Therefore wrestle for this blessing, though 
 you lame your bodies ; and strive for this kingdom, 
 though you lose your souls. 
 
 LECTURE XXXVIII. 
 
 TT7io can tell if God will turn and repent? &C. — Joxah III. 9. 
 
 THE last thing in the repentance of the Ninevites, 
 by the order of the words, though in purpose and 
 intention first, and that which presently giveth place 
 to the repentance of God, their expected deliverance 
 in the next sentence, is the foundation whereupon they 
 ground a knowledge and apprehension, such as it is, 
 of the goodness of God, and some likely hope to escape 
 his vengeance intended. There may be some part of 
 repentance without faith, contrition, anguish, vexa- 
 tion for sin, till not only the heart acheth, but the con- 
 science also is quite swallowed and drowned in the 
 gulf of it ; as there is no question, after that hor- 
 rible act of Judas, but his spirit was as full of grief, 
 as before of treachery and covetousness. Let the 
 world witness with him how deeply he rued his ma- 
 lice, when he pledged body and soul for it, and gave 
 over the one to the tree, the other to hell fire. For if 
 there had been a penalty to have taken of himself 
 ■worse than death and damnation, he would not, I 
 think, have shunned it. Cain was also as sorry for his 
 bloody fact, as ever greedy before to commit it. He 
 felt even a talent of lead upon his soul, never to be 
 
 removed, and therefore uttered a blasphemy against 
 the grace of God never to be pardoned : ' My sin is 
 greater than can be forgiven.' This is the reason that 
 he had ' a mark set upon him, that no man should 
 kill Cain,' Gen. iv., who, with a thousand daily 
 wounds, killed himself; and that he 'ran from place 
 to place,' not so much in his body as in his mind, 
 tossed like a wave of the sea, and finding no place for 
 rest, because the mercy of God shone not unto him : 
 ' Behold, thou hast cast me this day from the face of 
 the earth ; ' is that all '? ' And I shall be hid from thy 
 face,' driven from thy presence, banished from the 
 light and favour of thy gracious countenance. This 
 is the diirt that woundeth him to death. For, this 
 received into the mind, that we are hid from the face 
 of God, that we are so far in contempt and hatred 
 with his majesty that he will not vouchsafe to give us 
 the looking on, if all the clouds in the air rained 
 love and compassion, we could not be persuaded that 
 any of the least drops thereof should fall upon our 
 ground. AVherefore there must be a belief to con- 
 ceive, and an hope to expect, our reconciliation and 
 
242 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 atonement with Go J, and God's with, us; or it ^viil 
 be an unprofitable and uupossible attempt to endeavour 
 a true repentance. For either it will follow that we 
 become desperate, and give over care of ourselves, 
 ' it is in rain to serve God, and what profit shall we 
 reap to bumble om-selves before him,' seeing his 
 mercy is clean gone from us for ever, and he hath 
 bent his soul to do us mischief? And, as it is written 
 of Julius the pope, that having received an overthrow 
 hy the French at Ravenna which he looked not for, 
 be set his face and mouth against the God of heaven, 
 and thus spake unto him : So, henceforth become 
 French ; in the name of all the devils of bell, holy 
 Switzer, pray for us ;* do we betake us to new saints, 
 or r.ither to new devils, flying to hardness of heart, 
 carelessness of salvation, contempt of God ; or else 
 we repent but after the manner of hypocrites, we 
 make some proffer and likelihood of returning to God, 
 but cannot do it. Such, I think, was the repentance 
 of the PhiHstincs, the first of Samuel, the fifth and 
 sixth, when they had taken the ark of the Lord and 
 placed it first in Ashdod, and there were punished with 
 emerods and with death ; afterwards in Gath and 
 Eki'ou, and there they could not endui'e it. It is said 
 of them, not only that they were troubled, and con- 
 ferred of canying home the ark again, but that ' they 
 cried, and their cry went up to heaven,' and they sent 
 it back with a present unto the Lord, and with sin- 
 offerings ; nay, their priests and soothsayers said vuito 
 them, ' Wherefore should you harden yom* hearts, 
 as the Egj'ptians and Pharaoh hardened theirs ?' Such 
 the repentance of Saul, 1 Sam. xv., who, having re- 
 ceived a message by the prophet, that, as he had cast 
 off the word of the Lord, so the Lord had cast him 
 off from being a king, and that his kingdom was given 
 to bis neighbour better than himself; though at the 
 first be denied his crime, ' Yea, I have obeyed the 
 voice of the Lord,' yet afterwards he confessed, ' I 
 have sinned in transgressing his commandment,' and 
 he desired Samuel to ' take away his sin, and to return 
 with him that he might worship the Lord,' which, 
 when Samuel refused, he then altiired his speech : 
 ' Yet turn with me, I pray thee, and honour me before 
 the elders of my people, and before Israel.' So that 
 his principal care was not the service of God, but 
 honom' and estimation in the sight of men. Such the 
 repentance of Ahab, 1 Ivings xxi., who, having heard 
 the words of Elias thundering the judgments of God 
 against him and his house, ' he rent his clothes and 
 put sackcloth upon bim, and fasted, and lay in sack- 
 cloth, and W(,'nt softly ; ' but how temporary and 
 feigned his repentance was may appear in the next 
 chapter by his despiteful dealing with Micaiah. Such 
 is the repentance of those who are not riglitly per- 
 suaded of the pardon of their sins, fitter for Philistines 
 and reprobates than Christians, and to be used in 
 
 * Sic, esto nunc Gnllicua ; in nomine omnium dinbolonim 
 S. Swicere ora pro nobis. — In colloq. M. Lul/ieri, torn. ii. 
 
 Ashdod or Askelon, than at Jerusalem. The con 
 junction of faith and repentance is so close, that some 
 have thought it to be a part of repentance. I rather 
 take it to be the beginner and leader thereof. As the 
 body and soul, though they are joined together in the 
 same man, yet is not the body a part of the soul, nor 
 the soul of the body, but both distinct ; so faith, hope, 
 and charity, if they be true, they are narrowly linked 
 one to the other, yet naturally and essentially severed. 
 For final resolution whereof you may best satisfy 
 yourselves by proof from this place. For although 
 this sentence which I have in hand be the last of the 
 mandate in order and disposition of words, yet it is 
 first in jiroposal. For if they had asked in Nineveh 
 a reason of the king and his council why they should 
 bid them fast and wear sackcloth about their flesh, 
 sparing neither beast nor sucklings, why they should 
 add affliction and misery to misery, as if it were not 
 sufficient to be plagued by the hands of God at the 
 time prefixed, but they must plague themselves and 
 their cattle forty days beforehand, having but a hand- 
 ful of days (in comparison) to enioy their lives, and to 
 take their pleasure in earthly commodities ; or why 
 they should cry unto the Lord and not be heard, and 
 forsake their wickedness and not be pardoned ; the 
 reason of all this is alleged in this epilogue, ' AVho 
 can tell if the Lord will turn and repent ?' It cannot 
 lightly be worse, it may be better with us ; the doing 
 of these duties to God will not put us nearer to our 
 judgment, it may send us farther off; we are sure to 
 be overthrown if we repent not ; we may repent, and 
 haply escape it. It is but the leaving of our meat and 
 (bink for a time, who must leave both belly and meat 
 too ; the missing of our better gannents, who must 
 miss our skins and our flesh from our backs. If we 
 use our tongues in ciyiug, we lose nothing by it ; 
 and if w-e wash our hands and cleanse om- consciences 
 from iniquity, we shall go the lighter to our judgment. 
 ' Who can tell ?' It is the nature and property of God 
 to shew pity unto the whole world, and although 
 Nineveh be the sink of the earth, why not to Nineveh ? 
 Some change the reading,* and instead of ijuU novit, 
 ' who knoweth? ' they put qui iwvit, 'he that know- 
 eth,' connecting the sense with that which went before 
 in this manner : Lot every man turn from his evil way, 
 and from the wickedness that is in their hands, qiii 
 HOfil, who Icnowetb so to do,t and is not ignorant 
 what bolongetb to such a change ; or thus. He that is 
 privy in his heart of any wickedness committed against 
 God or man, public or private, let him amend it. The 
 instruction from so translating it is good, though the 
 translation itself bo mistaken, that knowledge must 
 ever go before the face of repentance : knowledge, I 
 moan, not only in kind, to distinguish sin from sin, 
 and to call them by all their proper names, but by 
 
 * ChiJd. paraph. Ar. Mont. Rabbini nonnnlli. 
 t Qui scit ; convertntur qui sibi conscius est admissi fuci- 
 noris, &c , quisquia penes se existere peccata aguovit. 
 
Ver. 9.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXViri. 
 
 24.3 
 
 number and weight, — how many, how grievous they 
 are, how for they extend, to the annoyance of the 
 earth, provocation of heaven, breach of Christian 
 charity, and striking at the majesty of God himself.* 
 Thus he acknowledged his sin in the Gospel, Luke 
 XV., who spake in his heart before he did it, and 
 therefore was not ignorant what he went about : ' I will 
 go to my Father, and say, I have sinned ;' yea, but 
 not a simple sin, I have sinned a mighty and manifold 
 transgression : ' I have sinned against heaven ; I have 
 also sinned against thee,' against the Father of my 
 spirit, against the father of my flesh, against him that 
 gave me his law, against thee that gavest me my 
 nature ; both the tables have I broken by my mis- 
 deeds ; and whatsoever duties I had to. perform, those 
 have I violated by mine unnatural disobedience. If 
 you observe the order of all the repentances in the 
 book of God, whether in Moabite, Edomite, Egyptian, 
 or in the people of God, they ever began vrith the 
 knowledge of their sins ; that as the first argument of 
 life which the widow's son of Nain gave was this, ' he 
 began to speak,' so in this spiritual resuscitation 
 from the death of the soul, the lii'st token of their re- 
 covery was the acknowledgment and confession of 
 their misdoing. The voice of Pharaoh, Exod. x., 
 was, ' I have sinned against the Lordyom- God.' The 
 voice of Balaam, Num. xsii., when he saw the angel 
 in his way, ' I have sinned.' The voice of Saul to 
 Samuel, 1 Sam. xv., 'I have sinned;' and, 1 Sam. 
 xxvi., when he saw the kindness of David towards 
 him, ' I have sinned.' The voice of David to Nathan, 
 2 Sam. xii., 'I have sinned;' and, 2 Sam. xsiv., to 
 God after the numbering of the people, ' I have 
 sinned ; ' nay, valde peccavi, ' I have exceedingly 
 sinned in that I have done ; and, it is further added, 
 that ' his heart smote him when he had done it.' And 
 when afterwards he felt the smiting of the Lord with 
 plainer demonstration, and with clearing the whole 
 laud besides. Ego sum qui peccavi, et ego sum qui 
 iniquc egi, ' It is I, and only I, which have done 
 wickedly.' The voice of Job, in the seventh of his 
 book, 'I have sinned.' The voice of Daniel, in behalf 
 of 'himself, their kings, princes, fathers, of every man 
 of Judah, and the inhabitants of Jenisalem, and of all 
 Israel, both near and far oil',' was, ' We have sinned 
 and committed iniquity, and done wickedly, and 
 rebelled, and departed from thy precepts, and not 
 obeyed thy seiwants the prophets ; and nothing, save 
 open shame, appertaineth unto us.' We hear no end 
 of accusation, iniquity upon sin, wickedness upon 
 iniquity, rehelhon upon wickedness, and still a further 
 proceeding in the testification of their unrighteousness. 
 When Ezra heard that the people of the captivity 
 were mingled with the heathen, chap. ii. 9, ' he rent 
 his clothes, and plucked off the hair of his head and 
 beard, and sat astonished until the evening sacrifice ; 
 
 * Ira est Dei non intelligero peccata, ne sequatur pocni- 
 tentia. — Ci/pr. 
 
 at what time he arose again, and fell upon his knees, 
 and spread out his hands to the Lord his God, and 
 said, my God, I am confounded, and ashamed to 
 lift mine eyes unto thee, my God, for our iniquities 
 are increased over our head, and our trespass is grown 
 up into the heaven.' As the manner of ancienter 
 times was, when heaviness and trouble was upon 
 them, to call for women and others that were most 
 skih'ul in mourning, so they that will learn to repent, 
 and are not cunning in the art thereof, let them repair 
 to Ezra, and such like, who were most skilful ia 
 repenting. Oh how available, saith Ambrose, are 
 three syllables ! ^;= PEC'—CA—VI is but three syllables ; 
 but the flame of an hearty sacrifice ascendeth therein 
 into heaven, and fetcheth down three thousand bless- 
 ings. ' Christ came not to call the righteous, but 
 sinners, to repentance.' Sinners ? Then all, even the 
 greatest princes and rulers of the Jews, for they the 
 greatest sinners. No ; but sinners in sense and con- 
 science, sinners in action and plea against themselves, 
 sinners in judgment from their own mouths, and 
 against their own heads; these are they to whom 
 Christ hath designed the medicine and restorative of 
 his saving health, according to his courteous invita- 
 tion, Mat. xi., ' Come unto me, all ye that travail 
 and labour;' not you that loiter with your sins, and 
 trifle with my judgments, you that bear your iniquities 
 like straws or cork, seek you other pardoners ; come, 
 you that are weary, and are loaden with the burden 
 thereof, and ' I will refresh you.' The poor publican, 
 Luke xvhi., was one of those patients that tasted of 
 such mercies : ' he stood afar ofl',' not daring to 
 approach unto God, that God might approacdi unto 
 hmi,t nor to ' lift up his eyes unto heaven,' which he 
 had moved to anger against him ; but, ' smiting upon 
 his sinfid breast,' as the ark of all iniquity, and 
 punishing himself with stripes, that the Lord might 
 forbear to punish him, J with a fearful heart and 
 trembling tongue called upon his Saviour, ' Lord, 
 be mercilul unto me a sinner.' I say not thy creature, 
 or servant, or child, but only a sinner ; my whole 
 composition is sin, whatsoever I am in body or soul, 
 so far as my manhood and humanity goeth, a sinner ; 
 and not only by mine own office and calling, because 
 I am a pubhcan, but even by nature and kind itself, 
 a sinner. So did IMary IMagdalcne in the seventh of 
 the same evangelist, of whom there is no more re- 
 ported, but that she was a sinner, as if the Spirit of 
 God had forgotten her other names. When she heard 
 that Jesus was come into a Pharisee's house, § 1, she 
 stood at his feet; 2, behind Iiim ; 3, creeping; 4, she 
 began to xmsh, as if she durst not go on, but did often 
 
 * Lib. ii. de pcenilent. — Quantum valent tres sjUalio? ! 
 
 f Non audet appropinquare, ut Deus ad ipsum appro- 
 pinquet. — Bed. 
 
 X Pcenas de so exigit, ut Deus parcat. — Gloss. 
 
 J There is no good reason to befievo that this woman was 
 Mary Magdalene. — Ed. 
 
244 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 retract and pull back lier hands ; 5, the lowest part 
 of his body, his feet ; 6, villi her tears, though the 
 water of the brook had been humanity enough ; 7, did 
 wipe them, not with the lap of her coat, but with the 
 hairs of her head ; 8, kissed them; and lastly, anointed 
 them u'ith a box of ointment. Oh how precious an 
 ointment flowed from her heart and eyes ! How 
 odoriferous and well-pleasing unto Christ, who made 
 her apology, not only against the Pharisee, in pre- 
 ferring her kindness before the entertainment of his 
 house, but against Satan, and the power of hell, in 
 forgiving her many sins ! The like submissive be- 
 haviour we read of the woman which had the issue of 
 blood, Mat. ix., for she also ' came behind Christ,' as 
 Mary Magdalene did, avoiding the sharpness and 
 piercing of his eagle's eye, and ' touched the hem of 
 his garment ; ' for she said in herself, I dare not be 
 so rude and unmannerly to press him, as the multi- 
 tudes did ; if I may ' but touch ' (not embrace) bim, 
 nay, his 'gaiments,' the very 'hem of his garment,' 
 no upper or honourable part thereof, ' I shall be 
 whole.' In all these humble and skilful repentances, 
 as of those who knew their sins by heart, and were 
 able to set down their full catalogue, what success do 
 we find ? That ' virtue went out from Christ ' to this 
 woman, and ' many sins were remitted ;' to the other, 
 the publican 'went home to his house justified;' the 
 children of the captivity were delivered ; ' the last 
 days of Job were blessed more than the first ;' David at 
 one time had his sin translated, at another the punish- 
 ment mitigated, the Lord himself crying unto bis 
 angel, ' It now sufficeth, hold thy hand ;' yea, Balaam 
 and Pharaoh themselves fared the bettor for the false 
 fire, and but blazing of repentance. Happj' therefore 
 is that conscience, to conclude with the saying of 
 Bernard,* wherein truth and mere}' meet together, the 
 truth of him that confesseth his sins, and the mercy 
 of God that pardoneth them ; for mercy can never be 
 wanting unto that soul which truly knoweth itself. 
 
 Others, in a far greater number, and with far better 
 reason, express it by an interrogation. Who knoweth? 
 and make it a sentence absolute and complete in itself, 
 without referring it to the former words. Then they 
 make this construction of it : It may be the Lord will 
 turn, or peradventnro have mercy upon us, fieri potest, 
 forsan. They put it with ambiguity, that when men 
 doubt of salvation, they may bo the more earnest in 
 repentance, and seek the better means to provoke 
 God to mercy. f And surely, as doubting is the 
 mother (they say) of inquiring, Acroj/a fj-rirrja ^nrri- 
 eniii (for a man that doubteth not will never ask), so 
 some kind of doubtfulness is the mother, or at least- 
 wise the nur.sc, of repentance. Jerome, whoso note 
 the former was, writing upon the second of Joel, ' Who 
 
 * Fcelix conscieiitia in qua iniscricorilia et Veritas 
 obviavcruiit sil)i.— /n Mcdilat. 
 
 t Ainliiguum ponitur, ut ilum de salute duljitant lioaiine?, 
 fortius agaiit iioeiiitoiitiara — Iliero. 
 
 knoweth if the Lord will return and leave a blessing 
 behind him ?' expoundeth the prophet, lest haply the 
 greatness of the clemency of God should make us 
 negligent, therefore the prophet subjoineth. Who 
 knoweth?* So that it seemcth those terms of un- 
 certainty are not in any sort to admit or allow of 
 doubting of salvation, but rather to keep us from pre- 
 sumption. We all know the mischief of that heady 
 sin. Many are hindered (saith Augustine), ft'om their 
 strength, by presuming on their strength, f The 
 collection that Pomeran maketb upon these words, is 
 rather to justify than to condemn the Ninevites ; so 
 far was it oS, that they had an}' confidence in their 
 works, tanlnm aliest ut conjiderent, &c., that they 
 rather doubted of the mercy of God; and they were 
 saved by faith, who, if they had rested upon their 
 own merits, must needs have despaired. And he 
 removeth all diffidence from the king and his nobles, 
 as if they included not themselves in the speech, 
 ' Who knoweth if the Lord will return ?' but onlj' 
 spake it unto the people in this sense. In these dread- 
 ful frights and pei-plexities, being encountered with 
 three sore mischief's at once, — atrocity of your sins, 
 shortness of time, greatness of destruction, — none of 
 you knoweth of the mercy of God as we do, and 
 therefore we preach it unto you that you may take 
 knowledge ; and for this cause do the Septuagint add, 
 in the end of the former verse, Xsyoinc, that is, saijinrj, 
 as if it were the voice of the people that is now in 
 question, and not of the king and his princes. 
 
 But how can it any way stand with the nature of 
 repentance, either in prince or people, to doubt, seeing 
 that faith is the principal prop wherewith repentance is 
 borne up; and we cannot acknowledge this to be a true 
 faith which hangeth and wavereth between such 
 uncertainties ; rather, it savoureth of infidelity and 
 desperation to cast forth such demands. It might bo 
 answeied, that albeit they doubted of the event of this 
 sentence, yet not of the favour of God towards them ; 
 for what if their city had been overthrown, as the tower 
 of Siloam, and their bodies bad perished ? Had that 
 been an argument that his mercies bad forsaken them ? 
 No more than it was to Moses, who died for angering the 
 Lord before he went into the land of promise ; or tlian 
 it was toPaul,whosaid that 'the Lord had dehvered him 
 out of the month of the lion, and would also deliver 
 him from every evil work, and preserve him unto his 
 heavenly kingdom,' 2 Tim. iv., though afterward bo 
 was slain by Nero, who was the lion he there meant. 
 But I rather answer, that infidelity would have spoken 
 by a flat negation, God will not return : and despera- 
 tiim would not have cried upon God at all, nor have 
 pretended so much earnest. % This speech of the 
 
 • No forsilan ^mngniliulo clemeiiti;u uos faceret negU- 
 
 gentei. 
 
 t Maltos impeflit a firmitatc pricsumjitio firmitatis 
 
 X Certe inficlulitns dixissft ncKativfi. Desper.ilio ad Deum 
 
 n'lii clamaret, n';c tale seriiun jiraiteuileret — Luther. 
 
Yek. 9.J 
 
 LECTURE XXXVIII. 
 
 2-t5 
 
 Ninevites, at the most, hath but doubting ; and doubt- 
 ing containeth in it a kind of afHnnalion. * As 
 Mordecai spake to Esther in the fourth of that book : 
 ' If thou boldest thy peace at this time, breathing 
 and dehverance shall arise to the Jews out of another 
 place ; but thou and thy father's house shall perish : 
 and who knoweth whether thou art come to the king- 
 dom for such a time ?' That is, I little doubt but the 
 providence of God hath advanced thee thus high, to 
 do this service. I find noted upon the same phrase, 
 Joel the second, that is the fittest speech the penitent 
 may use ; for it includeth both these, a sense of sin 
 and hope of deliverance, f The leper cometh to 
 Christ, Mark i., and telleth him, ' Lord, if thou wilt, 
 thou canst make me clean :' I cannot say that either 
 thou wilt, or thou wilt not, I leave it to thine own 
 wisdom. For mine own part, I have deserved no 
 grace at thy hands ; I see nothing in myself, either in 
 body or soul, but leprosy and uncleanness ; but in 
 thee there is power and mercy, if it shall please thee 
 to extend them towards me. In the ninth of the same 
 evangelist, our Saviour answered the father of the 
 child that had the dumb spirit, requesting him, 'if he 
 could do anything,' to help them, and to have com- 
 passion upon them ; ' this if thou canst believe, all 
 things are possible to him that believeth. The father 
 cried with tears, Lord, I believe, help mine unbelief;' 
 that is, I^believe, and scarce believe; I would fain, but 
 I feel a fainting in myself; and therefore he that 
 craved but lately a cure for his son's infii-mity, now 
 craveth help for his own unbehef. So then I make 
 no doubt, but^ these are the words of faith : ' Who 
 knoweth if the Lord will return '?' albeit and uufii'm 
 and unsettled faith. For as between knowledge and 
 mere or negative igoorance, vjnoratio neijationis, 
 opinion lieth, so between a perfect and ripe faith, 
 and plain infidehty or distrustfulness, a weak and 
 middling faith. For there are degrees in faith ; it 
 hath a beginning, increase, and consummation. The 
 disciples are rebuked, Mark is., by the name of a 
 faithless generation : ' faithless generation, how 
 long shall I now bo with you,' &c. ; Peter, Mat. xiv., 
 for a ' httle and doubting faith ;' Paul, 2 Cor. x. 
 speaketh of ' an increasing faith ;' but Colossians the 
 first and second, of a faith wherein they are ' rooted, 
 built, and established ;' yea, the strongest faith that 
 ever was, is it not mixed with doubtfulness, overcast 
 with clouds, shaken with storms, beaten with winds 
 and rains, winnowed by Satan, that, if it were pos- 
 sible, it might be tm-ned into chatf and bran ? What 
 else meant that wary advertisement, given to Peter by 
 his Master, Luke xxii., and his vigilant care over him, 
 ' Simon, Simon,' listen to my speech ; ' behold,' 
 look well to thy footsteps, have an eye to thy soul, 
 
 * Dubitatio affirmationem quanJam in se confinet. — 
 Mercer. 
 
 t Vox aptissima pcenitentis ; utrumque in se continet, sen- 
 snm peccati, et spem liberationis. 
 
 ' Satan hath desired you ;' it is the care of his heart, 
 it is the mark that he shooteth at ; he watcheth, 
 walketh, roareth, transformeth him into all shapes, 
 yea, into an angel of light, to have his purpose; 
 ' to sift you,' examine you, ' as wheat,' gi-ain after 
 gi-ain, person after person, that, if it be possible, you 
 may be reproved. And surely we need the prayers 
 of our own spnits, and of the Sphit of God, that 
 ' groaneth with groanings which cannot be expressed ;' 
 and of the Son of God himself, who ' sitteth at his 
 Father's right hand, and maketh request for us,' that 
 our faith fail not. For what think we of ourselves '? 
 Are we pillars of brass, or as the deaf rocks of the sea, 
 or as mount Sion, that can never be removed? Our 
 'shield and breast-plate of faith' (for so it is called, 
 Eph. vi.), is it not beaten and driven at ' with darts' ? 
 ' fiery darts' ? yea, ' all the fiery darts' ? — I say not 
 'of the wicked' that are in our flesh. Atheists, Ai-ians, 
 Jews, Paynims, deriders, blasphemers of our faith — 
 but of him that is principally wicked, and leader of 
 the dance, Satan himself? This made him triumph 
 so much when he saw the field ended, and his taber- 
 nacle at hand to be pulled up, 2 Tim. iv., that he had 
 'fought a good fight,' though his enemies were in- 
 creased against him as the hairs of his head, that he 
 had 'run his race,' though he had many stumbling- 
 blocks and snares laid in his way, openly to detain, 
 secretly to undermine, him ; and, finally, which was 
 the chief glory of a Christian soldier, that he had 
 ' kept the faith,' and not lost his target, though he 
 had borne in his body the marks of Christ Jesus, and 
 felt in his soul many a buffet and wound given by 
 Satan and his confederates. The issue is this : the 
 faith of a Christian is sometimes in fight and conflict, 
 in agony, passion, sweating, bleeding, as Christ was 
 in the garden, resisting unto blood, shall I say? nay, 
 even unto hell itself. They knew it by experience 
 who said, ' Thou bringest down to hell.' It is as the 
 last and least sparkle of fire, almost extinguished; as 
 a little grain of seed, 'which the birds,' nay, the 
 devils, ' of the air seek to pick from us ;' and as the 
 last gasp and pant of the soul, ready to fly out; at 
 length it getteth the victory again, according to that 
 1 John v., ' This is the victory that overcomcth the 
 world, even your faith.' Such as I speak of was the 
 faith of these Ninevites, doubting, I confess, but not 
 despairing. And as Aquinas, to acquit the blessed 
 virgin from sin, maketh a double kind of dubitation 
 — one of infidelity, dubitatio infiddilatis, another of 
 admiration and discussion, dubitatio admirationis seu 
 discussionis* 'How can this thing be?' (for it is not 
 doubted by any man but the virgin there doubted, 
 and Augustine t so expoundeth ' the sword that should 
 pierce through her soul,' Luke the second) — so may 
 I with better reason make a double kind of infidelity: 
 one of abnegation, denial, renouncement; the other of 
 
 * 3 quse. '27, 4, ad. 2. 
 
 t In quaest. vet. et Nov. Testam. 73. 
 
24G 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 •wrestling, combat, contention, -nhich hath not yet 
 subdued the adversary force, nor gotten the upper 
 hand. I never knew the soul of au_y man, no, not of 
 the son of man, or rather of the son of woman, though 
 anointed with the oil of gladness and spiritual comfort 
 above all his fellows; I never knevs^ the soul so happily 
 guarded with the strength and munition of God, that 
 it could escape these sights and terrors of conscience 
 ■whereof I speak. Look upon Abraham, the father of 
 the fiiithful, distrusting the providence of God, as 
 unable to defend him and his wife from Pharaoh and 
 Abimelech unless he committed an untruth ; upon 
 Moses, when he was called from Egypt ; Gideon, 
 when the angel appeared unto him at the threshing- 
 floor ; Samuel, when be was "willed to anoint David, 
 and be feared the malice of Saul ; Elias, when he 
 hid himself, and needs would have died in haste, 
 because of the threatenings of Jezebel ; upon Marj- 
 and Zacharias, who asked as doubtful a question as 
 the Ninevites here did, "^ui; ; upon all the apostles of 
 Christ, whom he often upbraideth with ' little faith,' 
 and ' no faith ;' and Christ, the bead of his apostles, 
 when be died upon the cross with such passionate 
 outcrying, as if all the mercies of God bad died with 
 him. And this is the lot of all the members of Christ ; 
 thus they totter and reel in their souls, though ' the 
 foundation of the Lord standeth sure, and bath this 
 seal upon it. The Lord kuoweth who are his,' 2 Tim. 
 ii. 19. I will more say, they are the happiest souls, 
 and dearest unto God, that are so tried ; they are as 
 the best gold, which hath been purified in the fire 
 seven times, and the Lord will heap comforts and 
 joys sevonfuld into their bosoms. The certainty of 
 election and grace, and our special assurance of the 
 mercy of God, is mightily oppugned by the adver- 
 saries.* I will say for this time no more than what 
 note Catharinus gave of the decree made against it by 
 the last Council of Trent.f He was archbishop of 
 Minoria, inward with the popes of Kome, and himself 
 in person present at that council. Besides his own 
 private opinion, declared at large against Dominicus 
 of Soto, confessor to Charles the Fifth, that a man 
 may be certain of his salvation by that assurance, 
 which although it be not equal to the catholic fuitb, 
 yet it is true faith ; and that by the common law, 
 namely, by that testimony which the Spirit glveth 
 nnto our spirits that we are the sons of God ; be 
 further telleth us that both the presidents of that 
 Synod (one of them afterwards Julius the Third) did 
 protest that the question did not seem unto them 
 sufficiently discussed to decide anything, and that the 
 Synod itself twice declared that the definition thereof 
 
 * Flac. Illyr. de. Controvers. llelig. 
 
 t Certum jklssc fum liomiiiem certitudiiie, quto licet non 
 sit asqualis fidei catliolic.'c, est tamen vera tides. Idque lege 
 communi, nempe testimonio illo, &c. Non viilori quics- 
 lionem lianc satis discussam ad decisionem. Kt ipsam 
 Bynodum Lis dcclarasse, &c. 
 
 was to be omitted and put off to another time ; lastly, 
 that the title thereof did abundantly manifest as 
 much, the tenor whereof was against the vain confi- 
 dence of heretics,* not against the certainty of salva- 
 tion in sound and sober believers. Vain confidence 
 of heretics ! Vain, without probability ! and in here- 
 tics, not holding the truth of doctrine ! Who ever 
 allowed it ? But is it vain confidence which is 
 grounded upon the promises of God, watered by the 
 blood of Christ, sealed by sacraments, testified by the 
 Spirit, and ascertained by the fruits of charity and 
 obedience ? That vain confidence, where and in whom- 
 soever we find, we call bj' no milder names than the 
 Ehemist commenters do if damnable, false illusion, 
 unhappy security, presumption, faithless persuasion, 
 and not the faith of apostles, but the faith of devils. 
 Against such we shut up the bowels of charity, the 
 bosom of the church, the communion of her treasure 
 and dowr}', which arc the merits of Christ, and, as far 
 forth as the keys are committed unto us, the gates of 
 everlasting life. Against such we say not with the 
 psalm, 'Rejoice and tremble,' Ps. ii., but tremble 
 without rejoicing; nor with the apostle, Philip, ii., 
 ' Work out your salvation with fear and trembling,' 
 but tremble and fear without any hope of salvation. 
 We use nothing but fetters and corrosives against 
 such, to make them smart : ' Be not high-minded, 
 but fear,' Eom. xi; and 'be that seemoth to stand' 
 in his own conceit, ' let him take heed that he fall 
 not,' 1 Cor. X. We will sooner cast pearls to swiue, 
 and bread to whelps, than salvation to such men, who, 
 howsoever they live, have no testimony of a good con- 
 science, vaunting of hope without the love of God, 
 despiting the good Spirit of grace, treading the blood 
 of the new testament under their feet, turning grace 
 into wantonness, and using the liberty of the gospel 
 for a cloak of maliciousness, yet say they are sure to 
 be saved by the mercy of God. Thus far we both 
 agree ; but from the assurance of salvation wisely and 
 substantially held, neither the learning of our adver- 
 saries, nor the cunning of devils, shall ever be able to 
 draw us. AVe will say with Antonius Mariuarius in 
 the council before alleged. If heaven fall, if the earth 
 vanish away,}: if the whole world run headlong, I will 
 look to the goodness of God, and stand upright; and 
 if an angel irom heaven shall labour to persuade me 
 otherwise, I will say Anathema unto him. Oh happy 
 confidence of a Christian heart ! § If an honest and 
 virtuous man, sailb Cyprian, should promise thee any- 
 thing, thou wouldst give credit unto him ; now, when 
 God speaketh with thee, and promiseth thee immortality, 
 dost thou waver in thy mind ? or art thou so faith- 
 less to distrust him ? This is not to know God at all ; 
 
 * Contra inaneni liajrilicorum fiduciam. — Sess. vi. cap. i.\. 
 t In Eom. viii. and 1 Cor. ix. 
 J Si cojlani nuil, &c — Domi. 4. qiiadrag. 
 § foelicem Cliristiani pectoris fiduciam, &c. — De Mortal, 
 ser. ii. 
 
Ver. 10.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXTX. 
 
 2-^7 
 
 this is to offend Christ, the master of believers, with 
 the sin of unbelief. This is to be planted in the 
 church, that is, in the house of faith, without faith. * 
 Stephen ' saw the heavens open unto him,' and com- 
 mended his spirit unto God, though as his body was 
 oversvhelmed with stones, so were his ears with con- 
 tumelies ; and as many stones of temptation were cast 
 by the devil against his conscience. For where should 
 the weak have safety and security, but in the wounds 
 of their Saviour ? The mightier he is to save me, the 
 more careless I dwell there. The world rageth, the 
 body overbeareth, the devil lieth in wait, yet I fall 
 not, because I am founded upon a sure rock. I have 
 sinned a huge sin, my conscience is troubled, but it 
 shall not be dismayed, for I will remember the wounds 
 of the Lord, f "What is so deadly that may not be 
 cured by the death of Christ ? Therefore, if I call 
 but to mind bow sovereign and eflectual a medicine 
 his death is, I cannot he daunted by the malignit}' of 
 any disease, j Wherefore, as Christ admonished the 
 church of Thyatii'a, Rev. ii., so I in the name of 
 Christ exhort you, ' that which you have already, hold 
 fast till he come.' Let not your hope and consolations 
 in the mercies of God be taken from you ; let others 
 for their pleasure, and for want of better grounds, be- 
 cause they lean upon a staif of reed, masses, merits, 
 indulgences, and the like, make shipwreck of this 
 swTet article, and be carried away, as the winds and 
 seas of their own opinions shall drive them, till they 
 find some other haven to rest in. But [this] shall 
 ever reign and bear the sceptre in our consciences as an 
 article of that price, without the which our lives are 
 not dear unto us. The sun may be under a cloud at 
 times, but fear not, it will shine again ; the fire may 
 be buried under ashes, but it will break forth ; the 
 ark may be taken by the Philistines, but it shall be 
 restored to Israel ; and these heavenly persuasions 
 may sometimes be assaulted, and battered, but thoy 
 shall soonest return unto us. I dare affirm that there 
 never was elect soul upon the earth, redeemed by the 
 blood, and sanctified by the Spirit of God, but hath 
 drunk largely of these comforts whereof I speak ; and 
 
 ♦ Hoc est in ecclesia cocstitulum, in c!omo fidei, fidum 
 nou lial)ere. 
 
 t Ubi tuta firmaqiie infirmis securitas nisi in vulneiibus 
 servatoris, &c. — Ber. Ser. Ixi. in Cant. 
 
 X Quid tarn ad mortem quod nou morte CLvisti sanetur ? 
 —Ibid. 
 
 then their largest draught, when they have most 
 thirsted after it, that howsoever their life hath been 
 tempered of good and bad days and good again, as 
 those that are held with agues, of honour and dis- 
 honour, health and sickness, war and peace, joy and 
 heaviness, yet the better of these two conditions 
 hath ever had the latter and the upper hand ; and to 
 have ended their lives, I say not in their beds, but 
 under a shower of stones, as Stephen did, or by the 
 sword of a tyrant, or amongst the teeth of wild beasts, 
 hath been no more unto them, than if a ripe fig had 
 been plucked from the tree which it grew upon. For 
 they have gone away with a sentence of peace in their 
 lips, as the dove came back to the ark with an olive 
 branch, ' Christ is my life, death mine advantage.' 
 
 Thus much of the phrase, ' Who knoweth if God 
 will return ?' The matter which they hope for (in a 
 word, and to conclude) is the mercy of God. In the 
 explication whereof they use an order of words : 
 1, that God must return, as if he were now absent, 
 and had withdrawn himself from them ; "2, that God 
 must repent, not by changing his mind, but by calling 
 in the decree which was gone forth ; 8, that the J'arij 
 of his wrath might be pacified ; lastlj', to this end, 
 that destruction may bo averted from them ; as much 
 as to say. If God vouchsafe not his presence unto us, 
 or if he hold his former intendment, or if the heat of 
 his fierce wrath be not quenched, we are sure to 
 perish. And so it fareth with us all, that except the 
 Lord do enlighten us with his favourable and gracious 
 countenance, except he apply himself with his whole 
 heart and with all his soul (as it is in Jeremiah, chap, 
 xxsii.), to do us good ; and unless the fire of his 
 anger be drowned in the bowels of compassion, and 
 his rage burning down to hell, be swallowed up into 
 pity above the clouds, what else can follow but the 
 wreck of our bodies and souls, the evcrsion of our 
 houses and families, and utter desolation to towns, 
 cities, and entire countries ? Therefore, let us be- 
 seech God that he ever vouchsafe to dwell with us, 
 as he sometimes ' dwelt in the bush,' to change his 
 cursings into blessings ; and to quench his deserved 
 wrath, kindled like a whole river of brimstone, with 
 his streams of grace, that it may be well with us and 
 our children, and our whole land, and our last end 
 may be that which is the end and conclusion of the 
 king's edict, ' that we perish not.' 
 
 LECTUEE XXXIX. 
 
 Aiul God saw their irorlcs, that theij turned from their ceil ivaijs. — JoN.VH III. 10. 
 
 THE ground which the people of Nineveh took for 
 repentance, was faith ; which, although it ap- 
 peareth by their manner of speech, having scruple and 
 
 uncertainty in it, to have been an unperfect fsith, not 
 thoroughly strengthened, and fighting as yet against the 
 horror of their own sins and terror of God's judg- 
 
248 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 ments, yet an imperfect faith is faith, more or less ; 
 and the best that ever were, have not escaped such 
 distractions and disquietings of their souls, and 
 when they have wrestled a time against the adversary 
 powers, they have returned with the victory, and have 
 set up their banners of triumph in the name and vir- 
 tue of the Lord of hosts. ' Their foundations are in 
 the holy hills,' not in the valleys of their own infir- 
 mities, for then they must despair, but in the might 
 and mercy of almighty God, which stand for ever. 
 The matter of their faith, consisting of four members 
 {three of them appertaioing to God, his return, re- 
 pentance, and leaving of his fierce wrath, the fourth 
 and last to themselves), I went over in haste, and will 
 briefly repeat unto you. 1. They believed that God 
 might return, and vouchsafe them his presence and 
 company again, taken from the manner of men, who 
 in their anger and displeasure forsake the very place 
 where their eye-sore lieth ; and, being reconciled, use 
 it for an argument of their revived friendship to return 
 to those houses which they had forsaken. So saith 
 God, Hosea v., ' I will go and return to my place, till 
 they acknowledge their faults and seek me. In their 
 affliction they will seek me diligently, and say. Come, 
 let us retm-n unto the Lord.' So they depart from 
 God,_ and God from them. They withdraw their 
 obedience, he his blessings ; and although he be in the 
 midst of them, nearer than their flesh to their spirits, 
 yet by any demonstration of love, they cannot per- 
 ceive his presence. God was ever in" Nineveh ; no 
 doubt by his essence, his power, his overlooking pro- 
 vidence, for ' in him they lived, moved, and always 
 had their being ;' but he was not in Nineveh by 
 grace, by the guiding and government of his Holy 
 Spirit, neither by special favour and assistance ; he 
 had forsaken their city and consciences, as thorny, 
 unprofitable ground, fitter for idols and abominations, 
 than for himself to dwell in. 2. They believed that 
 God might repent ; which is also borrowed from the 
 aflfections of men, whose manner is, to be sorry in 
 their hearts, for their former displeasure conceived, 
 and to wish it had never been, and as much as pos- 
 sible they may, to revoke whatsoever in the heat 
 thereof they had determined. 3. Thethirdisconscquent 
 to the former ; for if ho return and repent, his anger 
 must needs be removed. All these motions, either 
 of the body, in going from place to place, or of the 
 Boul, in altering her passions, are attributed unto us 
 truly, uXr^UMi, but unto God, in no other manner than 
 may stand with the nature and honour of his unmove- 
 able majesty, 3£(,a-j£T5j. 4. Now, lastly, where God 
 is departed, and the light of bis countenance, the 
 life of his compassions taken away, his wrath kindled, 
 nay, his fierce and furious wrath, the length and 
 breadth whereof, no more than of his mercies, can 
 be measured, there ensuoth an abundance of misery, 
 with a diligent train of all kinds of plagues, having 
 an open field to range in, because there is no will in 
 
 God to resist them. Therefore they believed, in the 
 fourth place, that if his presence were recovered, his 
 decree changed, and his wrath stopped, they should 
 be freed from the danger threatened unto them, assur- 
 ing themselves otherwise, that the buildings of their 
 city should sink down, stone after stone, and that the 
 children thereof should all be buried and entombed 
 together in one common destruction. Therefore 
 miserable is their estate, who live within the vapour 
 and heat of God's displeasure. We are all ' by nature 
 the children of wrath,' born to inherit it, as we in- 
 herit our fathers' lands ; but Christ hath purchased 
 us favour by his blood, and we confirm it to ourselves 
 in some sort by making conscience to oflend, and walk- 
 ing warily in the fear of the Lord. But such as run 
 on their wicked race without turning, and draw their 
 unhappy breath without repenting, heaping anger 
 upon anger, and not caring to pacify the force thereof, 
 their end is the end of the sentence, that they are 
 sure to perish, not in themselves alone, but in all that 
 appertaineth unto them — their tabernacles, children, 
 posterity, memorials ; not only in the life of their 
 bodies, but in the life and eternity of their souls ; nor 
 for an age and generation of time, but whilst God 
 reigneth in heaven able to do justice. To avoid this 
 danger, it shall be safe for us all to quench the anger 
 of God in time, to take the blood of the Lamb, and 
 cast upon the flames thereof, and through the riches 
 of his merits, to seek the acceptance, and to hold 
 acquaintance and friendship with our God, that we 
 perish not. 
 
 And God saw their works, &c. We'are now come 
 to the fourth part of the chapter, the mercy of God 
 towards Nineveh, greater than both the former, be- 
 cause it is not exhibited to one, as unto Jonah, nor 
 unto a few, as unto the mariners, but unto a whole 
 city, plentifully peopled and stored with inhabitants. 
 Even so it is ; whether one or more, many or few, 
 man, woman, child, cities, kingdoms, empires, worlds, 
 all generations, past, present, and those that are to 
 come, wo draw out waters of joy and comfort out of 
 this well of salvation. There is a degi'eo also in the 
 words of this sentence. For, Jirsi, God ' approveth 
 their works,' and conceiveth a liking of their service 
 done ; if you will know what works, j'ou have it by 
 explication made plain, their conversion from their 
 evil ways ; that is, their whole course of repentance. 
 Sccoiidl;/, upon that approbation, ' he repented him of 
 the evil which he said he would bring upon them.' 
 Third 1 1/, upon that repentance and change of mind, 
 ' he doth it not.' The words arc not greatly obscure, 
 a little explanation may serve to unfold them. 
 
 God xinr. Why ? Was he a stranger till that 
 time in Nineveh ? or did he but then begin to open 
 his eyes, and to take the knowledge of their works ? 
 Or is there anything in heaven, or earth, or in tho 
 deep, that he seeth not with his eyes ten thousand 
 times brighter than the sun ; yea, though it wero 
 
Ver. 10.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXIX. 
 
 249 
 
 hid, I say, not within the reins and hearts of our 
 bodies, but in the reins and heart of the lowest de- 
 struction ? Some interpret it thus : ' he saw,' that 
 is, he made themselves to see,* or the world to see, 
 that he was well pleased with their works ; others 
 more simplj- and trulj', he saw their works, that is, 
 himself approved them, fas Gen. i., 'he saw that 
 the light was good,' that is, he allowed it by his judg- 
 ment ; so here he shewed by his fact and event that 
 followed, that the repentance of Nineveh highly con- 
 tented him. Likewise, Gen. iv., ' God looked unto 
 the gift of Abel, but not unto the gift of Cain ;' he 
 saw them both with his eye of knowledge, but not of 
 liking and good afiectiou. Or to say further, God 
 saw that in the work of the Ninevites, which if 
 Jonah or the whole world had ])i'esumed to have 
 seen, they had deceived themselves ; he saw their 
 heart from whence those works proceeded, how truly 
 and sincerely they were done without dissimulation. 
 In this sense we say that the church is invisible, and 
 as we are taught in our creed, we rather believe that 
 it is, than with our eyes can behold it ; not that we 
 turn men into spirits, not having flesh and bones, or 
 into transparent substances, such as the air is, which 
 we cannot see ; but because, although we behold the 
 body and the outward appearance, we cannot search 
 into their spirits, neither are able to discern them in 
 that whereby they are Christians, and of the house- 
 hold of faith. We think they are myrtles, when they 
 are but nettles ; lambs when they are but wolves, and 
 citizens of Jerusalem, when they are but Jebusites. 
 
 Their ivoiks. Not only their works of ceremony, 
 order, and discipline, as fasting, sackcloth, crying, 
 which are not godliness itself, but gestures and be- 
 haviours setting it forth, cmiditiira pictatis; nor only 
 their moral works, of charity towards God and man, 
 in forsaking their wicked ways, and making restitution 
 of ill-gotten goods (for these are most of them out- 
 ward works) ; but he saw the works also of the inward 
 man, and, as it is expounded in the next words, he 
 saw their perfect and full conversion, which consisted 
 not in fasting and sackcloth alone, or in formal pro- 
 fessions, but in the change and alteration of all their 
 powers. Thus, to acknowledge the true and immortal 
 God is a work, but a work of the Spirit, both because 
 the Spirit of God is the author, and because the spirit 
 of man is the actor and administrator thereof. To 
 believe is also a work of the Spirit ; for when they 
 asked, John vi., ' What shall we do that we might 
 work the works of God ? ' Jesus answered them, 
 'This is the work of God, that ye believe in him whom 
 \he hath sent.' God saw all these works in them ; 
 vhat they thought, how they believed, which way the 
 pil'poses of their hearts were bent ; he saw their faith, 
 as well as their ceremonies; their justice evangelical, 
 as well as their legal ; he saw their whole body of 
 repentance, wherein there was knowledge, desire, 
 * Vidit., i.e. videre fecit. f Vidit., i.e. approbavit. 
 
 judgment, affection, faith, hope, and whatsoever else 
 was requisite to be used in that work. 
 
 Ami God repented. We had the word before, ' Who 
 knoweth if God will repent ? ' But can this be ? 
 Kepentance hath ever some grief annexed unto it, and 
 an accusation of ourselves, of something done amiss 
 which we would gladlj' retract. Both these are far 
 from God, who sitteth in heaven, having all sufficiency 
 of pleasure and contentment in himself; and for his 
 works abroad, they are so exactlj' done by rule, that 
 we cannot suspect any error therein committed. The 
 answer is this : He that dwelleth in such brightness 
 of light as never eye of mortality could approach unto, 
 the sight of whose face to an earthly man is unsuffer- 
 able, and the knowledge of those invisible things in 
 the Godhead unpossible ; yet to give some aim and 
 conjecture unto us what he is, he appeareth as it were 
 transfigured into the likeness of our nature, and in 
 our own familiar terms, not departing from our accus- 
 tomed manners, speaketh to our carnal senses ; and 
 that man may know him in some measure, he wiU be 
 Ivnown as man, by e3"es, ears, bands, feet, other bodily 
 members, by anger, sorrow, repentance, jealousy, with 
 the like spiritual afl'ections. By which he would 
 signify unto us, not that which is so indeed, but that 
 which is needful on our behalf so to be uttered and 
 expressed.* For, because we ai'e not ignorant of the 
 use, office, efiect, of these daily and natural things in 
 ourselves, therefore when we hear them ascribed to 
 God by translation, we are able partly- to guess what 
 is meant by them. The rule which Bernard giveth 
 in his fourth sermon upon the Canticles, is catholic, 
 and universally serveth to the opening of these figures : 
 Hcec hahet omnia Deiis per effectwii, uon ]ier naturam — 
 All these hath God, not by nature, but by eft'ect. 
 Now what is the efl'ect of anger ? Revenge. For a 
 man that is angered is desirous to be satisfied, and to 
 wreak himself upon him that hath provoked him. 
 The passion of anger is not in the nature of God, but 
 the efiect is : ' Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith 
 the Lord.' What is the effect of repentance '? The 
 change or abrogation of something formerly done, or 
 at least determined. Repentance is not in God, the 
 elTect of repentance is : the recalling or undoing of a 
 work which in the judgment of the world was like to 
 have continued. t Thus he 'repented the making of 
 man,' Gen. vi., and the advancing of Saul to the 
 kingdom, 1 Sam. xv. ; not that his heart was grieved, 
 but his hands, that is, his justice and power, undid it ; 
 and thus he repented his judgment against Nineveh, 
 by staj-ing the sequel and fall thereof. So that the 
 easiest exposition, indeed, of the repentance of God, 
 is in the third member of the verse : for therefore he 
 repented him, ' because he did it not.' 
 
 llie evil which is here mentioned is different from 
 
 * Quibus significare illud quod ita non est, sed quod ita 
 dici opus asset. — August. lib. i. dc Tim. cap. i. 
 t Non implevit quod fuerat comminatus. 
 
250 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. Ill 
 
 that which 'went before, where ' their evil ways ' are 
 sijokeu of. For that was culpable, malum ctilpw, this 
 but penal, miilnm jnrnce ; that defileth a man, this but 
 ehasteneth and aitiicteth him ; that was evil in doing, 
 this but in sullering, quoquis male fecit, quoque inali 
 j)erjjessus est ;* that in nature, tbis in feeling, malum 
 nalura, malum secundum seiisum ; f the latter proceed- 
 eth from the justice of God, the other he is most 
 free from. 
 
 And God saw their u'urks, that they turned from their 
 evil waj/s. When I first took in hand to declare the 
 repentance of Nineveh, I desired you to bear in mind 
 that the first and principal gate whereby they entered 
 into that service towards God was faith. The prophet 
 who compiled the history noted no less, as appeareth 
 by his placing of it in the head of the book, that is, 
 in the beginning of the whole narration. Ihcy he- 
 liircd God, crcdiderunt Deo ; they took him to be a 
 God of truth, and made no question but his word iu 
 the mouth of his servant should be established. And I 
 as little doubt but thuyalso believed iji God, credidcrunl 
 in Deum ; not only assenting to the truth of the mes- 
 sage, but entertaining iu their hearts a persuasion of 
 deliverance. In the ninth verse it is very plain, where 
 the hope of his mercy is that which induccth them to 
 all these works of piety. Here it is said that ' God 
 saw their works,' and consequently ' repented him of 
 the judgment, and did it not.' The place hath been 
 abused, and a weapon drawn therehence to fight 
 against God's grace : that these altlictions of the 
 Kinevites, macerating themselves with fasting and 
 sackcloth, prepared them aforehand to the easier 
 attainment of their pardon. Such are the pillars 
 wliich they build their works of preparation upon, 
 that before a man is justified his works may deserve 
 that favour of God ; not of condignity (they say), 
 worth for worth, but of congruity, as if it stood not 
 •with reason and conscience that their works should be 
 forgotten. If the prophet had trusted our simplicity 
 herein, and concealed the name of faith, which here 
 he placeth with her open face, as the leader and fore- 
 runner to all their other actions, could we ever have 
 imagined that they would have humbled themselves 
 by I'epentance, and prayed unto God, on whom they 
 had not first believed '? And whosoever he be that 
 spondcth his wretched days in the wilderness of this 
 world, a wilderness of sin, as the children of Israel in 
 that waste and roaring wilderness of Sin, Exod. svi., 
 without tbis cloud by day and pillar by night to guide 
 him the way to his rest, he walkcth he knoweth not 
 how, he straycth, slumbleth, i'alletb, because he hath 
 not light; he liveth and dielh in darkness; his soul 
 is as a field unfilled, or as a vineyard grown wild, 
 which though it have store of grapes, they are but 
 sour grapes ; his worship of God and works of common 
 civility, what gloss soever they bear of honesty and 
 
 * August do lib, arb. 
 
 ■\ Basil serm. An Dcus ait authur malt. 
 
 commodity in the eyes of men, they are both un- 
 fruitful to himself, and before the face of God full 
 of sin and reprobation. There are two things in 
 the whole course of this history whereunto I will 
 limit my speech : the one, what the Ninevites did, 
 they ' believed, proclaimed a fast, repented ; ' the 
 other, what God, he ' saw their works,' and was 
 satisfied. 
 
 In the person of the Ninevites, faith goeth foremost, 
 works follow it. This is the nature of a true and 
 living faith, it ever ' worketh by love,' Gal. v., and 
 'by works it is made perfect,' James ii.; and faith 
 without these is as an alms of the rich man to the 
 poor, ' Depart in peace, warm thyself, fill thy belly,' 
 but he giveth him nothing ; or as the body without 
 the spirit, wherein the life and motion thereof con- 
 sisteth. For even the thief upon the cross, that little 
 time which he had he bestowed in good works, in 
 reproof of his fellow, condemnation of themselves, jus- 
 tification of Christ, invocation of his name, and a 
 true confession that he was the King of Israel. And 
 this although we speak, and write, and imprint, and 
 preach in all our assemblies, and even the pillars of 
 our churches can bear witness unto us, that faith is 
 an idle, unperfect, verbal, and dead faith, where is not 
 sanctity of life to attend it ; and we both receive it 
 ourselves as ' a faithful saying,' and confirm it to 
 others, ' that such as have believed God, must also 
 be careful to excel in good works,' Titus iii ; yet if the 
 pens and presses of the Roman faction might pass 
 without controlment, we should be traduced as far as 
 the world is Christian (for preaching only faith in the 
 justification of a sinful man), that our gospel is a 
 gospel of liberty, epicm-ism, sensuality ; that we 
 pluck up good works as weeds by the roots, and cast 
 them forth of the doors, as the children of the bond- 
 woman, not worthy to inherit with the free-born. We 
 never said that faith without works (barren and empty 
 of her fruits) justified an unrighteous soul ; but that 
 faith, so qualified, doth notwithstanding justify with- 
 out those works. This we maintain against men and 
 angels. So we remove not works from faith, but 
 works from justifying. Still they follow their mis- 
 tress ; but in remission of sins, and clothing the 
 sinner with the justice of God, therein they give her 
 the place, and put the burden of that work upon her 
 shoulders. Let IJilhah the handmaid supjilv tbc defects 
 of Rachel, and bear children unto Jacob ; but let her 
 ever remember that Rachel is above her, and singular 
 in some respect. And let not Joseph forget, though 
 he ride in the second chariot of Egypt, and be the 
 next man to the king, yet that the king hath reserved 
 the throne to himself. Shall I yet teach you by a 
 more sensible and familiar demonstration ? Judith xiii., 
 Lethulia is in danger of Ilolofernes, the terror of the 
 east, as we of the justice of God ; and as the strength 
 of Bcthulia was thought too weak to encounter him, 
 so all our obedience to the law of God is weak and 
 
Ver. lO.J 
 
 LECTURE XXXIX. 
 
 251 
 
 nnsufficient to defend us ; Judith undertaketli for the 
 people of her city, faith for us ; Judith goeth accom- 
 panied with her handmaid, faith with her works ; 
 and though the eyes of her handmaid were ever to- 
 wards her lady, to carry the scrip, &c., yet in per- 
 forming that act of dehverance Judith is alone, her 
 maid standing and waiting at the door, and not so 
 much as setting her foot within the chamber. So, 
 although our love and obedience be as attendant to 
 faith as ever that servant was to Judith, yet in per- 
 forming this mighty act of deliverance, acquitting the 
 conscience from the curse of the law, pacifying the 
 anger of God, and presenting us blameless btfore his 
 holy eyes, all which standeth iu the apprehension of 
 the merits of Christ, and a stedfast persuasion that he 
 hath assumed for us, faith is wholly and solely alone, 
 our works not claiming any part in that sacred 
 action. 
 
 ' Therefore we conclude,' saith the apostle, Kom. 
 iii., ' that a man is justified by faith without the 
 works of the law.' ' Therefore you see,' saith James 
 in the second of his epistle, ' that of works a man is 
 justified, and not of faith only.' He is, and he is not. 
 Doth the one conclude the former, and doth the other 
 infer also by way of conclusion that he hath proved 
 the latter ? What shall we say ? Is God divided, 
 or is there dissension iu the spirit of unity, or is 
 there more than one truth ? Apostle against apostle, 
 James against Paul, in one and the same question 
 deriving a contrary conclusion ? Not so. But as the 
 striking of two flints together heateth out fire, so 
 the comparing of these their two opinions will make 
 the truth more manifest. Surely by faith we are 
 justified, and without the works of the law. Mean it 
 of ceremonies as some do, mean it of moral command- 
 ments, the position is both ways true. This rock we 
 must cleave unto; this rock must be published abroad; 
 rocks and stones will publish this rock if we conceal 
 it. ' To him that worketh not, but belicvcth on him 
 that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is accounted for 
 righteousness,' Rom. iv. To him that iroikclh )wt. I 
 will not say that he worketh not at all, but he worketh 
 not in this action, nor with any intent, either to pre- 
 pare or further his justification before the face of 
 God ; his works are not reckoned at that time, nay, 
 they withdraw their presence, and hang down their 
 heads, and are abashed to oii'er themselves in that 
 service. But here is the point. As I am justified by 
 faith without the works of the law, so b}' the works of 
 the law must mj' faith be justified, that is, avouched, 
 made good, and testified both to God and man, with 
 eflectual proof and demonstration that it is not a 
 naked, fruitless, hypocritical faith, but soundly and 
 substantially conditioned. So James meant it. And 
 Thomas Aquinas, writing upon that epistle, confirmeth 
 that meaning, that the justification whereof»he spake 
 is the exorcising or accomplishing of justice ; for a 
 thing is then said to be done, either when it is per- 
 
 fected, or when it is made known.* So, then, there 
 is one righteousness imputed, favoured, and cast upon 
 us, though it bo not ours ; there is another right- 
 eousness exercised or declared ; there is one justice of 
 justification, there is another justice of testification ; 
 there is one that acqnitteth before God, another that 
 approveth especially before man ; the one without us, 
 and lent, the other within us, inhabitant and inherent; 
 the one in Christ, and from him communicated to us, 
 the other in ourselves, and to him in some sort recom- 
 pensed. For such is the nature of faith and love, as 
 the ancients described their graces ; the one is in 
 taking and apprehension, the other is in giving and 
 remuneration. First, we receive by our faith, and 
 then by our charity we return something. Paul 
 speaketh of the former of these justifications, James 
 of the latter ; Paul delivered simply the doctrine, 
 James answered an objection against those that gloried 
 iu the name and shadow of faith ; Paul instructed the 
 understanding, James informed the life ; Paul as a 
 doctor in the schools lecturing, James as a pastor, and 
 in the pulpit applying ; the one handling justification 
 properly, the other (to speak as properly) sanctifipa- 
 tion; the one establishing a real. Christian, justifying 
 faith, the other confuting a verbal, devilish, falsifying 
 faith. There is now then but one Lord, one spirit, 
 one truth, one gospel, one tongue, one soul in both 
 these apostles. 
 
 Consider the state of the question in this present 
 example of the Niuevites. You know what they were, 
 not only aliens and strangers from the covenant and 
 hope of God, but of aliens and strangers, such whose 
 iniquity streamed into the highest heaven, and called 
 down vengeance upon them. What should they now 
 do to redeem their peace ? For if they had fasted 
 till their knees had bowed under them, if they had 
 put sackcloth about their loins fill the hair and wale 
 thereof had entered even into their souls, if they had 
 spent the day in crying and the night in wailing, and 
 it they had fived besides as justly to the world, as 
 Aristides did in Athens, who was banished the city 
 for over much justice, and had not withal believed, I 
 will not say but God might have spared to have made 
 them notorious examples of his justice to the world, 
 but surely they had remained as aforetime, children of 
 darkness still, and sons of perdition, and the ways of 
 peace they had never known. Therefore, to conclude, 
 on their part, they are justified by their faith. This is^ 
 it that investeth them into the friendship and love of 
 God ; their very believing of him is imputed unto 
 them for righteousness, as it was to Abraham ; and 
 to testify their faith to man, to make it perfect before 
 God, to seal it up to their own conscience, they are 
 abundant also in good works, which is that other 
 justification whereof James disputeth. For as in the 
 temple of Jerusalem there were three distinctions of 
 * Exercitatio vel consumraatio jiistitiaj : res enim turn 
 dicitur fieri, quando perficitur vel innotestit, 
 
252 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 rooms, the entry or porch where the beasts were killed, 
 the altar where they were sacrificed, and the holiest 
 place of all, whither the high priest entered once every 
 year ; so in this repentance of Nineveh there are 
 three sorts of righteousness : the first of ceremony, in 
 wearing sackcloth, and fasting; the second of morality, 
 in restitution ; the third, the justice of faith, and as it 
 were ' the door of hope,' Hosea ii., whereby they first 
 enter into the kingdom. 
 
 2. We have heard what the Ninevites did for their 
 parts, let us now consider what God for his. It is 
 said that ' he saw their works, and repented him of 
 the plague ' intended, and brought it not. Nay, it is 
 said, that God saw their works, and God repented 
 him of the plague, with repetition of that blessed 
 name, to let the world understand that the mischief 
 was not turned away for the value and virtue of their 
 works, but for the acceptance of his own good plea- 
 sure ; nor for the repentance of the city, but for the 
 repentance of his own heart, a gracious inclination 
 and propension that he took to deliver them. No 
 marvel it was, if when God saw their works, he be- 
 thought him of their deliverance. For when the 
 person is once approved, and received to grace (which 
 their faith procured them), his blemishes are not then 
 looked upon, his infirmities covered, his unperfect 
 obedience taken in good part, nay, commended, 
 honoured, rewarded, and daily provoked with pro- 
 mises and invitations of greater blessings to come. 
 So a father allureth his son ; the servant doth ten 
 times more, yet is the recompense of the son ten 
 times greater ; for the father respecteth not so much 
 the works of his child, but because he is a father, 
 tendeth and followeth him with fatherly affection, 
 whereas the hired servant on the other side is but a 
 stranger unto him. Why, then, were the works of 
 Nineveh acceptable unto God ? Not of themselves, 
 but for their sakes that wrought them, and they for 
 their faith ; for this is the root that beareth them all. 
 In that great cloud of witnesses, Heb. xi., what was 
 the reason that they pleased God (besides the honour 
 of the world, that they were well reported of), and 
 obtained the promises, which was the garland they ran 
 for (besides their sufl'ering of adversities, subduing of 
 kingdoms, working of righteousness, with many other 
 famous exploits there ascribed unto them), what was 
 the reason, I say, but their faith, which is the whole 
 burden of the song in that memorable bead-roll ? By 
 faith did Abel thus, Enoch thus, and others other- 
 wise. But why not their works of themselves ? For 
 is not charity more than faith ? ' These three remain, 
 faith, hope, and love ; but the greater of these three 
 is love,' 1 Cor. xiii. ; and ' the first and the great 
 commandment is this. Thou shalt love the Lord thj' 
 God,' &c., Matthew the two and twentieth ; and ' the 
 end of the commandment is love,' 1 Tim. i. ; and ' love 
 is the fulfilling of the law,' Romans the thirteenth. I 
 grant all this, if thou be able to perform it. ' Love 
 
 the Lord thy God with all thy heart, &o., and thy 
 neighbour as thyself; ' and there is nothing wanting 
 unto thee ; thou hast kept the commandment, thou 
 hast fulfilled the law, thou needest not the passion of 
 thy Redeemer, thou mayest catch the crown of life 
 by rightful desert. But this thou art not able to per- 
 form, wort thou as righteous as Noah, as obedient as 
 Abraham, as holy as Job, as faithful as David, as 
 clear as the sun and moon, as pure as the stars in 
 heaven, yet thou must sing and sigh with a better soul 
 than thine own, who saw and sighed for the impurity 
 of all living flesh: ' Enter not into judgment with thy 
 servant, Lord, for no flesh living can be justified in 
 thy sight.' God hath concluded thee, and thy fathers 
 before thee, and the fruit of thy body to the last gene- 
 ration of the world, under sin, and because under sin, 
 therefore under wrath, and malediction, and death, if 
 thou fly not into the sanctuary to hide and safeguard 
 thyself. But blessed be the name of Chi-ist, the days 
 are come wherein ' this song is sung in the land of 
 Judah,' Isa. ssvi., and through all the Israel of God 
 far and near : ' We have a strong city, salvation hath 
 God set for walls and bulwarks about it. Open ye 
 the gates, that the righteous nation which keepeth 
 faith may enter in.' Which is that righteous nation 
 that shall enter into the city of God, thus walled and 
 fortressed, but that which keepeth faith, or rather 
 faiths {/ides), as the Hebrew hath, that is, all faith, 
 not ceasing to believe till their lives' end ? They that 
 believe thus, adding faith unto faith, the Lord will 
 return them as great a measure of his blessing, even 
 ' peace upon peace,' in the next words, ' because they 
 trust in him.' We need no better expositor. The 
 righteous man is he that believeth, and the believing 
 man is he that worketh righteousness, for these two 
 shall never be sundered ; and the only key that open- 
 eth unto us the gates of the city is our faith. So 
 then, when we see good works, we must know that 
 they are but fruits, and seek out the root of them ; 
 and when wo have the root, we must also have regard 
 to the moisture and juice whei'eby it is nourished. 
 For as the fruits of the earth grow from their root, 
 and that root liveth not by itself, but is fed and pre- 
 served by the fatness of the soil, warmth of the sun, 
 and benefit of the air under which it standeth, so 
 good works grow from faith, and that faith liveth in the 
 object, the merits and obedience of Jesus Christ, feed- 
 ing and strengthening itself by the sweet influence and 
 sap of these heavenly conceits, that he ' came into the 
 world to save sinners,' and that ' he died for her sin, 
 and rose to life for her justification.' For as we 
 esteem the worth of a ring of gold not so much in 
 itself as in the gem that it carrieth, so are we justified 
 and magnified also in the sight of God by faith in 
 Christ ; not for this quality of believing, which is as 
 unperfect as our works, but for the object of this 
 quality, Christ our mediator, which is the diamond 
 and jewel borne therein. The hand of the lepor, 
 
Ver. 10.] 
 
 LECTURE XXXIX. 
 
 253 
 
 though never so bloody and unclean, yet it may do 
 the office of a hand, in taking and holding fast the 
 alms that is given. The giver may be liberal enough, 
 and the gift sufficient to relieve, though the hand that 
 received it full of impurity. So it is not the weakness 
 of our faith, in apprehending and applying the passion 
 of Christ, that can prejudice the bounty of our God, 
 and those rich benefits of his grace which his beloved 
 Son hath purchased for us. 
 
 : I now conclude. God saw the works of the Nine- 
 vites, and in those works not only their outward 
 countenance, but their inward and unfeigned afleclion, 
 and faith the root from whence they sprang ; and as 
 the fruits of their faith, so he accepted them, not for 
 the worth and account of the works, which they dare 
 not themselves rely upon, but through the riches and 
 abundance of his own loving-kindness. This is the 
 plea that Daniel held in the ninth of his prophecy, a 
 man of as righteous a spirit as ever the Lateran pa- 
 lace of Komeheld, 'according to all thy righteousness,' 
 secundum oniticm justitiam tuiim, ver. 16; 'for the 
 Lord's sake,' propter Doiiiinum, 17 ; ' for thy great 
 tender mercies,' propter miserationes tuas aiiipUssiincis, 
 18 ; ' for thine own sake,' propter te, 19 ; and with 
 direct exception to their inherent justice, ' for we do 
 not present our supplications before theo for our own 
 righteousness,' non enhn propter uUas juntitias nostras. 
 This plea we must all stick unto, God's mercy in his 
 own gracious disposition, God's righteousness in his 
 promises, God's goodness in the Lord, his Anointed, 
 his Christ, tis Messias. And this shall be a blessed 
 testimony unto us at the last day, that we have stood 
 and fought for the seed of the woman and for the pre- 
 ciousness of his blood and passion, against the seed of 
 the serpent ; that we never gave place, no, not for an 
 instant, to Pharisee, Jew, Pelagian, papist, libertine, 
 to dimish or discredit the power thereof. Give me 
 that soul that breafheth upon the earth in plight as 
 the souls of those Ninevites were, now called to a 
 reckoning of their fore-passed lives, their consciences 
 accusing them of hideous and monstrous iniquities, 
 the law pleading, the anger of God flaming against 
 them, the throat of hell gaping wide and ready to 
 swallow them down, when they were to take their 
 leave of one world and to enter another of endless 
 punishment, unless they could find the means to ap- 
 pease the fury of their Maker and Judge. Give me 
 the soul, that dareth for the price of a soul stand in 
 contention with the justice of God upon the trial of 
 good works, either to be justified the mean time, or 
 hereafter to be glorified and live by them. Oh sweet 
 and comfortable name, nature, operation of grace, 
 
 grace and only grace, blessed be the womb that bare 
 thee and the bowels that engendered thee. When it 
 cometh to this question, juslijictmur suiiul, ' let us be 
 judged together; if thou hast aught to say for thyself, 
 bring it forth,' Isa. xliii. Oh happy, heavenly, and 
 only grace, that bearest thy children safe in thy 
 bosom, and settest them with confidence and joy 
 before the seat of God ; when the clients and fol- 
 lowers of their own righteousness, be it what it may 
 be, with the least flash of lightning that fleeth from 
 the face of God, shall tremble and quake as the pop- 
 lar in the forest. Oh the ocean and main sea of over- 
 flowing grace, and we drink at puddles ! We sit in 
 our cells and comment, we come into the schools and 
 dispute about the merit of good works without trouble; 
 but lie we upon our beds of sickness, feel we a 
 troubled and perplexed conscience, we shall be glad 
 to cry, Grace, and grace alone; Christ, and Christ 
 alone. The blood of Abel, and Peter, and Thomas, and 
 Paul shall be forgotten, and the blood of the Lamb 
 shall be had in price ; and as for the merits of our un- 
 profitable service, we shall be best at ease when we 
 talk least of them. The only one and fiftieth psalm, 
 ' Have mercy upon me, Lord,' &c. (his memory be 
 blessed that gave the note), hath saved many dis- 
 tressed souls, and opened the kingdom of heaven unto 
 them, who, if they had stood upon riches and suffi- 
 ciency in themselves, as the church of Laodicea did. 
 Rev. iii., they had lost the kingdom. It is usually 
 given to our felons for their neck-verse when the law 
 is disposed to favour them. We are all felons and 
 transgressors against the law of God ; let it be our 
 soul's verse, and God will seclude the rigour of his 
 law and take mercy upon us. Some of the words of 
 that psalm were the last that Bernard uttered in the 
 pangs of death ; let them also be the last of ours : ' A 
 broken and contrite heart, God, thou wilt not 
 despise.' Finally, the choice is briefly proposed, and 
 as quickly made : ' if grace, not works ; if works, not 
 grace.' If this be the choice, let us humbly beseech 
 God to enlighten our eyes, to open our understand- 
 ings, to direct our afl'ections, and to reach forth our 
 hands to the better part which shall never be taken 
 from us : that leaving our works to his favourable 
 interj)retation, either to follow us, or to stay behind, 
 and either to be something or nothing in his sight, 
 his mercy may only triumph, and his covenant in the 
 blood of Christ Jesus ma)' ever be advanced, that we 
 may sing in our Jerusalem, as they sing in the courts of 
 heaven, ' Worth}' is the Lamb that was killed, to re- 
 ceive the glory, and honour, and praise,' and to bear 
 the name of our whole salvation. 
 
254 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 LECTUEE XL. 
 
 Therefore it d ispleaxed Jonah exceedingly, and he was aiir/r>/ — JoxAH IV. 1. 
 
 THE whole propliecy of Jonah, again to repeat 
 that which ought not to be forgotten, is the 
 preaching of mercy. An history written to the world, 
 and as a public evidence and instrument from God 
 delivered unto us, in every page and line whereof his 
 goodness towards mankind is marvellously expressed. 
 And as the four beasts in Ezekiel were joined one to 
 the other by their wings, so the four chapters of this 
 book hang together by a continuation and succession 
 of God's loving-kindness. Open this book, as our 
 Saviour opened the book of the prophecy of Isaiah, 
 by chance, and read at your pleasure, from the first 
 of it to the last, yon- shall never want a text or ex- 
 ample of comfort whereby a distressed conscience may 
 be relieved. The mariners are delivered from the fury 
 of the elements ; Jonah, both from those and from the 
 belly of a cruel fish ; the Ninevites, God knoweth 
 from what, whether from fire and brimstone, or from 
 sinking into the ground, or any such like weapons of 
 wrath, which in his armoury of justice in heaven are 
 stored up and reserved for the day of the wicked ; but 
 all are delivered. Notwithstanding which rare ex- 
 amples of mercy, as Christ spake in the Gospel, 'Be- 
 hold, more than Jonah is here,' so though the pro- 
 phet did his part before in penning those discourses, 
 yet in handling this last he is more than himself, and 
 though the mercy of God .abounded before, yet hero 
 it excelleth. Then was mercy practised, I confess, 
 but here it is pleaded, maintained, proved by argu- 
 ments, apologies, parables, the equity and reasonable- 
 ness thereof upheld, and means made unto Jonah in 
 some sort, that if God be gracious to Nineveh he will 
 be pleased favourably to interpret it. The distribu- 
 tion of the chapter is into three parts : 1, the affec- 
 tion of Jonah upon the deliverance of Nineveh, 
 whether revealed, and by a prophetical spirit dis- 
 covered before the term of forty days, or to the expira- 
 tion of them deferred, I cannot say ; 2, the reprehen- 
 sion and rebuke which God uscth against him for 
 that affection ; both by speech, ' dost thou well to be 
 angiT,' and by fact, in confuting him by a real simili- 
 tude, of a gourd soon sprung up and as easily 
 withered ; and as Jonah repeateth his impatience, so 
 God walketh with an even pace by him and repeateth 
 his reproofs ; 3, the conclusion or scope which God 
 referred himself unto ; not the forbearing of the city, 
 which was already passed, but the justification of his 
 goodness therein ; for first ho did it of fact, as they 
 say, and then defended the right of it. 
 
 1. The afiection of Jonah is generally recited in the 
 first verse, and more partictdarly displayed in the 
 rest, touching liis speech, gesture, and carriage of 
 himself in all points. 
 
 So it displeased Jonah exceedinyhi. What displeased 
 him ? Turn back yom- eyes to the epilogue of the 
 former chapter. ' God repented him of the evil ; he 
 did it not.' This is it that so much disquieteth 
 Jonah, that ' seemeth so evil, and very evil' (as the 
 Hebrew hath), Mahim videhatur apiid Jonain, malum 
 mar/num, in his unmerciful eyes ; rather this was evil 
 and very evil in the heart of Jonah. For why is Jonah 
 so exceedingly displeased that God bath spared 
 Nineveh ? It bad been fault enough m Jonah not to 
 have blessed and embraced the mercy of God towards 
 Nineveh, and to have given testimony imto it. But 
 to go so far from renovming it, that ho condemneth it 
 in his judgment, and so far in condemning it, that he 
 is grieved at the heart, and so far in grieving, that he 
 holdcth no measiu'e and stint therein, but doth ex- 
 ceedingly vex himself; this was a sore offence. Had 
 Jonah received mercy himself, and doth Jonah envy 
 mercy to others ? Did he know by experience in his 
 own person what it was to be driven from the land of 
 the living, to be cast into the mouth of destruction, to 
 lose the favour of God, and hath he no sparkle of 
 charity left, no gi'ain of compassion to weigh with him- 
 self the destruction of this great city ? A vexation, 
 saith Basil, without all reason. Unhappy man, why 
 art thou troubled so, having felt no harm ? Calamitas 
 sine ratione; quid miser anc/eris, nihil duri passnn. I 
 would rather have thought, if need had been, that Jonah 
 would have stood for Nineveh, being a prophet, and so 
 lately plucked from the fire himself, as Abraham did 
 for Sodom : If there shall be ten righteous men found 
 in Nineveh, destroy it not. For what else is the joy 
 and crowii of a prophet, apostle, any messenger of 
 Christ in this service employed, but the winning and 
 saving of souls, converting men unto righteousness, 
 translating them from darkness into light, a blessing 
 from God upon his laliours, an increase upon the seed 
 he had sown, which others would spend their days, 
 and consume their bodies, and jeopard their lives to 
 obtain, when Jonah obtained it with ease, and in the 
 compass of a short time ? The parable of the lord 
 and the labourers which wTought in the vineyard, thus 
 far accordeth to Jonah, Math. 20 : ' Take that wiiich 
 thine is ; I do thee no wrong ; is it not lawful for mo to 
 do with mine own as it plcaseth me ? Is thine ej'e 
 evil because I am good ? I will give to this last, as 
 much as to the first ; ' to this least, as much as to the 
 greatest ; to a Gentile, as much as to an Israelite ; to 
 Nineveh, as much as to thyself. You see the nature 
 of envy, the honour, prosperity, wealth, and whatso- 
 ever is good in another, sometimes life itself, it rc- 
 pineth at ; fruitful increase, and full udders in the 
 fields and beasts of any man, it pineth with ; it filleth 
 
Ver. 1.] 
 
 LECTURE XL. 
 
 255 
 
 men to the eyes, and in the e3'es it sitteth, and by those 
 windows looketh forth, and wheresoever it seeth a 
 blessing, it is sickness and death unto it, if God curse 
 it not. And it is true that Basil noteth of envy, a 
 Scythian seldom maliceth an Egyptian. JUiiyjitio 
 Scijtha lion invidet. Thoy spend their despite for the 
 most part within the same country, same kindred, same 
 profession, same benefit; as Jonah envieth Nineveh, for 
 communicating with him in the mercy of the Lord. 
 According to that wisdom which God gave to man to 
 call things by their right names, so is the name of 
 envy, either because it will not see at all that which 
 ia the blessings of God is to be seen, or because it 
 prieth too deep into them.* It was the first venom 
 which the de^-il poured forth against mankind. Hiiic 
 pciiit primus et pcrdidit ; by this he first perished him- 
 self and destroyed others. What else was the cause 
 that Cain lifted up his hands against his brother Abel, 
 1 Gen. iv.,androbbedhimst'lfalmost of his only comfort 
 in that new-bom world, but that the gift of his brother 
 was accepted to God, his own rejected ? Upon this he 
 was very WToth, and his countenance fell down, as not 
 able to endure the sight of his brother, and his anger 
 was not satisfied with blood. Did the brethren of 
 Joseph go home to their old father Jacob, and bring 
 him into an error that a wicked beast had devom'cd 
 the child, and that Joseph was surely torn in pieces ? 
 Gen. xxs^iii. A wicked beast had devoured him in- 
 deed, and Joseph was torn in pieces by the envy of his 
 brethren. ' Israel loved Joseph more than all his other 
 sous, therefore they hated him, and could not speak 
 peaceably unto him. And Joseph dreamed a dream, 
 and told it to his brethren, therefore they hated him so 
 much the more.' This was the wicked beast that cast 
 him into the pit, where their meaning was to have starved 
 him to death, and to have kept his blood secret, as ap- 
 peareth by the speech of Judah, and but that Reuben 
 persuaded the contrary, with their own hands they 
 had taken his life from him. Becanse the women sang 
 in the streets, 1 Sam. xviii. ' Sanl hath slain his thou- 
 sand, David his ten thousand,' therefore was ' Saul 
 exceedingly wroth,' and it is said that ' Saul had an 
 eye to David from that day forward.' It was a veno- 
 mous, mischievous eye, such as the burning eyes* of 
 witches, or the basilisk, or gorgon, that he cast to- 
 wards him. The elder brother, Luke xv., when he 
 lieard melody and dancing in his father's house, and 
 Imew what it meant, and that his father had kiUed the 
 fat calf to welcome home his lost son, ' he was angry 
 at the matter, and would not go in,' but that his 
 ' father went out and entreated him.' He omitted no 
 argument of exprohration, his service for many years, 
 without breach of any commandment, and not the gift 
 of a kid by way of recompenco, he saith not, wastefully 
 to spend, but to 'make merry amongst his friends,' 
 when the other 'that had devoured his goods with 
 
 * Invitlia, vel non videt, vel nirais intuetur. — Cypr. 
 t TJrentes oculi. — Pers. 
 
 harlots, must be entertained with the fat calf.' Ex- 
 amine the reason why innocency itself was hunted and 
 followed to death, with ' Crucify him, crucify him,' 
 he is not worthy to Uve, and Barabbas set at'libertv, 
 and let Pilate be the judge to pronounce sentence 
 against them; 'he knew," besides the Imowledge of 
 their own consciences, ' that for envy they had de- 
 livered him' Math, xxvii. Do we look that envy shoiild 
 favour the honour and welfare, when it favoureth not 
 the life ; or the life of man, when the Lord of life him- 
 self is vile before it ? Poison, they say, is life to a 
 serpent, death to a man ; and that which is life to a 
 man, his spittle and natural humidity, is death to a 
 serpent. I have found it thus applied, virtue and 
 felicity, which is life to a good man, is death to the 
 envious ; and that which the envious liveth by, is 
 the misery and death of a good man. For enyj 
 endeavoureth either that he may not live at all, as 
 all the former examples declare, for even the prodi- 
 gal son was also dead, and it gi-ieved his brother, that 
 he was brought back to life, Luke xv., or that he may 
 live such a life, B/'ov ajBii/jrov, as for the discomforts 
 thereof, he may caU it happiness to have ended. 
 Therefore, amongst other, the fruits of a reprobate 
 mind, Rom. i. ; those two are joined together, (p06vog, 
 (povoi, envy, and murder ; and likewise amongst the 
 works of the flesh, Galatians the fifth, with the same 
 combination, fSmu, (pivot, as if they were twins grow- 
 ing in one body, and could not be put asunder. It is 
 not namely expressed in the former member of the 
 verse, what perturbation it was wherewith Jonah was 
 so overborne ; but by the eU'eets it shewed in him, in 
 seeking so heartily the overthi-ow of Nineveh, and wish- 
 ing to die himself, because the Ninevites Uved (besides 
 the bidding of open battle to charity, one of whose 
 properties is that ' she envieth not,' 1 Cor. xiii., and 
 setting pity at nought, which hath ever a miserable 
 heart when it seeth the wretched, mherkordur cor iiiise- 
 ruiii), we may reasonably suppose it to have been 
 envy. The natiire whereof is this, that God in his 
 justice hath appointed it to bo a plague to itself ; and 
 amongst many mischiefs, it has fvu'nished it with one 
 only profitable quality, that the owner thereof takcth 
 most hurt.* He biteth and is bitten again, and be- 
 cometh his own punishment. f And as ^tna con- 
 sumeth itself, so the malicious man is burnt with the 
 fii-e of his own heart. J And therefore the poet did 
 notably declare her to have a pale face without blood, 
 a lean body without any juice in it, squint eyes, black 
 teeth, an heart full of gall, a tongue tipped with poison; 
 never laughing but when others weep, never sleeping, 
 because she studieth and thinketh on mischief. It 
 
 *• In qua nuilta sunt mala, unura iantum utile, quod au- 
 tliori incommoda. — Basil. 
 
 t Garpitque et carpitur una 
 Suppliciumque snum est. — Ovid, Met. ii. 
 
 J Ut iEtna seipsam, 
 Sic senon alios invidus igne coquit. — Id. 
 
25(j 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 displeaseth Jonah c.rcceJin(jhj. But the vexation whicli 
 lie took hurt himself more than Nineveh. 
 
 And Jonah was aiifinj. We have not ended the 
 affections of Jonah. We have another companion to 
 add to envy, which for the most part is coupled with 
 it ; for so we read, Gen. iv., ' Cain was exceedingly 
 wroth,' and 1 Sam. xviii., 'Saul was wroth' at the 
 song of the women, and Luke xv., ' The elder brother 
 was angry,' either with the father or the younger son. 
 Anger in a lit place is the gift of God, and there is 
 great cunning in being angry, with advised speech, 
 and in a seasonable time.* But of that hereafter. 
 Meanwhile, the time and cause, and mr-nsure of this 
 anger in Jonah, I think, are worthy to be blamed. 
 For with whom is he angry '? It seemeth with him- 
 self, — ' Take away my life from me,' — or rather with 
 God, who, if he had taken him at his word, the sun 
 had gone down upon bis anger — ^I mean bis life had 
 ended in a froward and furious passion. If God be 
 angry with us, there may be some remedy, because 
 God is merciful : Si Dcus iniscitur noliis, remediitm 
 esse potest, &c. But if we be angry with him, there is 
 no help for it. Quis jwpnin Iininano inisci sapieiiter 
 potent ? What man of wisdom can be angry with the 
 people of Fiome, much less with God ? And that you 
 may know how righteous the Lord is in this affection 
 of anger, as before of envy, when we are unruly and 
 lawless therein, Valerius Maxiinus, comparing anger 
 and hatred together (the one, at the first setting forth, 
 the quicker, the other, in desire of revenge, the more 
 obstinate)! saith, that both those passions are full of 
 consternation and amazement, and never use violence 
 without torment to themselves ; for where their pur- 
 pose is to offer wrong, they rather suffer it, as shall 
 better appear unto us hereafter in the behaviour of 
 Jonah. 
 
 I have in part described unto you tlic nature and 
 enormity of these perturbations from the mouth of 
 natural and worldly wisdom. What judgment be- 
 longeth unto them, when tlioy break their bounds,, I 
 learn in a better school : ' Whosoever is angry with 
 his brother without a cause, shall be culpable of judg- 
 ment,' Mat. V. And they are numbered amongst 
 the works of the flesh. Gal. v., whereof the apostle 
 gave them double warning, Aiyu v/j,i\i xa()w; -/.al 'j^o'.T- 
 m(jv, ' that they which did such things should not 
 inherit the kingdom of God.' Notwithstanding the 
 viciousness hereof liath been both opened and con- 
 demned by those who, though they had not the law 
 of God by peculiar assignment, as the Jews had, 
 written in books or in tallies of stone, yet ' the effect 
 of that law was written in tlieir hearts, and they were 
 a law to themselves, their thoughts accusing or excus- 
 
 * Ira Optimo loco est donuni Dri, ct magna est ara irasci 
 verbis prajmeditatis et tempore opportuno. — M. Luth. 
 
 t Val.Max.. lib. ix. cap. 3. — Ilia jirocursu colurior, nocriuli 
 cupidiue hoc pcrtiiiaciua, uterquo constcTiiaticniis plciius 
 affuctus, ac numiuam sine tormento sui violontui), &c. 
 
 ing them' in most of their doings, Rom ii. Pr'^cepfs 
 of moral conversation they have as soundly delivered, 
 and some as strictly observed, as if Moses had taught 
 and lived among them. The apostle's precept is, 
 Rom. xii., ' Give place to wrath,' and Eph. iv., 'Be 
 angry and sin not: let not the sun go down upon 
 your wrath.' They had the same precepts in Gen- 
 tility, who saw no less herein by their light of nature, 
 and therefore devised laws to repress anger — that an 
 angry man should not set hand or heart to anything 
 till he had recited the Greek alphabet, for by that time 
 the heat of choler would be allayed, and that he should 
 sing to his passion as nurses to their babes: ij^ri e--iuk, 
 /ir, Zoa, haste not, cry not, and anon I will content thee. 
 And the practice of Plato was according to these rules ; 
 for, his servant offending him, he said he could have 
 killed him, but that he was moved, and therefore de- 
 sired a friend to punish him in his stead. Occidissem 
 te nisi iiatus esscni. Likewise, reprehensions of all 
 sorts of vices, and commendations of their contraiy 
 virtues, ^they have both wisely conceived, faithfully 
 penned, and earnestly persuaded. And although they 
 were ignorant of the joys of heaven, and hell fire, yet 
 in their Gentile learning they saw reason snfHcient 
 that the embracers of these contraiy qualities, should 
 be contrariwise recompensed. Therefore I am not of 
 opinion with those men who think that all seculiir 
 and profane learning should be abandoned from the 
 lips of the preacher, and, whether he teach or exhort, 
 he is of necessity to tie himself to the sentence and 
 phrase of only Scripture. Good is good wheresoever 
 I find it. Upon a withered and fruitless stalk, saith 
 Augustine, a grape sometimes may hang.* Shall I 
 refuse the grape because the stalk is fruitless and 
 withered ? There is not any knowledge of learning 
 to be despised, seeing that all science whatsoever is in 
 the nature and kind of good things. Rather, those 
 that despite it we must repute rude and unprofitable 
 altogether ; who would bo glad that all men were 
 ignorant, that their own ignorance, lying in the 
 common heap, might not be espied. If philosophy 
 should therefore not be set by because some have 
 erred through philosophy, no more should the sun 
 and the moon, because some have made them their 
 gods and committed idolatry with them.f It seemeth 
 by the preface of M. Luther upon the epistle to tho 
 Galatians that the Anabaptists condemned the graces 
 and works of God for the indignity of the persons and 
 subjects in whom they were found. Luther retorted 
 upon them. Then belike matrimony, authority, liberty, 
 &c., are not the works of God, because the men who 
 use them are some of them wicked. Wicked men have 
 
 • In ariniiiino stcrili at(iuo ariila vel alligata aolet uva 
 pendere. — JJe llapi cont. IJonat., lib. vi cap. 3. 
 
 t Non ulla despicienda discipliua; cognitio, cClni de genero 
 bonorum scicntia sit omnia ; quin potius ip.sara spernentns et 
 ruslicos ot jilane iguavos cxistimare debemus, &c. — Greg. 
 Sazian, in Monud. 
 
Ver. 1.] 
 
 LECTaRE XL. 
 
 257 
 
 the use of the sun, the moon, the earth, the air, the 
 ■water, and other creatures of God; therefore is not 
 the sun the sun, and do the others lose their goodness 
 because they are so used ? The Anabaptists them- 
 selves, when as yet they were not rebaptized, had, not- 
 withstandiu;^, bodies and souls. Now, because they 
 were not rebaptized, wei-e not their bodies true bodies, 
 and their souls right souls ? Say that their parents 
 also had a time when they were not rebaptized, were 
 they not therefore tridy married ? If not, it will 
 follow, thereupon, that the parents were adulterers, 
 their children bastards, and not meet to inherit their 
 father's lands. 
 
 Likewise, truth is truth wheresoever I find it. 
 Whether we search in philosophy, or in the histories 
 of the Gentiles, or in canonical Scriptures, there is 
 but one truth. If Peter, if the sybils, if the devils, 
 shall say that Christ is the Son of the living God, it 
 is not in one a truth, a lie in the other ; but though 
 the persons, motives, and ends be different, the sub- 
 stance of the confession is in all the same. It was 
 true which Menander the poet spake, before the apostle 
 ever wrote it to the church of Corinth, ' Evil words 
 corrupt good manners.' And because it was a truth 
 in Menander, therefore the apostle alleged it, which 
 else he would not. The difference between them is, 
 that as in Lacedsemon sometimes, when in a weighty 
 consultation, an eloquent but an evil man had set 
 down a good decree which they could not amend, they 
 caused it to be pronounced by one of honest name and 
 conversation, and in such simplicity of words as he 
 was able presently to light upon, by that means neither 
 crediting the bad author so much as to take a judg- 
 ment from his mouth, nor rejecting the good sentence,* 
 so that which was a truth in the lips of Menander is 
 not more true, uttered by an apostle's tongue, but it 
 bath gotten a more approved and sanctified author. 
 And surely, as in the tilling of the ground, the culter 
 and share are the instruments that break the clods 
 and carry the burden of the work, yet the other parts 
 of the plough are not unnecessary to further it ; so for 
 the first breaking up of the fallow ground of men's 
 hearts, and killing the weeds and brambles that are 
 therein of Adam's ancient corruption, or for preaching 
 the great mystery of piety, and comfortable speaking 
 to Sion touching the points of salvation, the only word 
 of God, sharper than culter or share or two-edged 
 sword, is only and absolutely sufficient. But a man 
 must daily build upon the former foundation, and not 
 only teach, but explicate by discoursing, illustrate by 
 examples, exemplify by parables and similitudes, by 
 arguments confirm, shame the gainsayers, convince 
 the adversaries, fashion the life to the doctrine, plant 
 judgment and justice instead of unrighteousness, slir 
 up the aifeclions, and shew himself every way ' a work- 
 man not to be ashamed, and rightly dividing the word 
 
 * Sic bona sententia raansit, turpis author mutatus est.— 
 Aul. Geli. Noct., Alt., lib. xviii. cap. iii. 
 
 of truth,' 2 Tim. ii. from whom, if you take his knife, 
 that is, his art and cunning, he shall rather tear it with 
 his teeth, and pull it asunder with his nails, than rightly 
 divide it. 
 
 But you appeal to the consciences of believers, and 
 desire to know whether their first conversion to the 
 faith were by reading or hearing of Gentile stories ? 
 No. For who ever required that service of profane 
 learning ? which, whatsoever the instrument or means 
 be, is principally and almost wholly the work of the 
 Holy Ghost, and wherein is fulfilled upon every con- 
 vert that Cometh to the knowledge of the truth, that 
 which Samuel comforteth Saul with, 1 Sam. x., 'The 
 Spirit of the Lord shall come upon thee, and thou shalt 
 be turned into another man.' Who else ' taketh the 
 stony heart out of their bodies, and giveth them an 
 heart of flesh '?' Ezek. xxsvi. And we know, besides, 
 that the conversions of men to the faith have not been 
 all after one sort : in some by the preaching of Christ 
 crucified, as in those that were ' added to the church' 
 by the sermon of Peter, Acts. ii. ; in some by a word 
 from the mouth of Christ, ' Follow me ;' in some by 
 visions and voices from heaven, as Paul, Acts, ix., 
 was thrown from his horse and smitten with blindness, 
 and a voice came down from the clouds, saying, ' Saul, 
 Saul, why persecutest thou me '?' and Saint Augustine 
 reporteth (Confess, viii. 12), that by a voice from 
 heaven, saying. Take up and read, take up and read, 
 'Folic, lege, he was directed to that sentence, Rom xiii., 
 ' Not in chambering and wantonness,' &c. Jnstin 
 Martyr wituesseth of himself in his Apology to Anto- 
 ninas,* that when he saw the innocent Christians, 
 after their slanderous and false traducements, carried 
 to their deaths, patient and joyful that they were 
 thought worthy to sufl'er for the name of Christ, it 
 occasioned his change of religion. Socrates and 
 Sozomen f write that many of Alexandria, when 
 the great temple of Serapis was repurged and made 
 serviceable for the use of the Christians, finding some 
 mystical letters or cyphers therein, lilene hiemjly- 
 phica, wherebj' the form of a cross was figured, and 
 signification long before given that the temple should 
 have an end, thought it warning enough to forsake 
 their heathenish superstitions, and to embrace the 
 gospel of Christ Jesus. Many other Egyptians, being 
 terrified by the strange inundation of Nilus * higher 
 than the wonted manner thereof was, immediately 
 condemned their ancient idolatry, and allied them- 
 selves to the worship of the living God. Clodoveus, 
 the French king, after many persuasions of Crotaldis, 
 his lady, a religious Burgundian, vainly spent upon 
 him, having at length received a great discomfiture 
 and slaughter in a battle against the Almannes, and 
 finding himself forsaken of all earthly aid, cast up his 
 eyes into heaven and vowed to become a Christian, 
 upon condition that God would give him the victory 
 
 * Euseb. iv. 8 f Socra. iv. 15 ; Sozom. vii. 15. 
 
 X Sozom. lib. vii. cap. xx. 
 
 11 
 
258 
 
 KING OX JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 over Lis enemies, wlacli be faithfully performed.* 
 Now it holdeth not in reason that because men are 
 Gonverted to the faith by miracles, martyrdoms, 
 ■visions, inundations, hieroglyphics, and such means, 
 therefore the}' should always be confirmed by the 
 same, or that those who are converted by the word of 
 faith should uo otherwise be coniirmed and strength- 
 ened than by that only word. For our own parts, we 
 cannot work wonders, wo cannot call down lights and 
 visions from heaven; wo must use such means as God 
 hath enabled us unto. And therein, tell me also by 
 experience, if, as in former times, the Gentiles were 
 confuted by the writings of the Gentiles (which is 
 either a part or at least a preparative to conversion, 
 for we must first remove the prejudices conceived 
 against the truth), by the philosophy of Plato, Tris- 
 megistus, and others, which Julian, a wise but wicked 
 emperor, saw, — behold we are wounded with our own 
 quills,! out of our books they take armour, which in 
 fight they use against us, — and therefore made a law that 
 the children of the Galileans should not read philoso- 
 phers nor poets ; and as the Jews in later years by the 
 Talmud of the Jews (for proof whereof I send you to 
 the Tnic'iifss of Ckrisliaii ll/'lir/ioii, written both iu Latin 
 and French, and put into English by as honourable a 
 translator as the author was), so in the winning and 
 reclaiming of papists at this day, it be not an ordinary 
 way to root up their errors, besides the Scriptures of 
 God, not only by consent of fathers, decisions of 
 councils, but even by principles of philosophy, by 
 reason and outward sense, from the verdict whereof, 
 in many questions amongst them, they are wholly 
 departed. In transubstautiation, by name, do we not 
 shake and convince their inextricable absurdities by 
 evidence of sense, by tliat which our bunds handle, 
 and our eye declareth unto us ;]; by natural dimen- 
 sions which a natural body is subject unto, by cir- 
 cumscription of place, and collocation in one place at 
 once ; and how insensible a thing it is to have acci- 
 dents without their subject, roundness, whiteness, 
 and the relish of bread without bread, even as the 
 Lord himself proved the truth of his body by a truth 
 of philosophy, when they took him for a spirit, 'Touch 
 me, handle me, see me,' Luke xiv. : Tanijere enim ct 
 tan//i nisi corpus iiuUa potest res :^ for nothing can 
 touch or bo touched but a true body. Is it enough in 
 this conflict to tell a papist that Christ is ascended 
 into heaven, and there must sit till all things be re- 
 stored? Doth he not drive thee from thine hold, and 
 put thee to a further replication ? So do they also in 
 many other questions, wherein, if we rest uiion Scrip- 
 ture alone, we shall send them away unsatisfied, 
 because they admit not this judge without other co- 
 
 * An. Do. 49G, vid. Joan, rappiim liistor. do conver. gen- 
 tium. 
 
 t Propriis pounis confljjimur. — Theolord. Tiipart. Iliator. 
 lib. vi. cap. xvii. 
 
 ; IIoj ijuoii oculi rcnuuciuiit, &c. J Lucrct. 
 
 partners, to sit and give sentence alone in the ending 
 of our controversies. And therefore they must be 
 vanquished, as Basilides and Saturninus were iu Euse- 
 bius,* y.al di' lyy^dp'M UTodsi^ioiv, /.ai dl' dyodfoin 
 iXeyyuv, both by written demonstrations, and by un- 
 written redargutions. Is this now to make the pulpit 
 a philosopher's school, or rather the philosopher's 
 school a footstool to the pulpit, and to use it as a ser- 
 vant to divinity, that it may the better proceed in the 
 necessary work ? The histories of the heathen (as 
 lightly as we reckon of them), of Moab and Ammon, 
 and all the countries of Canaan in former times, of the 
 Medes and Persians, ancient Romans and Grecians ; 
 and at this day, of the Moors, Muscovites, Turks, and 
 Tartarians, their religion, sacrifices, manners, laws, 
 leagues, wars, stratagems, and even the wars of 
 Hannibal and Scipio, wherein the providence of God 
 mightily wrought, and the policy of men carefully be- 
 stirred itself; have they nothing in them fit for the 
 use of the temple and for the building of God's house? 
 Then why do we train up our children in poets, ora- 
 tors, histories, Greek and Latin, old and new, and 
 not presently set them to the Testaments, and ever- 
 lastingly keep them in the reading and conning of 
 only catechisms, if all that elementary learning (for so 
 I confess with Seneca, rudinieiila sunt, non opera, they 
 are rudiments and beginnings, not works) must be 
 wholly forgotten and laid aside in the exercising of an 
 higher calling ? Or is it a point of wisdom, think we, 
 to season these new vessels, when their taste of life to 
 come is especially to be framed, with such unprofit- 
 able liquor, whereof there is uo good use to be made 
 in riper years and at sounder discretion ? If such 
 were the vanity, and no better fruits of these younger 
 studies, when an elder profession and a more settled 
 judgment hath them in handling, let Licinius be 
 cleared of that infamous speech of his, in terming good 
 letters the poison of a commonwealth, virus rfipiib/icic; 
 and let all our books be heaped together and burned 
 iu the market-place, as those books of curious arts, 
 Acts xix., and let their barbarous opinion who cry to 
 pull down these schools and universities, find favour 
 and good speed in the wishings of all men. But I 
 ever retained, and till I am better informed, will en- 
 deavour to maintain, a more honourable opinion of 
 learning ; and such poor friendship as I am able to 
 lend to the defence of it I will ever be ready to shew, 
 as Jonathan did to David, not only in the field, where 
 uo man secth it, but even to the face of those by 
 whom it is most discredited ; because I have ever 
 found by my little and simple experience, that neither 
 the use of grammar iu the proprieties of words, nor of 
 logic in distinguishing ambiguities, nor rhetoric in 
 following precepts and rules of speech, nor philosophy 
 in scanning causes and their etTects, nor history in 
 calculating times, nor of any of these in many other 
 uses and services, could at any time bo missing to the 
 * Lib. iv. cup. vii. liistor. Ecclos. 
 
Ver. l.J 
 
 LECTURE XL. 
 
 259 
 
 mistress and quoen of all these arts : I mean to the 
 handliug of Jivhiitj', which is the science of sciences. 
 St Austin, writing against Petilian, telleth us that his 
 adversary, sometimes with open mouth and full breath, 
 would accuse him for a logician, and bring logic itself 
 to her trial before the people,* as the mistress of 
 forgery and lying ; and because he shewed some rhe- 
 toric, would note him by the name of Tertullus the 
 orator, and charge him with the damnable wit of 
 Carneades the academic ; but you must know the 
 reason : Cum ad intcrrogatum respondere non posset ; 
 when he was not able to answer the question pro- 
 pounded. f No doubt it was some great disgrace to 
 that learned father to be blamed for good arts, and to 
 bear an objection and reproach for too much scholar- 
 ship. Tints let ignorance ever be able to object to the 
 champions of the true church and propugners of the 
 faith of Christ. And because I am fallen into the testi- 
 mony of St Austin, let me further acquaint you what 
 he writeth of this very argument in his second book of 
 Christian learning. His judgment is ample and plain, 
 that if the philosophers, so called, especially the Pla- 
 tonics, had spoken any truth consonant to our faith, we 
 should be so far off from fearing it, that we should be- 
 reave them thereof, as unjust owners, tanquam ah in- 
 justis possessorihm, and possessiouers, and apply it to 
 om- own use. For as the Egyptians had not only 
 idols and burdens which Israel detested, non solum 
 idola ct oneiri, &e., but vessels and ornaments of 
 silver and gold, and store of raiment, which Israel, 
 not by their own authority, but by God's command- 
 ment, borrowed, and Egv-pt ignorantly lent, not know- 
 ing how to use them as they ought ; so all the learning 
 of the Gentiles, besides their superstitious and abomi- 
 nable figments, hath also liberal arts, serviceable to the 
 truth, and profitable precepts of civihty, and some- 
 what uni'eproveable of the worship of the true God, 
 which is, as it were, their silver and gold, not which 
 themselves found out, but took it fi'om the mines of 
 God's heavenly providence, universally infused into 
 the minds of all men hving. Likewise the institutions 
 of men, as it were apparel fit for human society, which 
 the life of man cannot want. He also numbereth the 
 Israelites that went out of Egypt, laden with those 
 spoils, suffarcinati, Cyprian, Lactantius, Victorinus, 
 Optatus, Hilary; and besides those who were then 
 living, an innumerable sight of Grecians ; and before 
 all these, the most faithful servant of the Lord, Moses, 
 of whom it is written that he was ' learned in all the 
 wisdom of the Egyptians.' Finally, he there con- 
 cludeth, not prejudicing any other either his equal 
 or superior, that would otherwise understand it, that 
 the policy of the children of Israel, in robbing the 
 Egyptians, did undoubtedly prefigurate this our spoil- 
 ing of the Gentdes. I will not conceal withal his 
 retraction touching this point, in that he had much 
 
 * Lib. iii. cont. Petil.,cap. xvi. Anlielis piilmonibus, tan- 
 quam dialccticum criminatur, &c. t Ibid. cap. xxi. 
 
 ascribed to liberal sciences, which numy holy men are 
 much ignorant of, and some that know them, are not 
 holy.* Therefore, in his first book of order, he 
 bringeth himself into an order and measure therein, 
 that the learning of those liberal sciences must be 
 iiiodcsla atqw, succincta, modest and short. Otherwise it 
 is cluum inehiians, as Bernard calleth it,] wine that 
 maketh a man drunk ; implens non nutriens, injians 
 non (cdi/icans, rather glutting than nourishing, and 
 putfing him up than edifiying him. Therefore Seneca.J 
 though he knew not the sovereign knowledge which 
 we do, and that which is hfe everlasting unto us, con- 
 cerning the Father of lights, and him whom he hath 
 sent, Christ Jesus, yet in comparison of other more 
 profitable studies and meditations, he ascribeth utility 
 no farther unto these than that they prepare the wit, 
 rather than fasten and seize upon it : non enim di-tcere 
 dcheinus ista, scd didki-ise. For we must not ever be 
 learning these, but have learned them. .Jerome (or 
 whether it were Valerius), in an epistle to llulfinus, 
 writeth thus : Dost thou marvel, or art thou dis- 
 pleased, that I send thee to the imitation of Gentiles ? 
 a Christian of idolaters ? a lamb of whelps ? the good 
 of the evil ? I would have thee like the witty discours- 
 ing bee, which from a nettle gathereth honey. So 
 do thou suck honey from the rock, and oil from the 
 hardest stone. I know the superstition of the 
 Gentiles, but every creature of God hath some pre- 
 cedent of goodness in it. ]\Iany things they do 
 perversely, but some things which have died with 
 themselves, have caused fruit to abound in us.§ And 
 in his 102d Epistle to Marcella, he taxeth some, who 
 held gross and palpable rusticity || (ignorance, lack of 
 learning) for only sanctity, and bragged that they 
 were disciples of fishermen, as if they were therefore 
 holy because they knew nothing. And elsewhere ho 
 wrote to Komanus, that he .should admonish Calphur- 
 nius, if he wanted teeth himself, not to be envious 
 against others who are able to cat, not to contemn the 
 eyes of goats, himself being a-want and stark blind. 11 
 To this purpose he allegcth and applieth the law of 
 the beautiful captive woman taken in war, whereunto, 
 if a man had a mind, ho must cause her head to be 
 shaven, her nails paired, and the garments wherein 
 she was taken put ofl', and then he might marry her, 
 Deut. xxi. What marvel is it then, saith he, if I take 
 the wisdom of the world, for the grace of speech and 
 comeliness of parts that I find therein, and of a 
 captive make it an Israelitish woman, and whatsoever 
 
 •'■= Quod multum tribui (lis(?iiiliiiis liberalibus, quas muUi 
 sancti multum nesciunl ; quidam autem qui sciunt eas sancti 
 non sunt. — Refrac. i. 3. 
 
 t In Cautic. ser. ix. 
 
 X Lib. i. epist. 8L Si pra;parent ingenium, non detineant. 
 
 § Volo sis api argumentosai similis, &c. Omnis croatura 
 Dei habet aliquod exemplar lioncsti. 
 
 II Crassam illi rusticitatem solum pro sanctitate habent. 
 
 1[ Ne vcscentiun dentibus edcntulus invideat, et oculos 
 caprarum talpa contcmnat. — Epist. 84. 
 
260 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 it Lath dead, idolatrous, voluptuous, erroneous, or 
 the like, either I cut it away or sha\e it, and liring 
 forth lawful children to the Lord of hosts ? Thus 
 Hosea took him a wife of fornications, Hosea i., 
 Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim, who bare him a 
 son, and he called him Jezreel, that is, ' the seed of 
 God.' And towards the end of that epistle, as if he 
 had been exercised with the objections of our times, 
 be would not have him mistake, as if it were not law- 
 ful so to do, save only in disputations against the 
 Gentiles ; for almost there is no book written by any 
 man, excepting Epicurus and his followers, but is very 
 full of learning. Basilius the Great, in a large treatise 
 to his nephews, of this very argument, counselleth 
 them not to cast the anchors of their shipping, nor to 
 fasten their opinions and afl'ectious upon such men, 
 but only to pick out those things that were profitable. 
 To life everlasting he doubted not but they may be 
 sufficiently furnished out of the sacred volumes. 
 Those other writings, which were not altogether dis- 
 crepant from the books of God, might serve as 
 shadows and glimpses beforehand to prepare the sight, 
 and for trial of wit, as those that practise a while in 
 the fence-school, before they profess their better skill, 
 and as fullers lay some ground colour, before they dye 
 purple. He addeth, that as to trees laden with fruit, 
 the leaves give some ornament and grace, so when 
 the excellentest truth is apparelled and compassed 
 with this outward wisdom of the world, it becometh 
 thereby the more delightful and pleasant. Notwith- 
 standing, he wlsheth them not to take their choice at 
 random, and to esteem all alike ; but as, in plucking 
 roses, they are careful to avoid the prickles, so they 
 give heed to that only which is good, and eschew the 
 noisome and pestilent. And although he leavcth ob- 
 scene and wanton poets to the stage, yet he encou- 
 rageth them to the better sort, upon the judgment of 
 a grave man, and well skilled in the poets, of whom he 
 had heard, that Homer's whole poetry was but a praise 
 of virtue, Omnis Honieri poesis vlituiis laus. David 
 Ohytrasus, a little to break the rank of the fathers, 
 speaketh as highly in the commendation of philoso- 
 phers and orators,* that all their writings of manners 
 are, as it were, a certain commentary upon the five 
 former commandments of the latter table. The know- 
 ledge of the former, he confesselh, was over-obscure 
 unto them, and of the last of all, touching concupi- 
 scence, almost extinguished ; and he honoured histories 
 no less, the common and universal argument of all 
 which he afQrmcth to be that which an heathen spake, 
 
 Discite justitiam moniti, et non temncre divos. 
 Ye princes and people of the world, take your warn- 
 ing to do justice and to fear God. For this cause, to 
 return back to the fathers, St Augustine, in one place, t 
 cleareth philosophy and philosophers, and tclleth his 
 mother that the divine Scriptures, which she em- 
 braced so earnestly, did not condeuui jdiilosophers 
 * Prolcgom. in Genes. t 1 "c "'''l- cap. ult. 
 
 simply, but the philosophers of this world, Col. ii. 
 And if any man thought that all philosophy was to be 
 shunned, his meaning was none other therein than to 
 have us love wisdom. In another, he speaketh for 
 eloquence,* and thinketh it no reason, that because 
 some bear arms against their country, others should 
 be debarred of armour to defend it ; or that physi- 
 cians' instruments should be denied to the skilful, 
 because the unlearned have used them to kill with. 
 Eloquence, he saith, is not evil (which for the ut- 
 tering of his mind he wisheth had fallen unto him to 
 his heart's desire, qua utiiiam mihi pro desiderio pro- 
 reiiiHset-f), but a sophistical, malignant profession, pro- 
 posing to itself, not as it meaneth, but either of con- 
 tention, or for commodit3''ssake, to speak for all things, 
 and against all things. What were more profitable 
 than the eloquence of Donatus, Parmenian, and others 
 of j'our sect, if it ran with as free a stream for the 
 peace, unit}-, truth, and love of Christ, as it fioweth 
 against it '? for else it is veuenata faciindia, a venom- 
 ous eloquence, as Cyprian wrote of the eloquence of 
 Novatus, in his epistle to Cornelius. I know there is 
 much amiss both in the matter and iu the use of pro- 
 fane learning; but this we are sure of, that if we bring 
 it to the touchstone of Scripture, whatsoever we road 
 in foreign authors, if it be vicious, it is there con- 
 demned ; if wholesome, we shall there find it, and 
 many things besides, which we have found nowhere 
 else : \ for it shall never be denied, but that here are 
 the riches and treasures of wisdom ; and that the 
 knowledge collected out of the books of the Gentiles, 
 with this of the book of God compared, is no more 
 than the treasure carried out of Egypt, which, to the 
 riches of Jerusalem, especially when Solomon was the 
 king there, was in a manner as nothing ; for as the 
 wine that cometh from the vines of the mountains is 
 both finer and pleasanter than that of the valleys, so 
 the heavenly knowledge which descendeth from the 
 highest hills, and from the throne of God, must needs 
 be sweeter to oiu' taste than the sour and unsavoury 
 knowledge of the world, which groweth in the valley 
 of tears. To conclude ; what things soever, and iu 
 what authors soever, were well spoken, they are ours; 
 I mean the Christians', and we maj- take our own 
 where we find it.§ Plato is sometimes alter Moxfs, et 
 Moses .-llticus, another Moses, and Moses at Athens ; 
 wheresoever, therefore, he speaketh as Moses did, 
 that is ours. Orpheus and Sybilla have delivered 
 certain introductions or essays of prophetical learning, 
 pru/i!/>iiii(isiiiiilii ; these are ours.jl What poet, what 
 philosopher, is there that hath not drunk at the well 
 of the prophets ? That is ours. Clemens Alexandri- 
 
 * Advers. Crescen. lib. i. cap. ii. t Ibid. cap. ii. 
 
 J Si iioxiimi, ibi dnmnatur; si utile, ibi invenitur, &c 
 
 Auff. ii. lie doct. Chr. 42. August. Ibid. Covasrub. dam i., 
 advent, scrm vi. 
 
 § Qnre'cuiique, iijnul omnr s recte dicta sunt, nostra Cbris- 
 tianonnn ■snnl,— Justin Mart. orat. el Genlil. ad Sen. Rom. 
 
 II Tcvt. in Ap.!!. 
 
Ver. 1.] 
 
 LECTURE XL. 
 
 261 
 
 nus'- calleth them thieves, and chargeth them to have 
 stolen their best opinions from holy writers ; those 
 are ours also. Many things they speak at unawares, 
 et tanquam per recantationem ,'aX a fit, as it were, recant- 
 ing their errors, many things ingratis, compelled and 
 against their wills, f which in them are but guesses 
 and presumptions, in us grounded knowledge ; these 
 are ours likewise, pra'sumptio)ies in iis, in nobis smnmfc 
 scientiic. It skilleth not in what ground the herb 
 grew, nor what gardener sowed it, or brought it up, 
 so it heal, iion refert qiid terra nata, ciijus hortiilani 
 curd creverit herba, wodd annet. And what matter is 
 it though the crown were the king's of Ammon, so it 
 be meet for the king of Jerusalem, to take away, and 
 to set upon his own head ? 2 Sam. xii. A countryman 
 of onr own,:!: though an obscure author, wrote not 
 obscurely touching this controversy; for in the pro- 
 logue of his tripartite work, he giveth a reason why 
 he induceth the laws of the heathen. The wisdom of 
 God, saith ho, hath brought the stork, and the kite, 
 and the swallow to witness against sinners ; where- 
 fore, by his example and assistance, ejus if/it ur excm- 
 ])Io ct au.riUo, &c., who hath brought an honeycomb 
 out of the mouth of a lion, and abundance of water 
 from an ass's jaw-bones, and who is able of stones to 
 raise up children to Abraham, I have endeavoured of 
 the laws of Pagans, to make children's bread fit for 
 the information and instruction of a Christian life. 
 
 I have long troubled you with the opinions of the Chris- 
 tian fathers, and some later divines, touching these Gen- 
 tile and external helps : but where shall I seek pati'ons, 
 if need be, for these fatherless and fi-iendless fathers 
 themselves ? For these we also account to be spots 
 in our sermons, and our labom's seem the worse, if the 
 names of Augustine, Jerome, and other reverend doc- 
 tors, do but sound therein. Surely, according to that 
 image of the world, which I have found pictured with 
 the feet upwards, to note that all things are turned 
 upside down, we the punics and proselj-tes of good 
 learning, control and correct our fathers ; and al- 
 though in many of us there may be very small cause, 
 yet we presume to say with David, not speaking from 
 the humble Spu'it of God, but from a strong conceit 
 of oiu- own weakness, and a weaker judgment of the 
 strength of others ; ' I am wiser than my teachers ; 
 I have more understanding than the ancient ever had,' 
 Ps. cxix. Howsoever we account of them, it is most 
 tnie, that they have laboured for us, and ' we are en- 
 tered upon their labours.' The fruits whereof, if we 
 reap without acknowledgment, we arc unthankful ; or 
 if we pass them over with contempt and disdain, and 
 think it the losing of good hours to peruse their books, 
 we are too fond of our own learning : other men as 
 they list. Let them esteem the light of antiquity no 
 better worth than to be hid under a bushel, and quite 
 
 * 1 et 5 Strom. 
 
 t Joan. Langus prcefat. in Justin Mart, ad Gent. Justin 
 Mart, adver. Greec. t Joan, de Bromyardo. 
 
 suppressed, that they may set their own upon a can- 
 dlestick, and cause it to blaze to the view of the whole 
 house : eyo rero iUos reneror, et lantis nominibus sem- 
 per assurgo ;* but, for mine own part, I have them in 
 great reverence, and honour their very names ; and I 
 say of their works in general, as Theotimus, a bishop 
 amongst the Scythians, spake of the works of Origen, 
 when Theophilus and Epiphanius urged him to join in 
 the condemnation of them. I will neither discredit 
 him, who has since happily fallen asleep in the Lord, 
 neither dare I attempt so blasphemous a thing as to 
 reprove those writings which our forefathers have not 
 reproved, f They carried memorable names in for- 
 mer ages. Cyprian called Tertullian his master. 
 Yincentius Lirinensis saith of him, that his argu- 
 ments were as the lightnings to beat down heretics. 
 The testimonies that Augustine giveth unto Cyprian 
 are very large, and this amongst the rest, that the 
 mother church reputed him in the number of a very 
 few of most excellent condition. J But who can study 
 to spend more honour upon him than he who said. 
 Loquitur diserta, sed magis fortia quam diserla, neque 
 teim loquitur fortia qurmi vivit.l His speech is elo- 
 quent, yet hath more strength in it than eloquence, 
 and his life more strength than his speech. Augus- 
 tine they termed not unworthily the hammer of here- 
 tics, lucreticorum malleus. Athanasius called Ambrose 
 the eye of the world, orbis terrarum ocidiis. Athana- 
 sius himself was siuTiamed the Great, magnus Athana- 
 sius, for his in\-ineible corn-age in defending the chm'ch. 
 Nazianzeu wi-iteth of Basil, that between him and 
 his followers there is no more comparison than between 
 pillars and their shadows. I omit the rest ; but such 
 are our unequal judgments of those whose equals we 
 shall hardly be, that if we were willed to speak what 
 we thought of Basil, we would reckon him but a 
 shadow and counterfeit to ourselves, and gi-eat Atha- 
 nasius as one of the least amongst us ; and thrust out 
 the eyes of Ambrose, and term him a crow and a 
 chough, cnrrum et cornieulam , as the pie of Mu'andula 
 did ; and Cyprian should have a letter of his name 
 changed, as sometimes it was, and be but Coprian[l 
 unto us, one that wrote of trifles and vanities. I omit 
 the rest, the classical and principal doctors of the 
 church (next the apostles of Christ, and their next 
 succeeders), the stars and ornaments of learning, the 
 pillars of religion and Christianity in their time, who 
 put their bodies and souls betwixt Christ and his ad- 
 
 * Senec. lib. viii., epist. C5. 
 
 t Ut reprobem quae majores nostri non reprobarunt. — 
 Socrat. lib. vi. cap. 12. 
 
 X Inter r.iros et paucos excellentissimos grati.-e viros. — 
 Lib. yi. Dc hapt. cont. Donatist., cap. 2. 
 
 'i Erasm. prsefat. in opera Cypriani. 
 
 II Cyprianus, Coprianus ; Lactant. — [It ougbt to be noted 
 that Lactantius does not himself spealf thus disparagingly 
 of Cyprian, but complains that he was derided by the learned 
 men of that age, and particularly by one whom he had heard 
 speaking so of him. — Div. Inst., lib. v. chap. L — Ed.] 
 
262 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 versaries ; wLo spake, and wrote, and lived, and died 
 in defence of his truth ; whose hiljours were then re- 
 nowned, and God in his providence hath reserved their' 
 books to this day, monuments to us of their infati- 
 gahle pains, and helps to our studies, if we be not 
 enemies to oui'selves. I could be content to sa3' much 
 for them, because I use them much ; for I never could 
 be bold to ofl'er mine own inventions and conceits to 
 the world, when I have found them such in St Augus- 
 tine, and others, as might not be amended. I would not 
 wish with the learned of any sort, that hath but borne a 
 book, to dispraise learning. She hath enemies enough 
 abroad, though she be justified by her children. It 
 is fitter that wisdom be beaten by fools, than by wise 
 men,* and that Barbaiy disgrace arts, rather than 
 Athens the mother and nurse of them ; but above all 
 other places, a blow given in the pulpit, leaveth a scar 
 in the face of learning which cannot easily be removed. 
 It prejudiceth the teaching of others, as if they fed the 
 people with acorns and husksinstead of bread ; and be- 
 cause they gather the members of truth together, dis- 
 persed through orators, philosophers, poets, fathers, 
 scriptures, and make one body of them all, which God 
 is the author of, they are thought in a manner to preach 
 falsehood. Or at least, it is vanity in those that 
 preach, and itching in those that hear, and in neither 
 of both to be allowed. I also condemn it, when it is 
 80. Vain and vain-glorious invention, let it wither 
 at the brain that sent it forth. And let itching ears 
 fret and consume away with the malignity of their 
 humours. Where we find them itching after pleasure, 
 it is good to make them smart with the acrimony of 
 severe^reprehension. But where it is otherwise, let 
 not a rash conclusion without proof be admitted 
 against good learning. If Asclepiodorus will draw 
 with a coal or chalk alone, I judge him not ; if others 
 will paint with colours, neither let them be judged. 
 If some will barely teach, and others prove ; if some 
 afl'ect to speak with simplicity, and others with variety 
 illustrate ; if some confer with men of yesterday, 
 others with antiquity ; some bind themselves preciselj" 
 to the W'Ords of God, others not refrain the words of 
 men, using them as 'the words of God,' il: \!,yit/. 
 08o3. If some stand narrowly upon the terms and 
 sentences of faith, others not depart from ' tlio pro- 
 portion of faith,' 1 Pet. iv., nor bring in anything dis- 
 sonant and disagreeing to the uniformity thereof; both 
 may do well, but the latter, in mine opinion, do far 
 the better. That which concerneth you in this little 
 dissent of judgments, the sheep of his pasture, by 
 whom we are set in his house to give you your portion 
 in due time, is this, that you bo not^dismaycd hereat. 
 For we preach not ourselves in such kind of preach- 
 ings, but Christ Jesus the Lord ; not to commend our 
 gifts, but to edily your consciences. And to this end, 
 I may say, with some alteration of words, as the 
 apostle to the Corinthians, 1 Cor. iii., ' All things are 
 * Ojiortct sapicutiam ab iusipicutibus feriri. — Viogen. 
 
 yours, whether it be" Paul, or ApoUos, or Cephas, or 
 the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things 
 to come ;' so all things are yours in our preaching, 
 whether it be scripture, or nature, or art, all is yours. 
 Yours are philosophers, orators, historiographers, poets, 
 Jews, Gentiles, Grecians, barbarians, fathers, new- 
 writers, men, angels, that you may be saved ; this 
 only is the end whereunto our knowledge and learn- 
 ing of what kind soever is directed. 
 
 To return to Jonah discontented, and withal to con- 
 clude. You see the fall, nay you see the relapse of a 
 chosen prophet, a sickness recovered, and a recidiva- 
 tion into the same or a worse sickness. Before he 
 had sinned and recanted his sin, and washed his dis- 
 obedience away with the waters of the sea, but now is 
 returned to the miie again ; mire, indeed, wherein his 
 heart, as a troubled and muddy spring, is so disordered 
 that he discerneth nothing aright, neither in faith to 
 God, nor charity to man, nor love to himself; accus- 
 ing the most righteous Lord, envying his innocent 
 brethren, and carried away headlong with a kind of 
 detestation towards his own person ; once angr}', and 
 angryagain; not only conceiving, but defending anger; 
 angry, and with the worm in the earth, angry with 
 the sun in the sky, angry with the wind in the air, 
 angry with the former and governor of all these, who 
 could have ended his passion with the least breath of 
 his angrj' lips. A dangerous and grievous wound in 
 a saint, if I would thrust my fingers into it, and 
 thoroughly handle it. But I leave it to the order of 
 my text, worth}' of another sea, and of another whale, 
 and once more of the belly of hell, even of hell indeed, 
 if God would exactl}' stand to repay it. Improbe Nep- 
 Innnm accunat, qui ilerum naufrofjium facit. He 
 hath no reason to accuse Neptune, that so presently 
 after a late danger, will hazard himself to take ship- 
 wreck again. God is admirable [in his saints, not 
 only in their risings, but in their fallings also. The 
 best amongst them have fallen. And I love to report 
 their falls ; not that I take any pleasure with ungraci- 
 ous Ham to uncover the nakedness of my fathers, 
 but because that mantle and cloak of charity, which 
 God casteth over their sins to cover their weaknesses 
 with, is the comfortablest reading and learning that 
 the world hath. St Augustine spake wisely of the 
 error of Cyprian :* Projitcica iioii vuli! aliqidtl, ut ali- 
 qiiid per cum siqieremiiiciiliiis vidcniiir. There was 
 something which he saw not, that he might gain the 
 knowledge of some more excellent thing. That which 
 he lost in faith, he got in charity. So there is some- 
 what that Jonah doth not, to make way to the doing 
 of some better work. For if he gained nothing else, 
 the mercy of God might bj' this means be the more 
 commended in the forgiveness of his trespass, and that 
 which he loseth in charity, he gelteth in faith ; that 
 is, in the assurance and ratification of the love of God 
 towards him. Coiiimissiiiii aUjiie conscriptum est, saith 
 * Lib. i. do baptis. cout. Douat. cuji. xviii. 
 
Ver 2.] 
 
 LECTURE XLI. 
 
 2G3 
 
 Augustine, upon the 51st Psalm, of the adultery and 
 murder of David. So is this fault of Jonah both done 
 and written b}' one, of whom I am sure that his wit- 
 ness is true, because he aocuseth himself ; and it is 
 written for our learninr;, that those who j"et stand, fall 
 not ; and those that are fallen may rise again. Trust not 
 your arms of flesh, trust not your hearts of ashes, 
 trust not your purest and uprightest spirits, whilst 
 the}' have their dwelling in houses of clay ; and there 
 is a law in the members striving agaiust them to get 
 the victory. If you have stood a time, yet trust not 
 your legs, you may slide again ; or if you have slipped 
 and recovered, trust not that recovery for fear of 
 backsliding. Trust not the prerogative of j-our call- 
 ing ; prophets have fallen, patriarchs have fallen, 
 apostles have fallen, stars have fallen, angels have 
 fallen. Trust not your strength, it is infirmity ; trust 
 not wisdom, it is folly ; trust not the friendship of the 
 world, it is enmity with God ; trust not the authority 
 thereof, it is contemptible in his sight ; trust not the 
 purity of nature, it is defiled ; trust not the righteous- 
 ness of your works, it is unpcrfect ; trust in the 
 mercy of God, for that only is absolute, and in the 
 merits of his beloved Son, for they are all-sutficient: 
 Isa. xliii,, ' It is I, it is even I, which, for mine own 
 sake, put away thine iniquities.' It is not I, nor thou, 
 nor Abraham, nor Moses, nor Peter at Rome, nor 
 Paul at .Jerusalem, that can do this cure. Hear thy 
 Physician: ' It is I, even I.' Not with the prepara- 
 tion of thine own nature, nor with the liberty of thine 
 own will ; not with the co-operation of thine own jus- 
 tice. Hear him once again. It is I, even I, which ' for 
 mine own sake.' If thou thiukest to hire him, thou 
 losest him. He standeth not upon thy desert, but 
 upon his own most holy name, his own most right- 
 eous promise, and the obedience of his own and most 
 only begotten Son, the Lord Christ Jesus. 
 
 An Admonition to the Readers. 
 
 It may seem strange that I have used so large and 
 impertinent a digression in behalf of good learning. As 
 after a long oration spent in the praise of Hercules, 
 one asked, Qiiisrilupi'irnil ? who dispraised Hercules'? 
 So you may desire to know who dispraised learning. 
 Let it sufliceyou to understand, that one of my fellow- 
 labourers in this work of the Lord, whom neither I 
 judge in the freedom of his conscience for speaking 
 what he thought, neither can free from the community 
 of erring with myself and others, because we are all 
 unperfect in knowledge, upon the best day of the 
 seven, in the best place, and before not the meanest 
 assembly, handling the words of the apostle, 1 Cor. 
 xvi. 13, ' Watch ye, stand fast in the faith,' took occa- 
 sion thereupon, to ctand for the only word of faith in 
 sermons, with vehement exception against the histories 
 of the Gentiles, orators, poets, and other profane 
 knowledge. Wherein, let it be his commendation 
 that according to the warning of his text, he was dili- 
 gent in his watch, and being jealous for the truth, 
 suspected those for enemies which were not, and 
 shewed his fidelity to the faith, though he went a little 
 too far, and missed in the just measure of applying 
 it. For mine own part, I would have spared mine 
 answer, especially in public, but that I perceived the 
 speech to be bent to some mark of a few' that laboured 
 in that calling, and the cars of the people drank it in 
 with earnest attention, because it was heartily spoken, 
 and some w^ere perplexed, others ofiended therewith, 
 and learning was wounded, which not to have salved 
 had been a wrong, and the arrow flew from her side, 
 and glanced upon us all without exception in that 
 church, who, in our manner of teaching held no other 
 course. 
 
 LECTUKE XLI. 
 
 Ahd lie prayed unto lite Lord, and said, 1 pray tliec, Lord, was not this my saxjiiuj ulien I uas yet in my 
 
 country? — JoN^ui IV. 2. 
 
 nWE first part of this chapter is spent in declaring 
 J_ the fault of Jonah, his unmerciful afl'ection to- 
 wards this poor people freed from the wrath of God, 
 to whom he should have wished well if they had been 
 enemies, as now they were friends and reconciled by 
 apparent repentance, and rather than have missed 
 this success which fell out, not only have doubled 
 and trebled his pains, but even have pulled out his 
 eyes, and laid down his life to have saved their lives. 
 Jonah, in lieu hereof, envieth their mercy received, and 
 is angry against God, the dispenser and carver of that 
 mercy, and angry against himself, that he Uveth to 
 behold his expectation so eontraricd. A wound in a 
 prophet, so much the more intolerable that it was but 
 
 green after his late recovery. For being newly raised 
 up ii'om falling, he dashed his foot presently against 
 the same stone ; rebelling before against the express 
 commandment of God, and now repining, fretting, ex- 
 postulating, and not much less than rebelling again. 
 One would have thought that the salt sea should have 
 purged and washed away all his choleric distempera- 
 tures, and that his danger, so newly endured and 
 eschewed, farther than his hope could see into, 
 should wholly have transformed him into a man of 
 mercy. Rut you see it is otherwise ; for the good- 
 ness of God ' displeaseth Jonah exceedingly, and he 
 is angry.' The impatience of Jonah, consisting of 
 envy, implied, and probably conjectured (it displeased 
 
264 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 Jonah), and of anger openly expressed, we have in 
 general laid down in the first verse, and are particu- 
 larly to pursue in those 'that follow. Then were 
 named the aflections only, now we come to the eflects 
 of those aflections : with what gesture and speech he 
 came before God. Surely the eflects are such, that 
 they deserve to be smitten with the censure of the 
 wise man, Prov. xxvii., ' A stone is heavy, and the 
 sand weighty, but j'et a fool's heart is heavier than 
 them both.' Balance the justice of God in his right- 
 eous dealing with the penitent city of Nineveh, against 
 the anger of Jonah fii'ed and enraged. Doth not Jonah 
 impeach it, as if the Lord had done some injury, 
 for which he were justly to bo taunted and brought 
 into question ? ' 0, 1 beseech thee, was not this my 
 saying ?' &c. Ponder his own ofl'ence, which if Saul 
 or some other alien had committed, he should have 
 borne his trespass. Doth he not justify it ? ' Therefore 
 I prevented it ;' that is, I did not amiss to flee unto 
 Tarshish. The state of this mighty city, to be desolate 
 and overthrown, he regardeth no more than to see a 
 grass in the field mown down : ' for I knew thee to 
 be a merciful God ;' that which I feared is fallen upon 
 me, the exhibition of thy grace to Nineveh. Yen, the 
 price of his own life is but vile in his own eyes, so he 
 may wreak his anger and satisfy his discontented mind, 
 by any cither lawful or unlawful means : ' Now, there- 
 fore, I pray thee, take my life from me,' &c. Neither 
 did he only conceive anger in his mind, but he fol- 
 loweth, feedeth, maintaiueth it, that we have just 
 cause to strike him again with another sentence of the 
 same wise man : Eccles. vii., ' Be not thou of an 
 hasty spirit to be angry, for anger resteth in the bosom 
 of fools.' Damascene* maketh three degrees of 
 anger. Litem, iracitndiam, infcnsionem , choler, wrath, 
 and heavy displeasure. The one, he sayeth, hath be- 
 ginning and motion, but presently ceaseth ; the other 
 taketh deeper hold in the memory ; the third desisteth 
 not without revenge. Gregory Nyssen, keeping to the 
 same number, calleth the one anger, the second light- 
 ness of the brain, the third stark staring madness, 
 iram, maniam, furorcm.\ Cliehtoveus compareth the 
 first to fire in stubble, which is soon kindled, and soon 
 put out ; the second, to fire in iron, which hardly 
 taketh and longer abideth ; the third, to fire that is 
 hid and never bewrayeth itself, but with the ruin and 
 waste of that matter wherein it hath caught. Some 
 are sharp, O^yiy.oi, saith Aristotle ; J others are bitter, 
 n/zgo/ ; a third kind is implacable, XuhiToi. The 
 anger of Jonah may seem to have been in the third 
 place : it cannot be mitigated. He desireth nothing 
 so much as that Nineveh may bo overthrown. He 
 compliiineth, persistcth, replioth, and by no persua- 
 sions can be brought from shewing his displeasure both 
 against God, and against his own life. 5 
 
 To come to my purpose, the particulars to bo 
 
 * Lib. ii. cap. xvi. do fido orthod. 
 t Comment, in Damos. 
 
 t 4 Klliic. ii 
 
 examined for the better searching out of his fault are 
 1. That lie prayed unto the Lord. 2. What he prayed ; 
 and therein both the substance of his petition in the 
 3d verse, tJwrefore, 1 beseech thee, take mij life from me ; 
 and the causes', that moved him so to pray, for that 
 the mercy of God had disappointed him, / kneio that 
 thoa art a i/racioiis God, kc, together with an expro- 
 bation, that he suspected so much when he was at 
 home. 
 
 1. And lie prayed unto the Lord. That Jonah 
 prayed, or that he praj-ed unto the Lord, I dislike not. 
 Happy is that man, who, either in the midst of anger 
 or of any other ofl'ence, can 'pray. He ever obtaineth 
 either that which he prayeth for, or that which is 
 better, or that which is sufficient. Aut hoc quod oral, 
 aut quod melius est, aut quod sufficit. If Jonah had 
 restinguished and choked the fervour of his wrath 
 with the fervency of the Spirit, he had done beyond 
 exception; but it is well that he remcmbereth himself 
 any way to be a prophet, and doth not quite forget 
 God, and his whole duty towards him. For anger hath 
 a company of most pestilent daughters ;* swelling of 
 the mind, tumor mentis, so high and so full, that there 
 is no room for any good motion to dwell by it : con- 
 tumely towards men, blasphemy towards God, indig- 
 nation of heart, impatience and clamour of speech, 
 violence of hands, with other savage and monstrous 
 demeanour, as far forth as strength will give it leave. 
 ' Anger is cruel,' saith the proverb, ' and wrath is 
 raging ; but who can stand before envy ?' Prov. xxvii. 
 I know that the eflects of anger have been such as I 
 named before. They were such in Simeon and Levi, 
 whom Jacob their father upon his deathbed. Gen. 
 xlix., wdien all displeasure should have died with him, 
 detested in his very soul, and instead of blessing, 
 cursed them. They were such in Saul against Jona- 
 than, his own flesh, for excusing the absence of David, 
 and making no more than a just defence of his inno- 
 cency, ' Wherefore shall he die? what hath he done?' 
 1 Sam. XX., when ho took up a javelin in his hand, 
 and would have nailed him to the wall, if his mark 
 had not shunned him. It appeareth by that which 
 followeth, that if it had been possible for Jonah to 
 have commanded fire from heaven, as the disciples 
 would have done, Inike ix., against a toNni of Samaria, 
 he would not have spared it. But anger cxorciseth the 
 arms of the strong, the tongue of the weak, -f There- 
 fore, since he hath not the power over the thunders 
 and lightnings of God, he occupieth but his tongue ; 
 but whatsoever may be done by the inteniperatoness 
 thereof, he dissembleth it not. 
 
 It is no great commendation to Jonah that he 
 prayed, because he prayed in choler, with a spirit 
 troubled and disordered, measuring all things, not by 
 the will of God, but by the fancies thereof; because 
 with such distraction of mind, the fountain of his 
 
 * A()niii. ii. 2 qii.T. 158. 
 
 t Ira forti producit lacertos, irabcUi linguam. — Scaliger. 
 
Ver. 2.] 
 
 LECTURE XLT. 
 
 265 
 
 heart, ponring forth sweet and sour together ; the 
 ■words of his lips directed unto God, but his inward 
 cogitations altogether bestowed in purging himself, 
 wishing revenge, accusing God, and other such like 
 foreign and improper intentions. It might have been 
 said to Jonah, bending himself to prayer in this sort, 
 as the prophet spake to Jerusalem, Jer. iv., ' Wash thy 
 heart from malice: how long shall thy wicked thoughts 
 remain within thee ?' Or as it was said to the scribes in 
 the Gospel, Mat. is., ' Why think ye evil in your 
 hearts ?' Our Saviour counselled his disciples. Mat. 
 vi., when they prayed, not to be as hypocrites, stand- 
 ing at the heads of the streets, but to ' enter into their 
 chambers, and shut the doors unto them,' and to pray 
 to their Father in secret, that he might openly reward 
 them. Now to what purpose is it to remove the body 
 from the eyes of men, to close it up in a private cham- 
 ber within walls and doors, if the soul have a trouble- 
 some and unquiet companj' within — mqer, impatience, 
 envy — to disturb her meditations wi.u noise ? * For 
 these must also be put forth, as C! rist put foi-th the 
 minstrels and mourners ; all the afifections of the heart 
 must be repressed ; the whole strength and might of 
 the soul kept nearly together, without wandering 
 abroad, that by their forces united in one, the good- 
 ness of the Lord maj- the sooner be obtained. The 
 oracle gave answer to a man desirous to know what 
 art he should use in praying : Thou must give the half 
 moon, the whole sun, and the anger of a dog;t that 
 is, CC>B, thy whole heart, with every affection belong- 
 ing unto it. In that introduction of prayer, which 
 our Saviour setteth down in the Gospel, though there 
 be sundry branches of requests to God, as the sancti- 
 fying of his name, the enlarging of his kingdom, or 
 whatsoever else is meet, either for the body or the 
 soul of man, yet all the rest are passed over with their 
 only first reciting, and the only exposition which ho 
 leavuth unto us is upon the fifth petition, wherein we 
 desu-e pardon of our own debts, as we pardon others. 
 Mat. vi. ; for there our Saviour addeth, culling this 
 one from amidst all the rest, and setting his special 
 mark upon it, ' If you forgive men their trespasses, 
 your heavenly Father will also forgive you ;' if not, 
 look accordingly to be dealt with. His meaning, no 
 doubt, was, that ' when we bring our gift to the altar,' 
 the oblation of our lips and hearts, and come not in 
 charity, whatsoever we make request for, is returned 
 back again, and our whole offering refused, as an un- 
 savoury thing which the Lord hath no pleasure in : 
 1 Cor. siii., ' Though I speak with the tongues of 
 men and angels, and have not charity, I am as sound- 
 ing brass, or a tinkling cymbal, and though I had the 
 gift of prophecy, and knew all secrets and knowledge, 
 yea, if I had all faith, so that I could remove mountains, 
 and had not charity, ovdsv ii/j-i;' before, I was little ; I was 
 
 * Molesta intus familia. — Senec. Turbam intus Bustinet. 
 — Gregor. 
 
 t Da mcdiam lunam, solem siraul, et coenis iram. 
 
 but a sound, now ' I am nothing.' What can we less 
 pronounce of the prayer of Jonah ; — though one that 
 spake with the tongue of a man, and in comparison of 
 other men, the tongue of an angel, a tongue of the 
 leai'ucd, a tongue refined like silver ; though one that 
 had the gift of prophecy, and knew as many mysteries 
 of knowledge as was expedient for flesh and blood to 
 be acquainted with ; one that had faith enough to save 
 him in the bottom of the seas, the bottom of the 
 mountains, the bottom and belly of a monstrous fish ; — 
 but that the want of love was sutficient to have lost 
 the blessing and grace of all his heart's desires ? ^7I~ 
 2. And said, 1 pray thcc, Lord, teas not this my 
 saying, &c. Consider now, I beseech you, what he 
 prayed, and therein, how long it is before he cometh 
 to the matter intended, a foolish and unnecessary dis- 
 course interposed of his own praise, but his subjection 
 to the will of God not thought upon. For what is the 
 substance of his praj'er ? that which is inferred, 
 after a long preface, ' Therefore, I pray thee, take 
 away my life from me ;' he strengthencth it by reason : 
 ' for it is better for me to die than to live.' Why 
 better ? The causes of this commodiousness and con- 
 venience are contained in the prolocution, in thoso 
 frivolous and vain speeches that are first laid down: 
 ' I beseech thee, was not this my saying,' &c. ; as 
 much as to say, I was thrust forth into a charge, which 
 from the first hour I had never liking unto, and where- 
 in I thought and said, and resolved to make myself, from 
 the very beginning, thati should be deceived. Admitall 
 this. Say thou forcsawest it, and that the end would 
 be other than thou lookedst for, oughtest thou, there- 
 fore to have refused thy message ? A necessity was 
 laid upon thee, and thou mightest well assure 
 thyself, that woes would have lighted upon thee, as 
 many as the hairs of thy head, if thou didst it not. 
 Leave the event to God, let him use his floor at his 
 pleasure ; whether he gather into the barn, or scatter 
 as the dust of the earth, do thou the office of a pro- 
 phet. Again, then sentest me to denouuce a judg- 
 ment, and thou meantest nothing but well unto them ; 
 I preached righteousness and severity, and ' thou art 
 a gracious God, and full of pity ;' I made their ac- 
 counts perfect and straight that destruction should 
 fall upon them at the end of forty days, thou takest a 
 pen of thy mercy, and dashest thy former writing, 
 and writest them a longer day, years and generations 
 to come, I know not how many. Upon this he con- 
 cludeth, ' therefore now, Lord, take away my life,' 
 &c. But we will weigh the conclusion when we come 
 to it. Meantime we must rip up his former speeches, 
 which were of preparation, making the way to his suit 
 beforehand. Peruse them who will, he shall find 
 find them fuller of affections than words, and such a 
 bundle of errors wrapped together, as one would 
 hardly have imagined in a prophet. Wherein by a 
 blind self-liking and love to his own wit and judgment, 
 he is carried from reason, truth, obedience, and from 
 
266 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 that reverent estimation which he should have had of 
 God ; for how often, in so short a space, doth lie chal- 
 lenge wisdom to himself! 'I beseech thee, Lord;' 
 I appeal to thine own conscience, speak but truth, and 
 be not part'al in thine own cause; 'was not this my 
 saying?' I am able to allege particulars, I can re- 
 member the time and the place, ' when I was yet in my 
 country,' therefore I prevented it. If I had had mine 
 own will, I had stopped this inconvenience, for I was 
 not to learn that thou wast a gracious God ; there was 
 po point of foresight wherein I mistook. Thus his 
 saying, his providence, his prevention, his knowledge, 
 these are the things that he standeth too much and 
 too long upon. Thy saying, Jonah, or my saying, or 
 the saying of any mortal man ! what are the words of 
 our lips, or the imaginations of our hearts, but naughty, 
 foolish, perverse, from our youth up, if God direct 
 them not? or what thy prevention and forecast, or of 
 all thy companions, prophets, or prophets' children in 
 the world, to know what to-morrow- will bring upon 
 you, or the closing[up of the present day, unless some 
 wisdom from heaven cast beams into your minds to 
 enlighten them? As Elisha, 2 Kings" xiii., directed 
 the hand of Joash, the king of Israel, to shoot, and the 
 arrow of God's deliverance followed upon it, and so 
 often as he smote the gi'ound by the appointment of 
 the prophet, so often, and no longer, he had likelihood 
 of good success ; so the Lord must direct our tongues 
 and hearts in all that proceedcth from them ; and 
 where his Holy Spirit ceaseth to guide us, there it 
 will be verified that the prophet hath, ' Surely every 
 man is a beast by his own knowledge.' Therefore 
 the advice of Solomon is good: Prov. iii., 'Trust in 
 the Lord with all thine heart ; and lean not unto thy 
 wisdom. In all thy waj's acknowledge him, and he 
 Bhall direct thy paths. Be not wise in thine own 
 eyes : and fear the Lord, and depart from evil. So 
 shall health bo to thy ravel, and marrow to thy 
 bones.' You have heard the counsel of the wise, now 
 join unto it for conclusion the judgment of the most 
 righteous : Isa. v., ' Woe unto them that are wise in 
 their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight.' 
 Wisdom presumed, you see, and drawn from the 
 cistern of our own brain, is, in the reputation of 
 God, as the sins of covetousness, oppression, drunk- 
 enness, and such like, and standeth in the crew of 
 those damned and wretched iniquities which God 
 accurseth. 
 
 I pray tlwe. I like the note that Jerome giveth 
 upon this place. He tempcrcth his complaint because 
 in some sort he accusetli God of injustice, qucrelam 
 temjiernt, (judd iiiJHslilicE quailttm riioila Ileum (Ut/iiot. 
 For this cause he sweet(^ncth the accusation with fair 
 and flattering speech. For, to have challenged God 
 in gross and blunt terms had been too apparent ; 
 therefore be comcth with a plausible and glozing in- 
 sinuation unto him: 'I pray thee, Lord.' For, 
 remembering that fearful name of his, Jehovah, wherein 
 
 he saw nothing but majesty and dreadfulness, could 
 he do less than entreat him ? If he had spoken but 
 to the king of Nineveh, in whose dominions he was, 
 or to Jeroboam the Second, who reigned in his own 
 native country, the very regard of their persons and 
 place would have enforced him so muc'n. It was the 
 counsel that xEsop gave to Solon, enquiring what 
 speech he should use before Crcesus, either very little 
 or ver}' sweet, aut qiuvn minima aut qudm didcissima. 
 For a prince is pacified with com-tesj', and ' a soft 
 answer turneth away wrath,' and ' a gentle tongue 
 breaketh a man of bones' (osseuin), Prov. xxv. and sv. ; 
 that is, of the hardest and toughest disposition that 
 can be. If such, then, be our usage before the princes 
 of the earth, who are but smoke and vanity, much 
 more doth the presence of the most high God re- 
 quire it. 
 
 I pray thee, Quiiso, Jeliorah. The form of speech, 
 I have elsewhere noted, befitteth suitors ; ' The poor 
 speaketh with pr yers, but the rich speaketh roughly,' 
 piauper cum ohseci ationihus loquitur, Prov. xviii. For 
 those that are rich are full and sufficient, as they 
 think, in themselves, and therefore they say unto God, 
 in the vain trust of their own abundance, ' Who is the 
 Almighty, that we should serve him ? and what profit 
 shall we have if we pray unto him ? ' Job xxi. The 
 Jews, Isa. Iviii., were so filled and blown up with the 
 opinion of their own merits, that they thought per- 
 haps God was little able to stand them in stead, and 
 therefore they come not unto him, ue bescecli thee, but 
 upbraiding, challenging, provoking : ' Wherefore have 
 we fasted, and punished ourselves, and thou regardest 
 it not?' As if God were bound unto them, to hear 
 them for their service sake. Such were the scribes 
 and the pharisees in the Gospel : ' Why eateth your 
 master with publicans and sinners ? ' and ' This man 
 is a friend to publicans and sinners ; ' and, ' If this 
 man were a prophet, he would have known who had 
 touched him, for she is a sinner.' Themselves, what 
 were they, in this eyeing and pointing at sinners so 
 much ? Angels or men ? saints or sinners ? One of 
 that school, though he went into the temple to pray, 
 yet he prayed not as if he found want, but rather gave 
 thanks lor that which he had received, and gloried in 
 himself before all other men, and especially, with 
 scornful demonstration, before that publicau, Luke xviii. 
 Let them swell with their full conceits till they break, 
 and let their eyes stand out with fatness ; let them 
 bear the collops of presumption and disdain in their 
 flanks. But the voice of the gospel of Christ, which is 
 the rod of our comfort, 'The poor receive the gospel,' 
 and ' Blessed arc the poor in spirit,' is smally to the 
 comfort of these stately and stout guests : ' I came 
 not to call the righteous, but the sinners to repen- 
 tance.' This is the spar of the gate. If ever they 
 think to enter into the supper of the Ijamb, their 
 righteousness, falsely supposed, keepcth them out. 
 They ' have purchased a lium ' of righteousness, they 
 
Ver. 2.] 
 
 LECTURE XLI. 
 
 267 
 
 think their dwelliDgs safe enough without the house 
 of God, aud therefore they desire to be excused ; they 
 ' plough with the oxen ' of their own imagined right- 
 eousness, and ' hare married ' themselves unto it as 
 unto a wife, and ' therefore thej cannot come.' ' To 
 him that is full, honey is unpleasant ;' but emptiness 
 and sinfulness lioth at his gates who is rich in mercj', 
 as Lazarus at the gates of the rich man, with all her 
 ulcers and sores laid open, all her infirmities detected, 
 craving, begging, beseeching to be refreshed with the 
 crumbs that fall from his board, even with the smallest 
 pittance of mercy that God is author of. Therefore 
 he saith, I pray thee. Lord. 
 
 In the prayer of the mariners before, chap, i., I 
 commended their humility, upon occasion of the like 
 term, in that they used the right form of supplication. 
 It shall not be amiss to commend humility unto you, 
 and you unto it, oiice again ; there is so hard getting, 
 harder keejiing of it. We have all haughty and phari- 
 saical eye-brows, whether we talk with God or man ; 
 aud as all vices are against humility, either openly or 
 privately, so especially pride of heart is a sworn and 
 professed enemy unto it in the open field. Yea, all 
 virtues are against humility ; for we are proud of 
 giving alms, tithing, fasting, praying, learning, wis- 
 dom, knowledge, and love to be seen of men. To say 
 fmther : humility hath an hand against humility, 
 against her own person ; and by an unnatural prodigi- 
 ous birth, bringeth forth pride : for the humble some- 
 times is as proud of his lowliness as Diogenes of his 
 rags.* Even for that difficulty's sake, we are to 
 desire the teacher and actor of humility, who both 
 delivered it by precept, Mat. xi., and declared it by 
 the example of his whole life, when we send our prayers 
 into heaven, not only to bow the knees of our bodies, 
 but the knees of our hearts, yea, even to humble and 
 bow the very phrase of our words, that we may utter 
 them as if the smallest grasshopper of the earth were 
 to speak, with fear and reverence before that dreadful 
 Majesty : I beseech thee, Lord, without upbraiding, 
 challenging, covenanting, for any our highest service 
 that hath been or shall be done. If we well examine 
 ourselves we shall find somewhat without us, extra 
 nos, to teach us humility, not only the better virtues 
 of other men, who have more deserved and received 
 less at God's hands, but even their falls in the midst 
 of those virtues ; somewhat beneath us, iiifia nos, the 
 obedience of beasts and birds, who in their kinds 
 glorify their Maker, and God hath enabled them with 
 strength and comeliness of nature more than ourselves ; 
 somewhat within us, intra nos, the conscience of our 
 own unworthiness and deformity of sin wherewith we 
 are spotted ; somewhat above us, supra nos, the 
 majesty, justice, and vengeance of an angry God ; 
 finally, somewhat against us, contra iios, enemies of 
 all sorts, outward, inward, carnal, spiritual, many, 
 
 * Sajpe etiam homo de ipso vanse glorioc coutcmptu vaniis 
 gloriatur. 
 
 mighty, deadly, both in heavenly and in earthly jjlaces. 
 Boughs of trees, the more they are laden with fruit, 
 the nearer they hang to the earth ; the best gold goeth 
 down in the balance, the lighter stayeth above ; good 
 corn lieth in the bottom of the heap, the chatf keepeth 
 on high ; so the more fruitful, precious, and virtuous 
 the soul is, the more it abaseth and vilifieth itself, 
 that he who ' hath chosen the weak to confound the 
 mighty ' may the more exalt it. 
 
 Was not this mij sayinij ? Jonah began well, if he 
 bad continued it ; hut he stumbleth at the threshold, 
 and in the first entry of his speech starteth back. I 
 should have thought, by the hope which he gave in 
 the greeting and salutation of God in his foremost 
 words — 'Z pray thee. Lord' — that he would have pro- 
 ceeded to an humble recapitulation and recital of his 
 rash, both speeches and actions before past. Pardon, 
 Lord, mine unadvised words, which I used in mine 
 own country ; forgive my purpose of preventing thy 
 will ; bury my flying to Tarshish, and all my trans- 
 gressions, in the bottom of the sea, where thou buriedst 
 me. Thus he should have done. But he, in a dif- 
 ferent mood, as if he had gotten a victory against 
 God, beginneth gloriously to triumph, little esteeming 
 to set his foot ujion the neck of justice itself, so. the 
 credit of his doings and sayings may be justified : . Lo, 
 Lord, this, this was the cause why I played the fugi- 
 tive ; was not this my word ? Had I not reason to 
 do as I did ; * to run unto Tarshish ? Did I jiot 
 say thus much before ? Was I not wise to presage 
 the event that would fall out ? If my counsel had 
 been followed, all these inconveniences of falsifying 
 my message, of bringing thy truth into question, had 
 been avoided. 
 
 Was not this my word [rerhum)? that is, his thought, 
 the word that his soul spake ; for the tongue is but 
 servant and messenger from the soul in this action. 
 AVhcn Jesus healed the man sick of the palsy, Mat. ix., 
 willing him to ' be of good comfort,' and adding, more- 
 over, that his ' sins were forgiven him,' ' behold, cer- 
 tain of the scribes,' not thought, but ' said, ii'rrov, 
 within themselves, this man blasphemeth. '.They 
 thought there were no witnesses present to their 
 speech ; ' but when Jesus saw their thoughts, it^vij,-/\- 
 Biig, he said, Wherefore think ye evil things in your 
 hearts ? ' That which the Gospel saith, tliey said, 
 Christ calleth thotiylits ; because the tongue is but the 
 instrument; it is the soul that speaketh ; and Christ is 
 as near to the speech of the one as the voice of the 
 other. I touch it in a vi'ord. The thoughts of our 
 hearts (we think as the scribes did) are close and 
 private to ourselves, but the Lord hath spies and 
 watchmen over them. The birds of the air shall be- 
 wray the counsels and conspiracies of thy bedchamber; 
 but the God of heaven beholdeth thy thoughts in the 
 midst of thy bosom. Say not within thyself, I did it 
 
 * Ejd domine, ilhul vero, illml orat cur fiercm transfuga. 
 — Luth. 
 
2()8 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 not, I spake it not, I only thought it in my heart, and 
 what more free than thought ? Mistake not. Thy 
 thoughts are not only thoughts, they give their sound 
 ■without, they go for words, and actions too, in the 
 sight of God. 
 
 The speech of Jonah, in every part thereof, savour- 
 eth of much presumption. (1.) He demandeth, Was 
 not this my saying ? Annon? which is the manner of 
 checking and controlling, for the most part. ' Art thou 
 a master in Israel, and knowest not these things?' 
 ' Answerest thou the High Priest thus ? ' ' Knowest 
 thou not that I have power to kill thee, and power to 
 let thee go ? ' ' Thou sittest to judge according to 
 the law, and smitest thou me contrary to the law ? ' 
 I spare the rest. My meaning is but to let you 
 understand that it had been a milder manner of speech 
 thus to have delivered it, ' This was my saying,' &c. 
 
 (2.) He maguifieth his xrord, as if there were more 
 than wind in it. Was not this my tvonl, rerhan meiim? 
 What is the word of Jonah, or of any mortal man ? 
 What virtue, what power, what truth, what edge, 
 what authority, what spirit, what life hath it in it ? 
 ' By the word of God the heavens were formed,' and 
 they are 'reserved for fire by the power of the same 
 word.' By the word of God is ' man turned to de- 
 struction,' and by the power of the same word is it 
 commanded, ' Retm-n, ye sons of Adam.' By the 
 word of God Nineveh is warned, and Nineveh is spared 
 b}- the power of the same word. But as touching the 
 word of Jonah, unless he observe the rule that Balaam 
 did, Num. sxii., ' The word that God putteth into 
 my mouth, that shall I speak,' it is as weak as water, 
 and as easy to be dispersed as the mist in the air. 
 
 (3.) He bringeth in a calendar of the time and place, 
 amplifying his complaint against God by singular cir- 
 cumstances: Wlicii I II (IS ill my count rij, clinu injiritrid 
 med, I told thee this. He saith not in Jewry, but in 
 mine own country, in terra mcd; as who should say. 
 What needed my travel and pains into Assyria, a 
 country unknown unto me, the going from mine own 
 home where I was best at case, and the compassing 
 of seas and lands, to lose the fruits of my labours ? 
 
 (4.) When I was yet, adhiie, in Judea ; if I had 
 spoken too late, I had spent my speech in vain; but 
 I spake in season, when I was first called, before ever 
 I stirred my foot, when all these troubles and mishaps 
 might have been eschewed. 
 
 Thcri'fore, iilcirco ; as if he had won the field, and 
 evicted it by plain argument and proof. Thus he in- 
 solently disputeth, and concludeth against God, as if 
 he reasoned with his neighbour; yet ' God is not as 
 man, that wo should answer him,' Job ix. And he 
 doth not only resist, hni prevent, nnteverteram ; as if 
 the wisdom and providence of the Most Higli were 
 inferior to his ; and not by staying in Israel, but by 
 going to Tarshish, nay, by flying to Tarshish, Thar- 
 sum J'wjicndo, as one that meant to leave the Lord 
 behind him by the swiftness of his pace. If this be 
 
 not sin and sins, presumptuous, high-minded, high- 
 speaking sins, I know not what sin is; and those that 
 labour to assoil the prophet from sin in this his dis- 
 obedience, what do they else but cover a naked body 
 with fig-leaves, which either the heat of the day will 
 wither, or the least blast of wind pull from it ? If we 
 wash his fault with snow-water, and purge his hands 
 and his heart never so clean by our charitable defence 
 of him, yet he hath plunged himself in the pit, and his 
 own clothes, his own words, have laid open his imper- 
 fections unto us. 
 
 The remembrance of his native country, I doubt 
 not, was sweet unto him. It was one of Jacob's con- 
 ditions in his vow to God when he was sent to Haran, 
 Gen. XX., that ' if God would be with him in the journey 
 which he went, and give him bread to eat, and clothes 
 to put on, so that he came again to his father's house 
 in safety, then should the Lord be bis God.' It was 
 also a great probation and trial of Abraham's obe- 
 dience. Gen. xii., when God sent him word to go from 
 his own country, and from his father's house. And 
 it seemeth unto me by this speech of Jonah, that he 
 had some longing after the laud of Israel, and thus 
 spake to himself. Oh that I were as in the months past, 
 when I stood upon mine own ground ! that corner of 
 the world best pleased me, iUe terrarum mihi prater 
 omnes anyulus ridet ; there I was in the midst of my 
 friends and companions, here I am a stranger to 
 strangers, with men of a foreign tongue and foi-eign 
 conditions. But ho remembereth that with pride and 
 ostentation of himself, and to justify a fault, which 
 without grief of heart, and shame of face, and stam- 
 mering of tongue, he should not have remembered. 
 Were those thy words in thine own country ? The more 
 thy sin, and thy shame too. Thou spakest against thy 
 life; if God had not favoured thee, if his mercy had 
 not held the bridle of thy tongue when it was in 
 motion, instead of speaking folly, thou wouldst have 
 proceeded to mere blasphemy. Canst thou remember 
 the time and the place without blushing, without 
 smiting thyself upon thy thigh, and asking forgive- 
 ness ? Wretched man that I am ! what have I done ? 
 Thou shouldst rather have cursed the gi'ound in thine 
 heart which thou then stoodest upon, than remem- 
 bered it with vaunting, and bitterly condemned thy 
 tongue for sending out such words of folly and indis- 
 cretion. But so is the manner of us all; we sin as 
 we breathe, sin as we eat and drink, as daily and with 
 as much delight. We commit sin with greediness, 
 wo are drunk with sin, and again thirst after it; j'et 
 we will justify ourselves, whether God be justified, 
 yea or no; we will double sin, and bind two together, 
 by hiding, excusing, translating sin ; if there be any 
 means in the world, any bush in paradise to lly unto, 
 we will shroud ourselves. If we can put it to the 
 woman, or rather by rebound to God, ' the woman,' 
 not of mine own choosing, but ' which thou gavest 
 me,' whereas indeed it was a woman of his own 
 
Ver. 2.] 
 
 LECTURE XLII. 
 
 2(19 
 
 choosing, even the concupiscence of bis heart ; or if 
 we can lay it upon the serpent, if we can cover it with 
 lying as Gehazi did, ' Thy servant went no whither,' 
 2 Kings V. ; or colour it with pretence, as Saul did, ' I 
 kept the best for the sacrifice ;' if there be good in- 
 tention, I meant well, or happy event, it succeeded 
 well ; or any other thing to be alleged, we will not 
 omit it. Brethren, forsake these ways of dissembling, 
 diminishing, self-liking, and set your desires wholly 
 upon that which our Saviour prayed for, John xii., 
 ' Father, glorify thy name.' His own name he would 
 not say, that had a name above all names ; and shall 
 we seek to glorify and set forth ours ? AVhether we 
 seek the glory of his name or not, the voice that came 
 from heaven at that time shall be fulfilled, ' I have 
 both glorified it, and will glorify it again.' God is 
 true ; the unfaithfulness of man shall never be able to 
 diminish his truth ; his justice shall be justified in 
 heaven and earth, and his name shall be sanctified, 
 even when we study most to blaspheme it. There- 
 
 fore let us conclude \Yitli that general discbarge and 
 manumission that the blessed prophet giveth to the 
 whole honour of mankind, Ps. exv., ' Not unto us, 
 Lord, but unto thy name give the glory;' not we 
 to our own earthly, corrupt, rotten names. And let 
 it not repent us once to have given it away from our- 
 selves, but again, and for evermore : ' Not unto us, 
 not unto us.' And rather than thou shalt lose any 
 part of thy glory, loss of credit and reputation be to 
 all our doings and sayings, loss to our goods and good 
 names, lands and hves, and whatsoever in this world 
 is more dear unto us ! This is the way to be justified, 
 to justify God in his words and works, and to con- 
 demn ourselves; to cast away our righteousness as 
 stained clouts, to renounce our wisdom as foolish- 
 ness, our strength as weakness, our knowledge as 
 ignorance, and to ascribe all unto him who is all in 
 all, righteousness, wisdom, sauctification, glory, and 
 peace unto us. 
 
 LECTUEE XLII. 
 
 Therefore I prevented it to /Ice unto Tarshish'j for I kiieic that thou art a graeious God. — Jonah IV. 2. 
 
 IN distributing the matter in hand, I have already 
 acquainted you both that Jonas prayed, and what 
 he prayed. In the latter of these two, 1, the sub- 
 stance of his petition, together with the reason sub- 
 joined ; 2, the causes impulsive that moved him to 
 make it. In those impulsives we weighed every 
 moment, 1, his smooth insinuation, 'I pray thee, 
 
 Lord,' wherein, I doubt not, was hid some secret 
 murmuring and repining, but all the rest bewray a 
 manifest imperfection; 2, his speaking by demand, 
 which is the manner of upbraiders ; 3, the advancing 
 of his own word and thought ; 4, his fighting against 
 God with circumstances of time and place; 5, his 
 malapert concluding, as if he had overthrown God by 
 plain argument ; 6, his endeavour to prevent, as if he 
 had been able to do it; and, lastly, not by going, but 
 by flying, to Tarshish, as if by the swiftness of his 
 feet he could have outrun him who rideth upon the 
 wings of the cherubims. That which angered and 
 discontented Jonah so much was the mercy of God, 
 which Jonah knew; and upon that knowledge con- 
 cluded with himself, that be was to decline the com- 
 mandment, howsoever it fared in the mean time, either 
 with his own safety or with the honour and will of 
 him that sent him. But admit that the Lord was a 
 merciful God, and would deal with the Ninevites 
 otherwise than Jonah had preached ; what then, was 
 this a just cause to refuse the errand ? Surely it 
 Beemeth so, for thereupon Jonah mferreth, ' Therefore 
 
 1 prevented,' &c. 
 
 There are two reasons brought why Jonah assayed 
 to prevent this business : 1, because he was loath to be 
 
 accounted a false prophet, to have his credit impaired, 
 to have his name called into question, as if he had run 
 not being sent, and to be mistrusted in whatsoever he 
 should afterwards speak. The cause, I confess, is 
 vehement and weighty ; for the least suspicion of 
 heresy and falsehood, if anything in the world, maketh 
 a man impatient, siixpicio ha^reseos] impatientem, facit ; 
 and he that dissembleth or putteth up one note of 
 heresy without clearmg himself, is not a Christian, 
 unam notain hcereseos ']ui dissimnlat, non est Christianus. 
 ' It is required of a dispenser that he be found faith- 
 ful,' 2 Cor. iv., and the master of the house, Luke sii., 
 askuth for ' a faithful servant whom he may set over his 
 household.' The law of God is strict against false 
 prophets, Lent. xiii. and xviii. His father and mother 
 that begat him shall say unto him. Thou shalt not 
 live, for thou speakest lies in the name of the Lord ; 
 yea, his father and mother that begat him shall thrust 
 him through when ho thus prophesieth.' Zecb. xiii., 
 ' One shall say unto him, What are these wounds in 
 thine hands ? Then be shall answer, Thus was I 
 wounded in the house of my friends.' The admoni- 
 tions of Christ in the Gospel, and his disciples, are 
 frequent against false prophets, false apostles, false 
 Christs, wolves in sheep's clothing, lying spirits, anti- 
 christs, mockers, seducers. How careful was Samuel, 
 towards the end of his life, to approve his innocency 
 both to God and man, through the whole course of bis 
 forepassed administration ; 1. Sam. xii., first in the in- 
 tegi-ity of his life, ' "WTiom have I ever wronged ?' after- 
 wards in the sincerity of his office, ' God forbid that I 
 should sin unto the Lord, and cease praying for you ; 
 
270 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV 
 
 but I will sliew you the good and tlie right way.' 
 When Jeremiah saw that the ' word of the Lord was 
 in reproach and derision, and that every man mocked 
 him, his familiar friends watching for his halting, and 
 saying, It may be he is deceived, so shall we prevail 
 against him,' Jcr. xx., you know what perplexities it 
 drave him unto : first, he would not make mention of 
 the Lord, nor speak any more in his name ; afterward, 
 he curseth the day of his bii-th, and the 'messenger 
 that carried word of it. It is a memorable apology 
 which Paul maketh in the Acts, chap, xx., for himself 
 and his apostleship unto the clergy of Asia, appeal- 
 ing to their own knowledge, that he had taught both 
 Jews and Grecians openly, and throughout every 
 house, and that he had kept nothing back which was 
 profitable, but shewed them all the counsels of God ; 
 he careth not for bonds, afflictions, death itself, ' so 
 he may fulfil his course with joy, and the ministra- 
 tion which he had received of the Lord Jesus.' Con- 
 sonant hereunto was that which he did in other 
 churches : 2 Cor. ii., ' We are not as many who make 
 merchandise of the word of God, but as of sincerity, 
 but as of God ; in the sight of God speak we in Christ.' 
 Ai'ain, 2 Cor. iv., ' We walk not in craftiness, neither 
 handle we the word of God deceitfully, but in the 
 declaration of the truth, we approve ourselves to every 
 man's conscience in the sight of God,' nay, to every 
 conscience of men ; npo'; ■rairai' svnihri'^iv riv^jwruv, that 
 is, be the conscience good or bad, light or dai'kness, 
 they shall have no just cause against us. What needeth 
 longer discourse ? The Son of God himself, John xviii. 
 confesseth before Pilate, ' For this cause am 1 born, 
 and for this cause came I into the world, that I might 
 bear witness unto the truth;' for when the truth of 
 God is wTonged, then the advice of Cyprian taketh 
 place :* We must not hold our peace, lest it begin to 
 savour, not of modesty and shamefacedness, but distrust 
 of our cause, that we keep silence ; and whilst we are 
 careless to refute false criminations, we seem to acknow- 
 ledge the crime. The truth of Christians is incom- 
 parably fairer than that Helen of the Greeks, and 
 the martyrs of our church have fought more constantly 
 in her quarrel against Sodom, than ever those nobles 
 and princes for^Helen against the Trojaus.f There 
 was never prophet, true norfiilse, in Israel nor Canaan, 
 but took it a great reproach and stain unto them, to 
 be touched with falsehood. Micaiah, whom neither 
 the court-like persuasions of the eunuch that went for 
 him, nor the consent of four hundred prophets, nor 
 the favour of two kings, nor danger of his own head, 
 could draw from the word of God, staudeth firmly in 
 defence of the truth, 1 Kings xxii. Zedekiah the 
 false prophet (in seeming), as earnestly for the truth 
 likewise, yet these as contrary one to the other, as 
 
 *Taceicnon oportet iiejam nmi vorecundiseseiUliffiJentias 
 incipiat esse quoil tacemuH, kc.— Tntc. contra Demetr. 
 
 t Incomparabiliter pulchridr est Veritas chrislianorum 
 quam Helena Greoorum. — Av(j. ai Uicron. 
 
 hyaena and the dog. The one saith, ' Go to Ramoth- 
 Gilead and prosper ;' the other saith, ' If thou return 
 in safety, the Lord hath not sent me.' The one, to 
 express it in life, and by a visible sign, maketh horns 
 of iron,' audtelleth Ahab, 'With these thou shaltpush 
 at Aram till thou hast destroyed him ;' the other hath 
 also an image and a vision whereby to describe it : ' I 
 saw all Israel scattered upon the mountains, like sheep 
 that had no shepherd.' Yet both for the truth. Jere- 
 miah and Hananiah, Jer. xxviii., agreeing like fire and 
 water, the one bidding the king to go unto Babylon, 
 the other advising the contrary ; the one sending letters 
 to the king and the nobles, the other pulling the yoke 
 from the neck of Jeremiah, and saying ' Thus shall the 
 yoke of Babel be broken ;' the one affirming, the other 
 denying, yet both arc champions for the truth. The 
 devil, ' a liar, and the father of lies, who abode not in 
 the truth, because there is no truth in him, who, when 
 he spcaketh a lie speaketh of his own ;' that is, his 
 natural and mother tongue is lying, John viii. ; yet he 
 ' trausformoth himself into an angel of light, therefore 
 it is no great thing,' saith the apostle, 2 Cor. xi., 
 ' though his ministers transform themselves as though 
 they were the ministers of righteousness, whose end 
 shall be according to their works.' Christ is truth 
 indeed, antichrist truth pretended.* The daily ex- 
 clamations of the Donatists in Africa against the 
 orthodox and sound believers, was, that they were 
 traitors against the holy books, sacrorum libronim 
 trnditori's, and themselves the propugners of them. 
 Augustine answereth, traitors, not by conviction, but 
 by confiction and false accusation of their enemies, 
 lion convicti sed conftcti traditores.f Dioseorus crieth 
 out, himself an heretic, in the council of Chalcedon, I 
 defend the opinions of the holy fathers ; I have their 
 testimonies, not by snatches, or at the second hand, 
 but uttered in their own books ; I am cast out with the 
 holy fathers ;J as if truth itself had been condemned in 
 the condemnation of Dioseorus. So is it at this day. 
 The prophets of Babylon, though they have received 
 the mark of the beast in their foreheads, that all the 
 world may know them to be such, yet, as Cyprian in 
 his Epistle to Jubaianus wrote of the Novatian heretic, 
 that after an apish manner he taketh unto him the 
 authority of the church, § so these, by the like imita- 
 tion, take unto them the church, truth. Scriptures, 
 fathers, all antiquity, consent, perpetuity unto the 
 end of the world ; and rather than the world shall 
 think that they deal not truly in defence of truth, they 
 spend both conscience, and sometimes life upon it. 
 O qiiatitnm tcijmcn est falsitatis ?\\ how gi-eat a show 
 doth falsehood make ? 
 
 * 'Veritas Christus, .simulata Veritas Antichristus. — Origen. 
 
 ■j- 2 l)e baiit. cont. Douat 6. 
 
 X K;,'!) (Ufcmlo dogmata S. patrum, &o. Noii obiter nco 
 in trauscuv.'iii. 
 
 § Novatianus simiarmn more arripit sibi authontatcm 
 ooolesiic. II August, li. ii., cap. xvi, de raorib. Manich. 
 
Ver. 2.] 
 
 LECTURE XLir. 
 
 271 
 
 For our own parts, who by the grace of God are 
 that we arc, put in charge for the gathering together 
 of God's saints ; if we be harmed in our goods, or good 
 names, or in the carriage of our Hves, or in our wives 
 and children, as sometimes the manner is, we account 
 them our private wrongs, and easily may digest them. 
 It hath been ' done in the green,' in all the times that 
 have been ever of old, ' much more in the dry ; they 
 have called the master of the house Beelzebub, much 
 more those of the household.' ' We preach not our- 
 selves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your 
 servants for Jesus sake,' 1 Cor. iv., and for his sake 
 we will endure it. ' We are fools for Christ's sake, and 
 j'ou are wise ; we are weak, and yon arc strong ; you 
 are honourable, and we despised.' Be it so, but we 
 will never abide that the honour of Christ Jesus him- 
 self shall lie wounded through our loins, that the re- 
 bukes which fall upon us shall redound to his disgrace ; 
 that his gospel and truth shall be defamed, the doctrine 
 which we preach discredited, oui' calling reproached, 
 which, though in vessels of earth, yet he hath sanctified 
 and blessed to such a work (I mean the saving of 
 souls), as by the policy of man, and all forcible engines, 
 could never have been compassed. How useful a 
 thing it is, upon eveiy light surmise, not only to chai'ge 
 us for false prophets, but because we are prophets at 
 all to condemn us, and to disdain us_^for that, wherein 
 we are most to be magnified. I report me to that 
 common phi-ase of speech, when, if men will shoot 
 forth arrows against us with poisoned heads, even 
 bitter and sharp words, they think it the greatest 
 ignominy to call us priests or ministers ; herein, if the 
 zeal of God's house and his holy ordinance consume us, 
 if the maintenance of his cause and our calling bear 
 us away, and make us forget the spirit of gentleness 
 for a time, let no man blame us ; for is our ofiice 
 dishonoured amongst you ? We tell them, whosoever 
 they be, as David told Michal, who scorned him for 
 dancing before the ark, 2 Sam. vi., 'it was before the 
 Lord, which chose me rather than thy father and all 
 his house, and commanded me to bo ruler over the 
 people. And therefore I will play before the Lord, and 
 I will yet be more vile than thus, and will be low in 
 mine own sight.' It is before the Lord that we are 
 priests and ministers, to serve in his house and at his 
 table ; who hath chosen us rather than their fathers 
 and whole stock to serve in this office. And therefore 
 we will yet be more vile and low in our own eyes ; and 
 rather than these names shall die and be out of use, 
 we will wear them upon our garments ; and if you were 
 sparing to yield them unto us, we would desire you, 
 for Christ's sake, and as you tender our credit, not to 
 term us otherwise. The Jews, who thought they 
 mocked Christ when they ' bowed their knees and cried. 
 Hail king of the Jews,' they knew not what they did, 
 they did him an honour and favour against their 
 wills, for he was king of the Jews and of the Gentiles 
 also ; whatsoever their meaning is, who thuik to nick- 
 
 name us by objecting these names (which we will 
 leave to the censuring of the righteous judge in heaven), 
 we embrace them, honour them, and heartily thank 
 God for them, and desire that they may be read and 
 published in the ears of the world, as the most glori- 
 ous titles of our commission. The angels of God are 
 minstering spirits, and sent forth to minister for the 
 elect's sake, Heb. i. Aeirou^yixa 7Svi\i<JMra ilg diaxovlav, 
 &c., Math. sx. Christ Jesus himself ' came to minister, 
 not to be ministered unto," L^iaMvijtrai, ou diaxovrj- 
 6rivai. We will therefore say as the apostle said, 
 2 Cor. si., mi)itstii stmt, phis cr/n : are Christ and his 
 angels, and all the apostles of Christ, ministers ? We 
 speak like fools in the deeming of the world, we also 
 will be ministers of the gospel ; and if it were possible, 
 we would be more than ministers. honourable 
 ministry ! what government, rule, and dominion, is 
 it not superior unto '?* I conclude with the same 
 apostle : ' though I should boast somewhat more of 
 our authority which is given unto us for edification and 
 not for destruction, I should have no shame,' 2 Cor. x. 
 By this discourse it may appear unto you, if this were 
 a motive in the mind of Jonah, as some, both Jews 
 and Christians conceive, how grievous it seemed unto 
 him to be held in jealousy, for deceit in his calling, 
 that any in the world should be able justly to tax him 
 for a false prophet, and one that prophesied lies in 
 the name of God ; not^\'ithstanding, the matter is 
 quickly answered, for whatsoever the event had been, 
 the voice of the Lord was in reason to have been 
 obeyed. 
 
 (L) It was no new thing to be so accounted of; it 
 was the portion of Moses, and Samuel, and Elias be- 
 fore him, and thenceforth as many as ever spake, 
 unto the days of John Baptist, which came with the 
 spirit of Elias. They have drunk of the same cup ; and 
 not only the servants, but the Son and heir hath been 
 dealt with in the like manner : ' A prophet is not 
 without honour save in his own country.' Jonah 
 might have said to himself, as Elias in another case, 
 ' I am no better than my fathers.' Thus were we 
 born and ordained to ' approve ourselves in all kinds 
 of patience, by honour and dishonour, by good report 
 and evil report, as deceivers, and yet, behold, we are 
 true,' and deceive not, 2 Cor. vi. The world was 
 never more fortunate for prophets than thus to reward 
 them. Flatterers may break the heads of men with 
 their smooth oils, but the wounds that prophets give 
 have never escaped the hardest judgments. 
 
 (2.) Why should Jonah fear the opinion of men ? 
 His duty being done, the very conscience of his fact, 
 simply and truly performed, would have been a tower 
 of defence and a castle unto him. ' It is a very small 
 thing for me to be judged of you, or of man's judg- 
 ment, for I know nothing by myself,' &c. ; non ait, pro 
 nili'do est, sed pro mhiiino. He doth not say. It is 
 
 * pra'clarum ministeriuni ! ipionou id gloriosiiis magi- 
 stratu. — Bern, ad Eiijen. 
 
272 
 
 KING OX JOXAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV 
 
 nothing unto me, but 'it is a very small thing ; 1 es- 
 teem my n;^me somewhat, but I stand more upon my 
 conscience. ' This is our rejoicing, the testimony of 
 our conscience, that in simplicity and purity we have 
 been conversant in the world,' 2 Cor. i. When the 
 princes had given sentence upon Jeremiah, ' This man 
 IS worthy to die,' Jcr. xxvi., he answered them, 
 'The Lord sent me to prophesy against this house; 
 therefore amend your ways, that the Lord may repent 
 him of the plague which he hath pronounced against 
 you. As for me, behold, I am in your hands : do 
 with me as you please. But know ye for certainty, 
 that if you put me to death, you shall bring innocent 
 blood upon yourselves ; for of a truth the Lord hath 
 sent me unto j'ou to speak all these words in your 
 ears.' This is the brazen wall, the soundness of the 
 cause, and the assurance of the conscience, which all 
 the malignant tongues cannot pierce through. Let 
 the world be offended with us in these latest and sin- 
 fullest times, because the tenor of our message is 
 either too sharp, or too sweet, too hot, or too cold, 
 for it can hardly be such as may please this wayward 
 world. Let Satan accuse us before God and man 
 day and night, yet if we can say for ourselves, as the 
 apostle did, Eom. is., 'We speak the truth in Christ, 
 we lie not, our consciences bearing us witness in the 
 Holy Ghost,' who is not only the witness, but the 
 guide and inspirer of our consciences ; it is a greater 
 recompense than if all the kingdoms of the earth were 
 given unto us. 
 
 (3.) He could not be ignorant that the truth of 
 God might stand though the event followed not, be- 
 cause many of the judgments of God, as I have else- 
 where said, are denounced with condition. In the 
 place of Jeremiah before mentioned, chap, xsvi., when 
 the priests and people so greedily thirsted after his 
 death, ' some of the elders stood up and spake to the 
 assembly in this sort : Micah the IMorasthite pro- 
 phesied in the days of Hezekiah king of Judah, say- 
 ing. Thus saith the Lord of hosts : Zlou shall be 
 ploughed like a field, &c. Did Hezekiah put him to 
 death ? did he not rather fear the Lord, and prayed 
 before the Lord, and the Lord repenteth him of the 
 plague ? Thus we might procure great evil against 
 ourselves.' You know the collection those elders 
 make, that the judgment w^as conditional; and upon 
 their unfeigned repentance, might be otherwise inter- 
 preted. Thus much was Jonah not to learn ; for why 
 did he know that God was a merciful God, but to 
 shew the effects of mercy ? and the Ninevites them- 
 selves had an happy presumption thereof, as appear- 
 eth by their former speech. 
 
 ,'„ (4.) He was not to stay long in Assyria if he had 
 suspected their suspicions. 
 
 (5.) Lastly, there was no such thing to be feared ; 
 for by that public act of conversion, which all the 
 orders and states of the city agreed upon, it is mani- 
 fest that they received the preaching of Jonah as the 
 
 oracle of Almighty God : ' they believed God,' and 
 his prophet, as the children of Israel, 1 Sam. xii., 
 ' feared the Lord and Samuel exceedingly.' For 
 what greater argument touching their good and rever- 
 ent opinion of Jonah could they give than their speedy 
 and hearty repentance, whereby they assured him 
 that they esteemed not his word as a fable, or as a 
 jesting song, but as a man sent from God, and fallen 
 down from heaven, bringing a two-edged sword in his 
 lips, either to kill or to save, so they received him. And 
 surely, I rather think, that they blessed Jonah in 
 their hearts, and that the dust of his feet was wel- 
 come and precious unto them, who by his travail and 
 pains had taught them to fly from the anger of God 
 that was now falling. 
 
 Others conceive the reason here implied, ' Therefore 
 I prevented,' to be this : He saw that the conversion 
 of the Gentiles was by consequence an introduction of 
 the overthrow and casting out of the Jews, and that 
 it would be fulfilled upon them, which is written in 
 Deuteronomy, chap, xxsii. : ' They have moved me to 
 jealousy with that which is not God ; they have pro- 
 voked mo to auger with their vanities: and I move 
 them to jealousy with those which are no people ; I 
 will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.' That 
 is, if we will interpret it by this present subject, Niue- 
 veh shall repent and condemn Israel the more, for not 
 hearkening to the voice of so many prophets. Jerome 
 brieflj' thus : dolct quod pereal. Israel, non quod Gentcs 
 servcnlur, It grieveth him, not that the Gentiles are 
 saved, but that Israel perisheth. Our Saviour, wo 
 all know, would not ' give the bread of children to 
 dogs ;' and he was ' not sent but to the lost sheep of 
 the house of Israel ;' and he ' wept over Jerusalem,' 
 which he never did over Tyre and Sidon ; and the 
 prerogative of the Jews was, either only or principally, 
 that repentance and remission of sins should ba 
 preached unto them. I remit you to the 10th of the 
 Acts to see what labour was made to draw Peter to 
 the Gentiles, whom he called common and unclean 
 things; and in the 11th of the same book, they of 
 the circumcision contended with him about it, saying, 
 Thou wentest in unto the uncircumciscd, and hast 
 eaten with them. It might be his further gi-ief 
 that he only amongst so many prophets should be 
 singled out to declare the ruin of his people by the 
 uprising of strangers; to bear the envy of the fact, 
 and to bo the messenger of the uuwelcomest news that 
 ever Israel received. For he is the first that must 
 bring Judaism to contempt, and make it manifest to 
 the world, that his countrymen at home are uufruit- 
 fully occupied, and troubled about many things, sac- 
 rifices, sacraments, washings, cleanings, and the like; 
 when others abroad, ob.serviug that one thing is neces- 
 sary, with less labour and business came to be saved. 
 Luther, comparing the times wherein Jonah and him- 
 self lived, opeueth the case by familiar explication 
 thus : The Jews accounted themselves, by a constant 
 
Vee. 2.] 
 
 LECTURE XLII. 
 
 273 
 
 opinion anl claim, the peculiar people of God ; the 
 Komish, themselves the onlj' Catholics; they thought 
 there conld be no salvation without observing the law 
 of Mosos and the rites of the Jewish synagogue, nor 
 these without observing the ordinances and cere- 
 monies of the Romish Church ; they cried, ' Pour out 
 thy wrath upon the nations, and upon the i)eoplo that 
 have not called upon thy name ;' these held them for 
 heretics, not worthy the air they drew, that joined not 
 themselves nnto them. Now, lastly, as it was an 
 odious oflico in these latter days to preach unto any 
 nation or city under heaven, that the foolishness of 
 preaching, and only Christ crucified was able to save 
 sonls, without creeping to crosses, kneeling, knocking, 
 kissing, sprinkling, censing, ringing, fasting, gadding, 
 with such like toys, and the conversion of any part of 
 Christendom with less circumstances could not but be 
 a shame, prejudice, and condemnation unto Home in 
 some sort, that having greater helps and furtherances 
 to God, went further from him. So the reclaiming of 
 Nineveh by one, when Jewry had many prophets ; by 
 the denouncement of one, when Jewry had many pro- 
 phecies; by a single and short commination, when 
 Jewry had the whole law and testimonies ; by a com- 
 pendious course of repentance, when they fasted, and 
 tithed, and sacrificed, and cried, Tlie temple of the Lord, 
 the temple of the Lord, and I know not what ; conld 
 not less be than a reproach to the people which was 
 so far backward, and an exception to their whole 
 form of religion, wherein they no better profited. It 
 had been no marvel if, when Jonah returned unto Is- 
 rael, the hand of his own father and mother had been 
 first against him for doing that wrong to his people, 
 as they adjudged their bodies to the fire, and their 
 souls they delivered to Satan, who opened their mouth 
 against the Church of Rome. Whatsoever liis rea- 
 sons were, whether the care of his credit, or whether 
 afiestion to his countrymen, drew him away to that 
 recusancy, both which are but particular and partial 
 I'espects, when God commanded otherwise, his fault is 
 in no way excusable by reason, but that God of bis 
 grace is ready to give pardon and relaxation to all 
 kind of sin. 
 
 Therefore 7 j^rereiitcd. Thy ground is unstable, 
 Jonah, thy argument unsound ; thou usest but a fal- 
 lacy to deceive thyself, thou hadst no reason so to do ; 
 the will of the Lord of hosts, which is absolute right- 
 eousness, a reason beyond all reasons, withstood it. 
 Thou thoughtest to prevent the Lord ; thou couldst not. 
 The winds saw thy haste and stayed thee, the sea held 
 thee back, the fish made resistance against thee, the 
 bars of the earth shut thee up ; and if these had failed 
 in their mysteries, the wisdom of God would have in- 
 vented other stays. He could have stopped thee in 
 thy course as he stopped Paul in his journej^, by dazz- 
 ling thine eyes that thou shouldst not have found 
 thy way; or as he stopped Lot's wife in her way, by 
 making thee a pillar of salt or some other rock of 
 
 stone, a monument of contradiction to the latest ase 
 of the world. He could have dried up thy bands, 
 tied up thy feet ; in iron ? no, but in the bands of 
 death, never to have stirred again. Let all the wis- 
 dom of man beware of the like prevention, lest it pre- 
 vent itself thereby of all the blessings of God, use of 
 native country, comfort of kinsmen and friends, life of 
 body, happiness of soul, as Jonah might have done, 
 if the mercies of God bad not favoured him. When 
 we are ignorant of the will of God, let us lay our 
 hands upon our mouths, and upon our hearts too, till 
 God grant wisdom that we may descry it ; when we 
 are doubtful, let us inquire, dehberate, ask counsel of 
 the law and testimony of God ; but when it is clearly 
 revealed, by open and express commandment, let us 
 not then pause upon the matter, and much less resist, 
 and least of all prevent, unless, by making a proof and 
 experiment of our own wit, as Jonah did, we will hazard 
 that loss which the gain of the whole w'orld shall 
 never be able to recompense. 
 
 F<}r L kiieir tliat thou art a (iraciotts God, and merci- 
 ful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and rejientest 
 thee of the evil. Jonah proceedeth to that which was 
 the ground and inducement to his rebellion. For the 
 order of the scripture is this : God is a merciful God 
 for many respects, and one part of oflice of that mercy 
 is to repent him of the evil ; that is, to change his 
 sentence, in the last words of the sentence. This 
 Jonah Imew, he saith, and upon that knowledge 
 resolved long since, upon his resolution, laboured to 
 prevent it. We are now come to that which, if Jonah 
 bad rightly conceived of, it would never have grieved 
 him to see the bowels of pity opened and enlarged 
 towards bis poor brethren. Did Jonah know that 
 God was gracious, merciful, slow to anger, of great 
 goodness, repenting him of the evil ? (I will render these 
 variations in as many words more) ; did Jonah know 
 that God was gracious in atTection,* merciful in eflect, 
 long-suffering in waiting for the conversion of sinners, 
 of great kindness in striking short of their sins, re- 
 penting him of the evil in vouchsafing mercy to 
 sinners, and remitting their misdeeds ? Did Jonah 
 know that God was gracious in himself by nature, 
 merciful towards his creatures by communication, 
 long-suti'ering before he inflicteth vengeance, of groat 
 goodness in the number and measure of his stripes, 
 penitent in the stay and intermission thereof ; and is 
 it so strange and otl'ensive unto him, that God should 
 spare Nineveh, a thing which his nature and manner 
 was so inured unto ? The words, though difl'erent in 
 sound, and the power and signification of them not all 
 one, yet in the principle they all agree, and knit their 
 souls together in the commendation of God's mercy. 
 The first, i/racioiix, importoth a liberal disposition, 
 frankness of heart, gratuital, undeserved benevolence, 
 not hired, and much less constrained, but voluntarily 
 
 * Bonignus afi'ectii, misericors effectu, &c. — Qlossa in 
 Joel. ii. 
 
 s 
 
274 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 and freely bestowed. The second, merciful, a com- 
 miseration over other men's miseries, motherly 
 bowels, tender compassion towards those that sutler 
 affliction : ' Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me ?" 
 ' We have not a high priest which cannot he touched 
 with the feeUng of our infirmities ; ' 'I would not 
 the death of a sinner.' It goeth to his heart when he 
 is driven and enforced to take punishment. The third, 
 loiifi-suffciiiifi, bewrayeth a nature hard to conceive, 
 and not willing to retain wrath ; and when it seemeth 
 to be angiy, not angrj' indeed, and using rather a 
 fatherly scourge of correction, than a rod of revenge. 
 The fourth, of i/rcat i/oodiwss, dcelareth that there is 
 no end of his goodness ; and although he is somewhat 
 in all things, nay, all in all, yet he is much more in 
 mercy, and more than in other his properties : ■'' for 
 ' his mercy is over all his works,' to the good, evil, 
 friends, enemies ; and that when he giveth, he giveth 
 with an open hand, not sparingly, more than om- 
 tongues have asked, or our hearts ever thought of. 
 Lastlj', ]ie repenteth him nf the evil; that is, altereth 
 the word that is gone out of his lips, and sheweth how 
 easy hs is to be entivated, that the rod may be pulled 
 forth of his hands even when he is smiting us. 
 
 Paul, in his voyage towards Rome, speaketh of a 
 certain place which was called ' The Fair Havens, ' KaXol 
 Xi/Minc, Acts xxvii. We are now arrived at the lair 
 havens ; they are in number maiiy, and for the harbour 
 and road of a wearied sea-beaten conscience, which 
 hath long been tossed in a sea of wretchedness, more 
 comfortable and safe than ever was the bosom of a 
 mother to her young infant. Happy is the soul that 
 landeth at these havens ; and blessed be the God of 
 heaven, which hath given us a card of direction, to 
 lead us thereunto : the witness of his holy word, 
 written and sealed, that can never deceive us. For 
 these are f the words of the ignorant, but he that knew 
 them bare record, and his witness is true ; they are 
 the words of a prophet, who spake not by his private 
 motion, but as he was moved by the Hoh' Ghost; 
 nay, they are not the words of one, but of many pro- 
 phots, that in the mouths of sullicieut witnesses they 
 might be confinncd. Jonah reciteth them in this 
 place ; Joel repcateth them in the second of his pro- 
 phecy ; David hath the same thrice in his Psalms, 
 either all, or the most part of them, Ps. Ixxxvi., ciii., 
 and cxlv. ; Moses in the 14th of Numbers bringcth in 
 their perfect catalogue ; nay, they arc not the words 
 either of Moses, or David, or the prophets, bnt of God 
 himself. The fountain and wcll-hiad from whence 
 they have all drawn thorn, as Moses there confesseth, 
 is the proclamation which God made, Exod. xxxiv., 
 when he desc(nded in the cloud, and delivered his 
 name in this manner : ' The Lord, the Lord, strong, 
 merciful, and gracious, slow to anger, and abundant 
 
 * IMiijor est proiivictas bonitatis, quhni propiiclas ultionis. 
 — Ilehncorum sapientes. 
 t Qu. 'are not'?— Ed. 
 
 in goodness, in truth, reserving mercy for thousands, 
 forgiving iniquities, transgression, and sin.' ' Ho, all 
 ye that thu'st, come to the waters ' of comfort. Here 
 are wells enough to be di-awn at : drink at the first 
 fjnntain, the Lord is gracious ; and if your appetite 
 be not there quenched, go to the second, the Lord is 
 merciful ; and if you be j-et thirsty, go to the third, 
 tlie Lord is slow to cmrjer ; and thence to the fourth 
 and fifth, tiibite, el iiiebriiimiiii, drink till yom'selves 
 are more than satisfied. Do you not read, 1 Sam. xvii., 
 of five smooth stones which David chose out of a 
 brook to fling at Goliatli ? Here is the brook (my 
 brethren), the historv" of this prophet, and these are the 
 five smooth stones, which are now jiroposed ; let them 
 not lie in the brook unhandled and unoccupied, but 
 put them in your scrip as David did, bear them in 
 your minds, lay them up in your hearts, apply them to 
 your consciences, that they may be ready at hand 
 against the face of the Philistine, against the force of 
 Satan, if ever he step forth to desire the Lord of 
 hosts, or any Israelite in his camp. We find hut 
 three temptations, Mat. iv., that Satan bent against 
 the Son of God, difl'ering both in the place and in their 
 strength : the first was upon the ground, of turning 
 stones into bread ; the second upon the pinnacle of 
 the temple, of casting the body down ; the third upon 
 an exceeding high mountain, of committing idolatry. 
 The first concerned his power ; the second his life ; 
 the third his conscience : and our Saviour refellcd 
 him in all these with three several answers. But here 
 we have matter and answer enough for more than 
 three temptations : for if Satan object unto us lower, 
 and upon the ground, as it were, that God is a right- 
 eous judge, full of indignation and impatience, and 
 not making the wicked innocent ; answcrhim, that withal 
 he is a gracious God, and cannot deny himself. If he 
 climb higher in temptation, as it were to the pinnacle 
 of tlie tempk', and reply upon thee ; but thou art un- 
 wortliy of tliat grace, because thou art full of iniquity 
 and unrighteousness ; answer him, that withal he is 
 a merciful God, and sheweth greatest pity where there 
 is most need of it. If ho assault thee a third time, 
 and think to overthrow tliee, as it were, upon the top 
 of a mountain, by telling th(!e that thou hast long 
 continued in thy sins, that thou broughtest them from 
 the womb, and they have dwelt with thee to thy grey 
 hairs ; answer him, that God is as much commended 
 for his long-sufl'erance. If yet his mouth be not stopped, 
 but he maintain a further plea against thee, that thy 
 sins are as the sins of Manasseli, more than the sands 
 of the sea in uundicr, and lln'ir burden such that they 
 are gone over thine head, like mighty waters ; answer 
 him, that the goodness of the Lord is as much, and 
 that th<'re is no eoniprehension of his loving- kindness. 
 If, lastly, he object that judgment hath begun at thine 
 house, and to put tiiee out of doubt that tliou art not 
 in the favour of God, he hath smitten tliy body with 
 sore diseases, thy sold with agonies, thy family with 
 
Yer. 3.] 
 
 LECTURE XLIII. 
 
 275 
 
 orbities aud privations ; tell him for full conclusion, 
 that be can also repent bim of the evil, and cease to 
 punish, and leave as many blessings behind him when 
 his pleasure is. It was never the meaning of God 
 that these words should be spoken in the winds, and 
 blown away like empty bladders ; they were spoken 
 and written no doubt for the use of sinners. This is 
 the name which God hath proclaimed to the world, 
 and whereby he would be known to men, that if ever 
 we came before him, we might speak our minds in the 
 confidence and trust of that amiable name. Thus 
 Moses understood it, for as soon as the Lord had 
 ended his speech, Moses ajjplied it to the present 
 purpose, for he bowed to the earth, and worshipped 
 God and said, Exod. xsxiv., ' Lord, I beseechthee, 
 pardon our iniquities and sins, and take us for thine 
 inheritance ;' likewise in the the 14th of Numbers, 
 ' And now, I beseech thee, let the power of my Lord 
 be gi'eat, according as thou hast spoken, saying. The 
 Lord is slow to anger,' &c., referring himself to the 
 speech and proclamation which God had used upon 
 the mount. We are the children of our Father which 
 is in heaven ; if, therefore, it be an honour unto us to 
 be reputed his sons, let us follow our Father's steps, 
 and bear some part of his heavenly imnge. Let us 
 not seek to be like unto him in the arm of his strength, 
 
 nor in the brain of his wisdom, nor in the finger of 
 his miracles, but in his bowels of pity and tender 
 compassion. Let lions, and bears, and tigers in the 
 forest be cruel towards their companions ; let them 
 bite and be bitten, devour and be devoured again ; let 
 dogs grin ; let unicorns push viith their horns ; let 
 Scythians and cannibals, because they know not God, 
 not know what belongeth to humanity and gentleness; 
 but let Christians love their brethren even as God 
 hath loved them, and I'emit one the other their 
 offences, as Christ hath freely forgiven the sins of his 
 church. Let those reprobate-minded, Kom. i., carry to 
 their graves with them, and to the bottom of hell, where 
 all hatred must end, that mark which the Holy Ghost 
 hath scored upon their brows, that they arc asrosyoi, 
 aa-Trovb'it, dvAs^/^ojE;, ' without natural affection, not 
 fit for society, void of pity ;' but let the example of 
 the most holy Trinity, the God of peace, the Prince of 
 peace, the Spirit of peace, that one God of all conso- 
 lation, rich in mercies, be ever before om- eyes, that 
 as we have received freely, so we may freely return 
 gi-ace, mercy, long-suffering, abundance of kindness, 
 revocation of our wrongs and injuries begun, to all 
 our brethren in the flesh, but especially to Christ's 
 chosen and peculiar members. 
 
 LECTURE XLIII. 
 
 Therefore now, O Lord, take, I beseech lliee, nnj life, &c. — Jonah IV. 3. 
 
 THAT Jonah prayed, and how he prayed, in what 
 sort expostulating with God, justifying his offence, 
 and abusing his knowleJge of the mercy of God, to 
 utter the malice and cruelty of his own heart, we have 
 already seen, and considered the reasons which are 
 supposed to have moved bim to that undutiful and 
 uncharitable course : either the care of his own 
 credit, which he should not have stood upon to the 
 derogation of the honour of God, when the angels of 
 heaven sing glory unto him ; or affection to his coun- 
 try, which persuasion was as weak to have drawn him 
 to obedience, seeing that the Israel of God might have 
 been in Nineveh as well as in Jewry, because there 
 are Jews inwardly and in the spirit, as truly as out- 
 wardly and in the letter; and those that hear the word 
 of Christ are more kindly his brethren and sisters, 
 than those that are affined unto him in the flesh. 
 Upon these premises, be they strong or weak, is 
 interred the conclusion, including his request to God, 
 ' Therefore now, Lord,' &e. A man so contraried 
 and crossed in mine expectation, how can I ever 
 satisfy my discontented mind, but by ending my 
 life ! And he addetb a reason or confirmation drawn 
 from utility, and amplified by comparison. It is not 
 only good for me to die, but ' better to die than to 
 live.' 
 
 The force of anger we have in part declared before. 
 It rngeth not only against men made of the same 
 mould, but against God. Let the blood of Julian 
 thrown up into the air, and together with his blood, 
 blasphemy against the Son of God, witness it : nor 
 only against those that have sense and understanding, 
 but against unreasonable and unsensible creatures. 
 As Xerxes wrote a defying letter to Athos, a mountain 
 of Thrace :* Mischievous Athos, lifted up to heaven, 
 make thy quarries and veins of stone passable to my 
 travel, or I will cut thee down and cast thee into the 
 midst of the sea ! Nor only against those things 
 which are without us, but against ourselves. As in" 
 this place, the anger of Jonah beginneth to take fire 
 against the Ninevites, proceedcth as far as it dareth 
 against God, and endeth in itself. 
 
 In one word, that which Jonah requested, though 
 spoken by circumlocution, and more words than one, 
 is, that he may die. ' Take away my soul from me,' 
 aufer emhncnn iiieani. For what is life, but, as the 
 philosopher defineth it, the composition and colliga- 
 tion of the sotjl to the body ? ^uvDieig -/.ai auvOiSfj,og 
 ■^■j'/Tii eiiiMari, -a ^nv.\ In the 2d of Genesis, the Lord 
 ' formed man of the dust of the ground: ' there is his 
 matter ; and ' breathed in his face the breath of life, 
 
 * Plutarc. decohiben. irao. f Arist. 
 
276 
 
 KING ON JONAF. 
 
 [Chap. IV 
 
 and the man was a living soul : ' there is his form and ! 
 perfection. And what is death on the other side, but ' 
 the dissociation and severing of these two parts, or the 
 taking of the soul from the body, according to the 
 form of words in this place ? God telleth the rich 
 man in the Gospel, who was talking of larger build- 
 ings, when the Isuilding within him was near pulling 
 down, and thought he had goods enough for his soul 
 to delight in, when he had not soul enough to delight 
 in his goods, ' Thou fool, this night, riiv -^uyji)) aov 
 a-xoLiToZeiv, do they require and redemand thy soul ;' 
 that is, this night thou must die. Elias, in the tirst 
 of Kings and nineteenth, uscth the same phrase in the 
 wilderness, ' It sufhceth, Lord ; take away my soul 
 from me.' Let me not longer live to see the misery 
 that Jezebel hath threatened unto me. As when you 
 take away structure and fashion from au house, 
 temple, or tabernacle, there remaineth none of all 
 these, but a confused and disordered heap of stones, 
 timber, iron, mortar, and the like ; so when the soul 
 is taken from the body, either of man or beast, there 
 remaiueth but a carcase. Therefore the apostle, 
 2 Cor. v., calleth death the dissolution, or 'pulling 
 down of our earthly house,' .K'TTokaiv tou ffx>;vw,aaro5 ; 
 Peter, the deposition or laying along of a tabernacle, 
 2 Pet. i. And o'ur Saviour bade the Jews, John ii., 
 speaking of his bodily death, ' Destroy this temple, 
 and in three days I will rear it up again.' 
 
 There are many phrases throughout the Scripture 
 abroad, whereby the teiTor of death is lenified and 
 tempered unto us, and the very nature thereof wholly 
 changed. For whereas the nature of death is to kill, 
 and to spoil the being of living things, by these wo 
 may gather that, touching the elect, death itself is 
 slain, and deprived of its own being. God telleth 
 Abraham, Gen. xv., that his seed should be a stranger 
 in a land that was not theirs, but himself should ' go 
 to his fathers in peace.' What is that ? Shall he 
 travel again, as he did, to Canaan, or Egypt? No ; 
 but he ' shall be buried in a good age,' not prevented 
 by untimely death, nor carried into captivity, but laid 
 in the grave amongst his ancient friends and acquaint- 
 ance : a thing which a man would desire with much 
 suit if he were held from it. To Moses his servant 
 he altereth the phrase. For, Num. xxvii., he shall 
 be ' gathered to his people,' as one that were scattered 
 and strayed from the rest of the flock ; and, Deut. xxxi., 
 he must ' sleep with his fathers,' and take a comfort- 
 able rest with others that have laboured in their times. 
 David, beginning as it were where Moses leaveth, 
 calleth it ' the rest of the flesh in hope,' Ps. xvi. 
 Isaiah adJeth the place, and noteth where that rest 
 shall bo, chap. xxvi. : ' They shall enter into their 
 chambers, and shut the doors unto them, and hide 
 themselves for a time.' But in the fifty and seventh 
 of his prophecy, more perfectly, speaking of the de- 
 liverance of the righteous, ' they rest in their beds.' 
 So, first, they ffo to their fathers, as men left behind 
 
 to the company of strangers ; after their going, they 
 arc (lathered unto them, that as there was but one fold 
 of the living, so there may be but one fold and con- 
 dition of the dead ; after their gathering unto them, 
 they sleep and take tJieir rest, the visions of their heads 
 not making them afraid, nor breaking their quiet, as 
 in their life time, not upon a stone, as Jacob did, nor 
 in the tent of an enemy, as Sisera, but in their cham- 
 lers and upon llieir beds, the doors being close about 
 them, and their bones delivered from former disturb- 
 ances. Bat all these concern the body alone. The 
 sweetest and joyfullest of them all (I mean to the 
 Lord's inheritance) is the surrendering of the soul 
 into the Lord's custody and protection, and the re- 
 signing up of the spirit to him that is ' the Lord of the 
 spirits of all flesh,' Num. xvi. So was the prayer, or 
 rather bequest, of David, Ps. xxxi., leaving his crown 
 to Solomon, his body to worms and rottenness, or to 
 their ' lodging in darkness,' as Job called it : ' Lord, 
 into thy hands I lay down, or pawn (depono), my 
 spirit.' And Christ, of the seed of David, commended 
 his spirit to none other keeper, nor in other terms, 
 'na^a6riao/j,ai, Luke xxiii. And that you may know 
 how uniform and like itself the Spirit of God is, the 
 blessed apostle keepeth the same style, 2 Tim. i. : 
 ' These things I suft'er, but I am not ashamed, for I 
 know whom I have trusted, and I am persuaded that 
 he is able to keep my pledge that I have committed 
 unto him (Ua;a6r]y.r}v) against that day.' To those 
 that must die, more surely than they live (for Joshua, 
 chap, xxiii., calleth it ' the way and custom of the 
 whole earth '), can there be a greater comfort than 
 this, that when ' the dust shall return to the earth as 
 it was,' and yet in fulness of time to be formed into a 
 new Adam as that first original dust, ' the spirit re- 
 turncth to God that gave it,' Eecles. xii., and that we 
 may as boldly go to our Maker as ever Paul went to 
 Carpus at Troas, to leave his cloak and books and 
 parchment in his hands, so we to commend the richest 
 jewels wo have unto his fidelity, and to say with his 
 holy martyr. Acts vii., ' Lord Jesus, receive our 
 spirits ' ? 
 
 But to cease from further discussion of the phrase, 
 we may a little inquire whether it were lawful for 
 Jonah to wish for death. Many, I gi-ant, oppressed 
 with misery, and not able or willing to bear then- 
 cross, do little less than ' call to mountains and rocks 
 to fall upon them,' and to end their wretched days. 
 I am sure they complain that ' light should be given 
 unto those men whom God hath hedged in,' and they 
 ' rejoice for gladness when they can find the grave. 
 For then, they say, we should have lain and been in 
 quiet ; we should have slept then, and been at rest,' 
 Job iii.* As if tliey had been born with any other 
 condition than to walk a pilgrimage of few and evil 
 days ; or as if the evil day which the apostle warneth 
 
 * Mors miscrorum jiortus. — Caesar. Tav ?.ut)]«wk clmu- 
 duaic. — Theophrast. 
 
Veu. 3.] 
 
 LECTURE XLIII. 
 
 Ui 
 
 us of, Eph. vi., were not the whole course of our life, 
 partly through him who is principallj' evil, O Toi/jjgo;, 
 breathing out his malice against us, partly through 
 evil meu, 2Thes. iii., infesting an J disturbing our peace; 
 but rather through the evil of sin procuring wrath, and 
 the evil of adversity ensuing thereupon. In consi- 
 deration of which troubles of life it was that Simonides, 
 being asked, as Jacob was by Pharaoh, how long he 
 had lived, made answer. But a little, though many 
 years, pannn etai mulloi annus. For if we remember 
 how much of our better and vital life goeth away in 
 agues and feebleness, and other the like annoyances, 
 we may seem perhaps old men, and are indeed but 
 children.* It was a worthy answer that Artabanus 
 gave to Xerxes, the mighty emperor of Persia, when 
 viewing his huge army of at least a thousand thousand 
 men, drinking whole rivers dry as they went, and 
 commanding both hills and seas to give way unto 
 them, he wept, because it came to his mind that 
 within the space of an hundred years not one of 
 that goodly company should be found alive. I 
 would that were the worst, saith he. For we 
 endure much more sorrow by retaining life. Neither 
 is there any one of these, nor of all men living besides, 
 so happy upon the earth, that he doth not once and 
 often cast in his mind how much more pleasure there 
 were in dying than in hving. As our life is replenished 
 with all kind of misery, so death, by nature, is an 
 enemy to life, which both man and beast fly from. 
 All things desire being. And God never created death 
 amongst his good works. It came partly through the 
 envy of the devil, who lied unto man, saying, ' Ye 
 shall not die,' partly through the transgression of 
 Adam, and partly through the anger of God rendering 
 the right stipend due to sin. Whereupon he threatened 
 it, as a punishment. Genesis the second, 'The day 
 wherein thou shalt eat of the forbidden fruit, thou 
 shalt die the death.' Afterwards, when the law had 
 been given, Moses, in the name of God, protesteth 
 unto them, ' by heaven and earth, that he had set 
 before them life and death, and wisheth them to 
 choose life that they might live, they and their seed,' 
 Deut. XXX. Death is called an enemy in open terms: 
 1 Cor. XV., ' The last enemy, 'EsyazoQ £%%o;, that shall 
 be subdued, is death.' But who loveth an enemy 
 simply and for his own sake ? And amongst other 
 blessings betrothed to the elect of God, one is, that 
 ' death shall be no more,' Kevelation xxi. And to 
 reason with Augustine, t Si nulla cssct mortis amariludo, 
 non csset mcujna martynun Jortitudo, if there were no 
 bitterness and discontentment in death, the constancy 
 of martyrs were not great. Therefore, when Elijah 
 heard the word of Jezebel, ' The gods do so and much 
 more unto me, if to-morrow by this time I make not 
 thy life as the life of one of those whom thou hast 
 slain,' it is said that ' be arose, and went for his life 
 
 * Infantes sumus et senes videmur. — Mart. 
 
 t Do verb. Apost., ser. xxxiii., ilb7\ai Sanxrcu, Acta. ii. 
 
 to Beersheba,' 1 Kings, xix. How did David plead 
 for his life : Psalm xxx., ' What profit is there in my 
 blood, when I go down into the pit '? shall the dust 
 give thanks unto thee, or shall it declare thy truth ?' 
 as if he would move the Lord, for his own good and 
 glory's sake, not to cut him oil'; but afterwards, with 
 respect to himself, ' Stay thine auger a while, that I 
 may recover my strength before I go hence and am no 
 more seen.' And, being assured elsewhere of that re- 
 quest granted him, he sang joyfully to his soul within: 
 Psa. xxxix., ' Pieturn unto thy rest, my soul : the 
 Lord hath been merciful or beneticial unto thee.' 
 Psa. cxvi. 'Because thou hast delivered my soul from 
 death, mine eyes from tears, and my feet ftom faUing, 
 and I shall walk before the Lord in the land of the 
 living.' I speak not of the moan that Hezekiah made, 
 Isa. xxxviii., how he turned his face to the wall after 
 the prophet gave him warning of his death, ' and 
 prayed unto the Lord, and wept sore, and like a crane 
 or a swallow, so did he chatter, and mourn like a 
 dove, and Kfting his eyes up on high, said, Lord, it 
 hath oppressed me, comfort me ; ' and after his life 
 was ' freed from the pit of corruption,' as it were, 
 leapt for joy. The living, the living he shall confess 
 thee, as I do this day. When the beloved and blessed 
 Son of God, he that had power to lay down his life 
 and to take it up again, against that time, ' began to be 
 very sad and grievously vexed, XiiziTeHai -/.a'l abmiovini, 
 Mat. xxvi. ; and in the presence of Peter and the two 
 sons of Zebedee, let not to disclose his passion : ' M}' 
 soul is wonderfully heavy unto death.' And but that 
 the will of his Father was in the midst of his bowels, 
 and his obedience stronger than death, he would have 
 begged three times more that the cup might have 
 passed from his lips. Likewise, John xii., when 
 Andrew and Phihp told him of certain Greeks that 
 were desirous to see him, he, seeing an image of his 
 death before his ej'es, witnessed unto them, saying, 
 ' Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say ? 
 Father, save me from this hour ;' and but that another 
 respect called him back, ' therefore I came,' and 
 ' Father, glorify thy name,' he would still have con- 
 tinued in that prayer. Qnis cniin vuU mori ? prorsiis 
 nemo, ct ita memo, &c. For who is willing simply to 
 die ? Surely no man ! And so, undoubtedly, no 
 man, that it was said to blessed Peter, Another shall 
 guide thee and lead thee to the place whither thou 
 wouldst not go, John xxi.* Peter would not unless he 
 were carried. But what, then, was the reason that 
 the apostle desired to be dissolved and to be with 
 Christ, which, he said, was best of all ? YloWu 
 fiaXXov xg£/(ruo», Philip, i. ; and that the saints which 
 were racked, Heb. xi., ' cared not to be delivered, 
 that they might obtain a better ressurrection ;' that 
 Peter and Andrew welcomed their crosses. Salve crux, 
 as they were wont their dearest friends, and embraced 
 them in their arms, and saluted them with kisses of 
 * August, de verb. Apost., ser. xiiiii. 
 
278 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 peace '? that Ignatius called for fii-e and sword, voiial 
 iynis, and the teeth of wild beasts ? and other mar- 
 tyrs of Christ went to their deaths with' cheer- 
 fulness, rejoicing, and singing, and not less than ran 
 to the stake, as if they had run for a garland ? We 
 may easily answer, partly from the former authorities, 
 that they might ' be with Christ,' and that they might 
 ' obtain a better resurrection.' But the apostle in ex- 
 cellent terms decideth the question in the second to 
 the Corinthians, chap, v, Ou SsXu/y-Ev h.dvaaaSai aXX' 
 mivhhaacia', ' We will not be unclothed ' and stripped 
 of our lives, we take no pleasure or joy therein ; but 
 we ' would be clothed upon.' We have no other 
 means to get that better clothing than by putting ofl' 
 this, or that upon this, ' that mortality may be swal- 
 lowed up of life, and corruption of incorniption, so 
 that their thoughts subsist not in death, but have a 
 further reach, because they know it to be the highway 
 which must bring them to felicity. And it is no small 
 persuasion unto them when they think that, by the 
 ending of their lives, they make an end of sinning. 
 For, whilst thoy are in the flesh, they ' see a law in 
 their members striving against the law of their mind, 
 and subjecting them to the law of sin,' Rom. vii. 
 Therefore they cry, as he did, ' Wretched man that I 
 am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death ?' 
 In which postulations, notwithstanding, they evermore 
 submit themselves to the straightest and equallest rule 
 of the will of God, desiring no otherwise to have their 
 wishes accomplished than with that safe and wary 
 condition, Si Doininus rolet, If the Lord be pleased 
 with them, James iv. And as they regard their own 
 good therein, so because the blood of martyrs is 
 the seed of the church, — and that which is fire to their 
 flesh and bones, is water to the gospel, to make it 
 flourish, — and a good confession witnessed (1 Tim. vi.) 
 before the wicked tyrants of the world, doth good service 
 to the truth in this respect ; also they are not sparing 
 of themselves, ' that Christ may bo magnified in their 
 bodies, whether it be by their life or death,' Philip i. 
 Now Jonah hath more* of all these forenamed ends 
 to allege for himself why ho dcsireth to die, neither 
 the glory of God, nor the good of his brethren, nor 
 profit of his own soul ; but in a peevish and froward 
 mood, because his mind is not satisfied, and to avoid 
 some little shame, or to rid himself from the grievances 
 of life, which arc not reasons snfiicient, he will needs 
 die and follow the stream of liis foolish appetite, with 
 some such like aflection as Dido at her departure ex- 
 presseth. Sic sic jurat ire sub iimbrax, Thus I am 
 disposed to die, and not otherwise. 
 
 But to leave generalities. Let us look a while into 
 the parts of his wish. 1. It is his great fault, as Joab 
 ofl'ered his treachery to Aimer under the pretence of a 
 friendly and peaceable parley, and Judas his treason 
 to Christ under the colour of a kiss, so to tender 
 his impatient fits unto the Lord, the searcher of his 
 * Qu. 'none'?— Ed. 
 
 heart and reins, under the nature and form of prayer, 
 tolle 'qiiaso. His anger at another time, and in 
 another action, when he had sequestered his soul 
 from the King of heaven and heavenly things, had 
 been more sufterable. But then to pray when he was 
 thus angry, or then to be angry when he came to 
 pray, and not to slake the heat thereof, but still to 
 heap on outrageous words, as hot as juniper coals, 
 can no way bo excused. Yet thus he doth. The fire 
 is kindled in his heart, and the sparkles fly forth of 
 the chimney, as Solomon spake, undutiful speeches 
 towards the majesty of God, and most unnatural 
 against his own life. Surely ' the wrath of man doth 
 not accomplish the righteousness of God,' James i. ; 
 it is very far from it. 
 
 2. Consider his haste, how headlong he goeth in 
 his rash and unadvised request. For as if the case 
 required some such speed, as the prophet had in 
 charge for the anointing of Jehu, 2 Kings ix., ' Pour 
 the box upon his head, and say. Thus saith the Lord, 
 and then open the door, and flee without tarr3-ing,' no 
 sooner hath he opened his lips or conceived his suit in 
 his mind, but the Lord must presently and without 
 delay efiect it. It appeareth in that he urgeth the 
 matter so closely at God's hands. Now, therefore, 
 iwinc crijo, since I have proved it, and I am not able 
 to bear the burthen of my grief, nor longer endure the 
 tedionsness of my life, do it without protraction of time. 
 It was a goodly and sober oration that Judith made to 
 her jjeoplo of Bothulia, Judith viii., touching their 
 oath to deliver the city to the enemy within five day.*, 
 unless the Lord sent help : And now, who are you 
 that have tempted God this day, and set yourselves 
 in the place of God among the chOdrcn of men? 
 Nay, my brethren, provoke not the Lord our God to 
 anger ; for if he will not help us within those five 
 days, he hath power to defend us when he will, even 
 every day, or to destroy us before our enemies. Do 
 not you, therefore, bind the counsels of the Lord : for 
 God is not as man, that he may be threatened ; neither 
 as the son of man, that he maybe called to judgment. 
 Therefore let us wait for salvation of him, and call 
 upon him to help us, and he will hear our voice if it 
 please him. Thus we should teach and exhort our- 
 selves in all our pi-ayers not to set him a time, as the 
 disciples did about the kingdom of Israel, ' When, 
 Lord'?' or, as Jonah doeth in this place, ' Now, Lord;' 
 or Then, Lord ; but when it pleaseth him. And as the 
 psalm adviseth us, ' Oh tarry the Lord's leisure, hope 
 in the Lord and be strong, and he shall comfort thine 
 heart ' when he thinketh good, Ps. xvii. There aro 
 many reasons why God deferreth to grant our peti- 
 tions ; (1.) to prove our faith, whether wc will seek 
 uidiwful means, by giul ling to the woman of Endor, 
 or the idol of Ekron, or siich like heathenish devices; 
 (2.) to make us thoroughly privy to our own infirmi- 
 ties and disabilities, that we may the more heartily 
 embrace his strength ; (3.) to strengthen and con- 
 
Ver. 3.] 
 
 LECTURE XLIII. 
 
 279 
 
 firm our devotion towards liim, for delay extendeth 
 our desires, tlesidcria nostra dilnlioiie cxtendiininr ; 
 (4.) to make his gifts the more welcome and accept- 
 able to us, dividcrata dill didclus ohthioitur ; or, (5.) 
 it is not expedient for us to have them granted too 
 soon; or, lastly, there is some other cause, which God 
 hath reserved to his own laiowledge. Now this peti- 
 tion, which Jonah is so forward and hasty in, is con- 
 trary to all reason. For ' are not the days of man 
 determined '?' Job. siv. ; ' is not the number of his 
 months with the Lord ? and hath not the Lord set 
 him bounds which he cannot pass ?' Doth not another 
 say, ' My times are in thine hands, Lord' '? Ps. xxi. ; 
 why, then, dOth Jonah so greedily desire to shorten 
 his race, and to abridge that number of time which his 
 Creator hath set him '? 
 
 3. We commonly pray that it will please the Lord 
 to give, not to take away ; and to bestow something 
 upon us, not to bereave us of any blessing of his. 
 Solomon, 1 Kings iii., beseecheth him for wisdom : 
 'Give unto thy servant an understanding heart;' 
 and da mihi inlellcctum, ' tjive me understanding,' was 
 the usual request of his father David, Ps. cxix. We 
 say in our daily prayer, ' (jivo us this day our daily 
 bread, and forr/ivc us our trespasses ;' that is, f/ii-e 
 us remission of all our sius. That that is said to 
 descend from above, from the Father of lights, is oosig 
 aya'^ri and bu^ri/Ma riX^iov, f/iviiifj and r/ift, James i., 
 not taking away. For God hath a bountiful nature, 
 and as liberal an hand ; ' he openeth it at large, and 
 filleth every living thing with his blessing.' He ask- 
 eth of every creature in the world, ' AVhat hast tbou 
 that thou hast not received ?' and of us that have 
 received the first fruits of his Spirit, and to whom he 
 hath given his Son, A\Tiat is there in the world that 
 you maj- not receive ? But Jonah is earnest with 
 God, against the accustomed manner of prayer, and 
 the course of God s mercies, to take something from 
 him. 
 
 4. But what? Aufcr opprohriiiiii .' ' Take from me 
 shame and rebuke, whereof I am afraid,' as David 
 besought ? Vanitatem. ct verba moitlacia loiif/e/ac a 
 mc. 'Vanity and lying words put far from me,' Ps. 
 cxix. Aiifcr iiiiquitcitcm serri tui, 'Take away the sin 
 of thy servant,' when he had numbered the people ? 
 1 Chron. xxi. Or, as Job prayed, chap, ix., aiifcrat 
 a me viri/aiii xiiam, ' let him take away his rod from 
 me' ? Or as Pharaoh requested Moses and Aaron to 
 pray to the Lord for him, Exod. viii., to ' take away 
 the frogs ; ' and afterwards, when the grasshoppers 
 were sent, to ' take away from him that one death 
 only '? Exod. x. No ; his life, his darling that hved 
 and lay within his bosom ; which, because it is the 
 blessing of God, good in nature, and fit for the es- 
 ei'cise of goodness, the strongest man living is loath 
 to depart from, vir forlis e/iam cum morilur dolet. 
 The other which I spake of were plagues to the land, 
 banes to the conscience, hindrances to salvation, and 
 
 therefore it was no marvel if God were Immbly en- 
 treated to remove them. But Pharaoh in his right 
 wits, nor scarcely Orestes being mad, would ever have 
 desired that his life should be taken from him. Who 
 ever became a suitor to God to take away the life of 
 his ox or ass, because they were given him for labour '? 
 much less of his wife, which was made an helper unto 
 him ; or his child, a comforter. Or who ever hath 
 entreated him to give him evil for good, a scorpion for 
 a fish, a serpent for an egg, stones for bread ? Jonah 
 is found thus senseless, scant worthy of that soul 
 which he setteth so light by. He should have desired 
 God to have ' taken away the stony heart out of the 
 midst of him,' Ezek. xsxvi., and not scelus de terra, 
 Ezek. xxiii., or spirilwn iiiimiindiiiii de terrd, Zech. 
 xiii., 'wickedness out of the land,' or an ' unclean 
 spirit from the cavth,' but a wicked and unclean spu'it 
 from out his own breast, whereby he was driven to so 
 frantic a passion. 
 
 5. He will also prove (which is the reason annexed 
 to the petition) that ' it is better for him to die than 
 to live,' pra-stat ninri ; and he proveth it by comparing 
 two opposites, death and hfe, the horror of one of 
 which he should rather have condemned, than the 
 sweetness and comfort of the other. Thales on a 
 time giving I'orth, incredibly and strangely enough, that 
 there was no difference between life and death, one 
 presently closed upon him, Ciir enjo non moreris ? 
 Why, then, diest thou not ? Because, saith he, there 
 is no dift'erence ; albeit it appcareth sufficiently that 
 he shewed a difference by refusing it. But the para- 
 dox which Jonah here allegeth addeth much to that of 
 Thales. For, he aflSrmeth in peremptory terms, 
 having them hxid before his eyes to compare together, 
 and to make his choice, melius mihi mori, ' death is 
 better than life.' Howbeit, he saith not simply, it is 
 better to die than to live, but better /or me. One as 
 wise as ever Jonah was, who had been taken up into 
 the third heavens, and seen revelations, in this very 
 question between life and death, gave no other answer 
 or solution unto it but jjer hoc rerbmn itescio, by 
 this word, ' I know not,' y.al ri ai^};so/j,ai oil yvusi^ai, 
 ' and what to choose I know not,' Philip, i. And he 
 confessed that he was ' straitened or pinched be- 
 tween these two,' whether it were better for bim ' to 
 abide in the flesh, or to be with Christ.' No doubt, 
 simply to be with Christ. For that is toa>.w ij,a.X>jiv 
 ■/.is?aam, not only better, but ' much and very much 
 belter ;' but to abide in the flesh was avayxaiorsio]/ 
 di ijfx.tts, more needful and profitable for the church. 
 For we were not born to ourselves, but for the good 
 of our parents, country, kindred, and friends, said 
 Plato, and much more for the flock of Christ, which 
 he hath purchased with his blood, whether they be 
 Jews or Gentiles, weak or strong, Israelites or Nine- 
 vites, to further their faith, and to help them to sal- 
 vation ; for thus we are debtors to all men. The 
 speeches of Cssar were wont to be, that he had lived 
 
280 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 long enougb, whether he respected natuj-e or honour. 
 Tully answered him, It maj' be for honour and nature 
 long enough, but that which is cbiefest of all, not for 
 the commonwealth.- Again, I have beard thee say 
 that thou bast Uved long enough to thyself ; I believe 
 it. But then I would also hear, if thou livedst to thy- 
 self alone, or to thyself alone wert born ?t We are all 
 placed and pitched in our stations, and have our 
 watches and services appointed to us. Let us not 
 offer to depart thence till it be the pleasure of our God 
 to dismiss us, unless we have learned that uudutiful 
 lesson, which the messenger used at the doors of 
 Elisha, 2 Kings vi., ' Behold this evil cometh of the 
 Lord ; should I attend on the Lord any longer ? ' 
 
 It is better for me to die than to live. Say not so, 
 for how knowest thou ? If thou wilt hearken to 
 counsel, leave it to the wisdom of God to judge what 
 is best for thee, J. for he will not give that which is 
 most pleasant, but most convenient. Chariorest illis 
 homo quam sibi : a man is dearer to God than to 
 himself. Socrates in Alcibiades, would not have any 
 man ask aught at God's bands in particular, but in 
 generality, to give him good things, because he knew 
 what was most behovoful for each one, whereas our- 
 selves crave many things, which cot to have obtained 
 bad been greater ease.§ At length he concludcth. 
 For be that is wont to give good things so easily, is 
 also able to choose the fittest. || The promises in the 
 Gospel, I grant, are very large : ' Whatsoever you 
 shall ask in my name, that will I do,' John xiv. ; and 
 ' Ask, and it shall be given you,' Matt, vii., ' for evei-y 
 one that asketh receiveth.' How cometh it to pass, 
 then, that the sons of Zebedee ask and receive not ? 
 ' We would that thou shouldst do for us that that we 
 desu-e,' Mark x. The reason is given there by our 
 Saviour : Nescitis (jidd petatis, ' You know not what 
 j'ou ask.' This is also the cause that Jonah receiveth 
 not bis asking, he knoweth not what he asketh : ' You 
 have not, because you ask not,' James iv., that is one 
 cause. Yea, but 'you ask and have not,' dion xaxu; 
 aiTiiri, ' because you ask amiss,' both concerning the 
 end, ' to consume it on your lusts ;' and touching the 
 manner, because without faith ; and for the matter 
 itself, because it is hiu'tful unto j'ou. And if you ob- 
 seiTe it, you shall espy a condition conveyed into the 
 promise of Christ, Mat. vii., ' If you, being evil, give 
 good things to your children, how much more shall 
 your Father in heaven give good things to them that 
 ask bim ? ' ayaOri, good things, not such as may do 
 you hurt. Another evangelist saith for ciy/^a, TJEv/ia 
 
 * Natura; fortasai.-) et gloria: ; at, quod maximum est, 
 patria; certe parum. 
 
 t Sed turn id audirem, si U])i soli vivercs, &c. 
 
 } Si consilium vis. 
 
 Pormittc ipsi.^i expendero uumiiiibus, Slc—Jiivctial. 
 
 § Nam pro jucundis aptiaeima, &c.— Ta/cr. Max. \ih. wli. 
 cap. ii. 
 
 II Quia qui triLucre bona ex facili sokiit, etiam cligcro 
 aptissima possunt. 
 
 ciyiov, or ayaSlv, ' the holy or good Sijirit,' which is all 
 in all, able and ready to rectify your minds, order 
 your afl'ections, and set you to crave more wholesome 
 and pi'ofitabJe gifts. For if we ask the contrary, 
 (except when the Lord is pleased to lay a cuj-se upon 
 our prayers), though we call never so loud and impa- 
 tiently in bis ears ; Usque quo Domiiie et nan exaudies ? 
 ' Lord, how long shall I cry unto thee, and thou 
 wilt not hear mo '?' Hab. i. He answereth, at least 
 by his silence and denial, even as long as a man in a 
 buroing ague shall say to his physician, I'sque quo, 
 How long shall I ciy for cold water? I burn, I am 
 vexed, I am tormented, I am almost out of breath ; 
 and he answereth again, Non misereor modo, I cannot 
 yet pity thee. Such mercy were cruelty, and thine 
 own will and wish is dangerously bent against thee.* 
 This is the cause, to conclude, that Jonah his suit 
 speedeth not. Jonah thinketh it better to die. It is 
 only better in seeming, as a distasteful palate is soonest 
 pleased with the worst meat. God thinketh the con- 
 trary. Nay, Jonah thinketh, God knoiictli, that he 
 dicth indeed if he die out of charity, and that if he 
 should give his body to the fire, or again to the water, 
 or a thousand deaths more, without love, it could not 
 profit him. Therefore be is not suffered to die when 
 he would, but by anothermercy of God, not inferior to 
 that in bis former delivery, is reserved to another re- 
 pentance, and to more peaceable days. Saint August- 
 ine upon the words of the evangelist, Matt, six., ' If 
 thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments ' 
 (where be proveth that there is no true life but that 
 which is blessed, nor blessed but that which is eternal), 
 noteth the manner of men to be in their miseries, to 
 call for death rather than life : Deus mitte mihi mor- 
 tem, accehnt dies meos ; Lord, send death unto me, 
 shorten my days. And sometimes sickness comctk 
 indeed, but then there is coursing to and fro, physi- 
 cians are brought, money and gifts arc promised, and 
 death itself perhaps speaketb unto them, eccc ndsum. 
 Behold, here am I ; thou calledest for me, thou dc- 
 siredst the Lord not long since to send me. Where- 
 fore dost thou liy me now ? I have found thee a de- 
 ceiver, invent le falsalorem, and a lover of this wretched 
 life, notwithstanding thy show to the contrary. It is 
 the use of us all, with the like form of petition, 
 rather of banning and imprecation, to «ish for death, 
 yea strange and accursed kinds of death, wherein God 
 "sheweth a judgment. I^-t me sink as I stand, let tbo 
 earth open unto me, let me never speak a word more ! 
 And every cross and vexation of bfe make it irksome 
 and unsavoury unto us : Would God I were dead ! If 
 God should then answer us, c.r ore tun, out of your 
 own mouths, I grant your requests, be it unto you 
 according to your words, bow miserable and desperate 
 were our case. But as old Chrcmes, in the comedy, 
 told Clitipho his son, a young man, and without dis- 
 cretion, who, because ho could not wring from his 
 * Voluntas tua contra te petit. — Ilieron. in Ilabbac. 
 
Ver. 4.] 
 
 LECTURE XLIV. 
 
 281 
 
 fixther ten pounds to bestow upon Bacchis, his lover, 
 had none other speech iu his month but Eiiiori ciipio, 
 I desire to die. First know, I pray thee, what it is to 
 live ; when thou hast learned that, then, if thy hfe 
 displease thee, use these words.' So first know, my 
 brethren, you that are so hasty to pronounce the sen- 
 tence of death against yourselves, what belongeth to 
 the life of a Christian, whj' it was given you by the 
 Lord of life, to what ends he hath made you living 
 souls, what duties and offices he requireth at your 
 hands;! these things rightly weighed, if you think good, 
 call for death ; for by that time, I think, you will learn 
 more wisdom than to do it. It is good for you to see 
 to the whole course and transaction of your lives, they 
 should be prelusions and preparations for a better life 
 to come. Begin not, then, to live when you must give 
 over, which is the folly of most men ; or rather, take 
 heed that you give not over life before you have begun 
 it.f As one hidr shall not fall from your heads with- 
 out God's providence, so nor the least hair and minute 
 of time from your years without his account taken. 
 
 * Prius quajso disce quid sit vivere, tr.m, &c. 
 t Quid sumus et quiduara victuri giguimur. — Pers. 
 J Quidain incipiuut vivere cum desiuendum est ; qiiidam 
 aute dcsierunt qiiam inceperint. 
 
 But especially remember your end ; look to the falling 
 of the tree, consider how the sun goeth down upon 
 you ; now, if ever before, cast your accounts you build 
 for heaven ; now, if ever before, bring forih your 
 armies, you fight for a kingdom. Lay not more bur- 
 den of sin upon your souls at their going forth. Lot 
 the last of your way be rest, and the closing up of tho 
 day a sweet and quiet sleep unto you. My meaning 
 is, wish not for death before you be very ready for it. 
 Nay, rather desire God to spare you a time, that you 
 may recover, I say not your strength and bodily ability, 
 but his i'avom- and grace, before he pluck you away 
 and you be no more seen. It is not comfort enough 
 unto you to say, 
 
 Vixi, et quern dederat cursuiu natura, peregi, 
 
 I have lived indeed, and finished some time upon the 
 earth; unless you can also add, your consciences 
 bearing you witness, and ministering joy to the end of 
 your days, rhv h^oij-ov rsrs/.sxa, the second to Timothy, 
 "and 4th chapter : I have finished my race, I have not 
 only brought it to an end, but to a perfection ; though 
 I have died soon, yet I have fulfilled much time ; my 
 life hath been profitable to my country and to tho 
 church of God, and now I depart in his peace. 
 
 LECTUEE XLIV. 
 Tlwn said thr Lord, Docst thou udl to he aiignj .' — Jonah IV. 4. 
 
 THE fii'st of those three parts whei'einto this chajHer 
 was divided, touching the impatience and dis- 
 contentment of Jonah, we have in part chscovered out 
 of the former verses, reserving a remnant thereof to 
 be handled afterwards. The reprehension of God, 
 which was the second, bcginneth at these words, and 
 is repeated again in the 9th verse, upon the like 
 occasion given by Jonah. The mercy of God to- 
 wai-ds his prophet maniftsteth itself in this fatherly 
 objurgation many ways. 1. That the potter vouch- 
 safeth and humbleth himself to dispute with his clay. 
 2. That he is ready to give a reason of all his actions, 
 as a righteous Lord, who doth not enforce anything by 
 his absolute and mere authority, but dealeth reason- 
 ably and justly ; much more, that the Lord speaketh 
 unto him who spake and fretted against the Lord, 
 and giveth an account imto him why he spared 
 Nineveh, of whom no man wisely dust to have de- 
 manded, What dost thou ? that he that dwelleth in 
 hght unapproachable, and his counsels are so high in 
 the clouds as viho can find them out ? placeth them 
 notwithstanding, in the eyes of the world, to be ex- 
 amined and sifted by the reason of man ; but, most of 
 all, that he ministereth a word in season unto Jonah, 
 and when the stream of his anger was so violent, that 
 it bare him into an hearty desire and longing after 
 death, then that tho Lord interceptcth him, and 
 
 answereth in his course as Elihu answered Job, 
 chap, xxxii., ' Behold, I have waited upon thy words, 
 and hearkened unto thy speech, whilst thou sougbtest 
 out reasons ; I will now speak in my turn, and shew thee 
 mine opinion.' 'Dost thou well to be angry ?' It is 
 the singular wisdom of God, and without which poHey 
 it were hard for any flesh living to be saved ; that 
 when we are running on in our sins, and wearv-ing our- 
 selves in the ways of wickedness, amongst other his 
 retentives and stops, he hath the hook of reprehension 
 to thrust into our noses, and pull us back again. 
 Our iniquities would wander without measure, and 
 become rottenness in our bones ; our wounds would 
 dwell for ever iu our bowels, and fester to the day of 
 judgment, without this medicine. So Wisdom began 
 her lore : Prov. i., ' O ye foolish, how long will ye 
 love foolishness ? and the scorner take pleasm-e in 
 scorning, and the fools hate knowledge ? ' She giveth 
 us our right names, according to our corrupt natures ; 
 for Wisdom is able to judge of fools, and knoweth that 
 without her instruction we are wedded to om- follies ; 
 therefore she addeth, ' Timi ye at my correction ; 
 lo, I will pour out my mind unto 3-ou, and make you 
 understand my words.' Clemens Alesandrinus * com- 
 pareth our Saviour to an expert musician, such as 
 Terpander or Capito never were, for he singeth new 
 * In Protrcpt. 
 
282 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 songs, and Lath sundry kinds of modes and varieties 
 to work the salvation ot man. Sometimes ho hath 
 spoken bj* a burning bush unto him, sometimes by a 
 cloud of water, sometimes by a pillar of lire ; that is, 
 he hath been light to those that were obedient, and 
 fire to those that rebelled ; and because flesh is more 
 precious than either bushes, or fire, or water, there- 
 fore he hath spokeu unto him by flesh. It was he 
 that spake iu Isaiah, in Elias, and in all the prophets ; 
 and at length, though he were equal to the Father in 
 majesty, yet he was found in the shape of a servant, 
 and spake with his own lips. This gracious instru- 
 ment of almighty God, to shew the changes of his 
 notes, both pitieth and chasteneth, cntreateth and 
 tbreateneth ; and by threatening best admonisheth, 
 and by speaking roughly soonest convcrteth. He that 
 called Adam out of the thicket (which was the first 
 elements of this learning whereof I speak), he that 
 produced the sam,e through all the ages of the world, 
 he sent angels to Sodom, Koah to the old world, 
 Nathan to David, Samuel to Saul, Elias to Ahab, 
 prophets to Judah and Jerusalem, John Baj)tist to 
 the Scribes and Pharisees ; he reproved the elders and 
 princes with many taunting parables, corrected Peter 
 with looking back, retracted Paul with a vision from 
 heaven, advertised the seven churches with epistles 
 sent unto them. Leprosy unto Miriam was a writing 
 and scroll upon her flesh, engraven in her skin, to 
 teach her obedience ; dumbness unto Zacharias was 
 not a dumb instructor, it taught him faith against 
 another time ; blindness sent upon Paul took away 
 his blindness, and opened the eyes of his mind, mak- 
 ing him to see more in the ways of life, than all his 
 learning, gathered at the feet of Gamaliel, could have 
 revealed unto him. Such are the admonitions that 
 God sometimes nseth to mollify our hard hearts, lest 
 we should freeze too long iu the dregs of our sins, 
 and because we proceed with impimity and freedom, 
 claim them for inheritance. Behold, therefore, as 
 Eliphaz comforted Job, chap, v., ' Blessed is the 
 man whom the Lord correcteth ; therefore refuse not 
 the chastising of the Almighty: for he maketh the 
 wound, and biiideth it up ; he smiteth, and his hand 
 maketh it whole. He shall deliver thee in six 
 troubles, and in the seventh the evil shall not touch 
 thee.' Nay, he lindeth a wound, and bindeth it up ; 
 ho cspicth a blow, and his hands heal it ; he letteth 
 thee alone in six iniquities, but in the seventh he will 
 pull thee by the garment, and thou shalt no more 
 oU'end. 
 
 On the other side, wretched is the man whom the 
 Lord correcteth not ; whoso first messenger and 
 monitioncr is the first-born of death ; that is, his life 
 is taken from him before he sceth his sins. This 
 were (as Augustine ealleth it) li'nihilis leiiitax, cnidelitas 
 parcciis, lenity, full of horror, and sparing cruelty ; 
 such precious balms break the head, nay, wound the 
 conscience, when bitter and biting corrosives were 
 
 more wholesome for us. This is also one part of our 
 duty, who are to gather the sheep into the shtepfold of 
 Christ: we must not only teach, but reprove, for other- 
 wise (as Origen noteth upon Exodus) we ofl'er red, but 
 not scarlet ; ■•■' the colour and dye of our preaching 
 goeth not deep enough ; our fire givoth light and 
 shining, but kindleth not; f we lead men the right 
 way unto knowledge, but we bring them not to the 
 practic and better part of divinity, to feel a pricking 
 in their consciences, and to be driven to say, ' Men 
 and brethren, what shall we do ?' 
 
 In the reprehension which God here useth, two 
 things come to bo handled : the nianxer thereof, which 
 is mild, courteous, and peaceable ; and the matter, 
 which altogether concerneth his anger. 
 
 1. The manner is as kind nud familiar, and with as 
 much indulgence as if Eli, or the kindest father in 
 the world, were to deal with his child whom be 
 most favoured ; no anger or gall uttered in the re- 
 proving of his anger, no unpleasant expostulation, 
 and neither bitterness nor length of speech, but as 
 few and as friendly words as lenity itself might devise. 
 ' Doest thou well to be angry ?' I should have looked 
 for burning from his lips, and coals of fire from his 
 nostrils, that one who dwelt at his footstool should 
 dare to assault heaven with his indignation, and cross 
 the doings of his dreadful judge ; but that the thoughts 
 of the Lord are peace, and of another disposition thau 
 the thoughts of man. Doubtless, if one of his 
 brethren, the prophets of Israel, out of his own tribe 
 and family, had taken the cause iu hand, I cannot 
 conceive how he should have used him with so favour- 
 able and sparing an increpation, ' Doest thou well to 
 be angry '? ' 
 
 If there be any amongst you that taketh advantage 
 hereat, to say in your hearts. What mean our prophets 
 and preachers to make such bitter invectives, decla- 
 mations, outcries, against the sins of our age ? Their 
 salt is too quick, and we are over-much seasoned v.ith 
 it ; our ears are not able to bear their words. We 
 cannot ofl'end in the wearing of a garment, in the use 
 of our money, in eating our bread, and drinking 
 our drink, but the pulpits must presently ring, 
 our cars tingle, aud the world wonder at it. God 
 never taught them such roughness of speech ; it 
 had been an happier thing for us to have lived and 
 sinned in former times, and then to have been an 
 adulterer, then a drunkard or extortioner, when God 
 spake himself, who knew how to temper his words, 
 and to shape his reprehensions in milder sort. Ho 
 would have said but thus : Doest thou well to be 
 angry, well to be proud, well to bo covetous, well to 
 give thy money upon usury ? He would not have 
 threatened and stormed, as the manner of our 
 preachers is. Surely (my brethren) God is the mas- 
 ter of his own, both speeches and actions ; his wisdom 
 
 * Obtulisti coccum, sed iion bis tincbim, nou duiilicatuin. 
 t Ignis uoster illuminat, non accendit. 
 
Ver. 4] 
 
 LECTURE XUV. 
 
 283 
 
 is as the great Jeep, I cannot find it out. It maj' be he 
 saw amemlment in the heart and reins of Jonah, which 
 we cannot do ; or ho was able b}' his power to create 
 his spirit anew, and to change his heart, that it should 
 be rectified in an instant, as well by one word as if 
 he had tired and torn his ears with ton thousand ; and 
 he dealt with a prophet, an anointed servant of his, 
 one that was dear iu his eyes ; or he kept him for 
 another time, when his anger should be past, and 
 his heart more capable of discipline and correction ; 
 or he qualified his speech, to school and scourge him 
 the more with actions. Behold, then, and rest satis- 
 fied with us ; our tongues should be still enough, if 
 we had worms to command to eat up your plants and 
 fruits, or if we could charge the sun in the sky, or the 
 east wind in the air, to beat upon your heads, and to 
 grieve your souls, as God grieved Jonah. He spareth 
 him in words, but he payeth him in fact ; and though 
 he vex not his ears, as we do, he vexeth his head by 
 taking away his shelter, the only temporal comfort 
 which he then enjoyed. I would we might see those 
 days wherein our speech might never exceed this com- 
 pass, ' Do you well to do thus?' It is no pleasure to 
 us, to sharpen our tongues like razors against you, to 
 speak by the pound or talent, mighty and fearful 
 words, if softer might suffice. But if we be briars in 
 your coats and flesh, it is because we dwell with briars ; 
 if we be perverse, it is because we dwell in the midst 
 of a perverse generation. An hard knot in the timber 
 cannot be driven out without heavy blows ; * sundry 
 diseases require simdry kinds of cures, and as the 
 dispositions of men are varied, so must we vary our 
 teachings. One must be washed with gentle baths, 
 another must have his wounds cut with lancers ; f and 
 as the damsel. Mat. ix., was raised up in her father's 
 house, the widow's son of Nain without his mother's 
 gates, Lazarus before a great multitude of all sorts, 
 so some must be handled privately, others openly, a 
 third kind publicly ; J some must be held for weak, 
 others accounted publicans unto us ; some their infir- 
 mities supported, others delivered unto Satan ; some 
 chastised with a rod, others warned in the spirit 
 of meekness ; some pulled out of the fire, others 
 left to be burned ; some saved by fear, others by 
 love ; some must be used as our own bowels, others 
 as rotten members, whose cure is despaired, cut 
 off from the body, that they do no more hurt. § 
 In all which reprehensions (except where all hope is 
 past), that singular precept of Gregory taketh place. 
 In the controlling of faults, there must be some anger, 
 rather to attend upon reprehension, than to command 
 it ; so that in the execution of this charitable and mer- 
 ciful justice, it bear not a sway by going before, but 
 
 * Gravissimus nodus in ligno non potest expelli nisi 
 gravissimo oppressorio. — A mlros. 
 
 t Hie lavacra mollia, illu t'evnim qusi-it ad vuhiera. — 
 Cassiod. X Riibau. in Mat. ix. 
 
 I Varium poscit rcraedium diversa qualitas passionum. 
 
 rather make a shew by coming after. "^ And Leo hath 
 the like counsel, that it must be used, iu»i scevientis 
 aiiimo, scil medeiitis, not with the mind of a tyrant or 
 persecutor, but of an helper : ' Considering thyself ' 
 (saith the apostle. Gal. vi.), ' lest thou also be 
 tempted.' For a man may once, and often in his life- 
 time, say to him that reproveth another, as Elipbaz 
 did to .Job, ' Behold, thou hast taught many, and 
 strengthened the weary hands ; thy words have con- 
 firmed him that was falling, and thou hast upheld [the 
 weak knees : but now, it is come upon thee, and thou 
 art grieved ; it toucheth thee, and thou art troubled. ' 
 2. The matter reproved by God is anger : ' Dost 
 thou well to be angiy ?' or, as some render it, doth 
 anger help thee? Nninqiiid henefucU ira lihU\ or, art 
 thou angry justly, nwn putas'quhd juste irascrrk ' and up- 
 on reasonable cause ; anfnctnm ln'iie, i.e. mtiiinahiliter '' j 
 or, as some of the Hebrews expounil it, art thou very 
 angry ? is not thy vrra,ih vehement ? interpreting bene 
 by valde, an vald-e iiraceris.'i Jonalhaii veiiit, adrno- 
 diiin. Nonne vehemem est iva tdn ? As Moses did, 
 Dent, ix., when he told the children of Israel that he 
 took the sin, the calf which they had made, and ground 
 it ' very well,' Optimc, that is, sufficiently, till he had 
 brought it to the smallest dust. So some interpret 
 iccU, in this place, by the quality and goodness of 
 anger, whether it may be justified ; others by the 
 quantity and greatness, noting the excess and immo- 
 deration thereof. They come both to one ; for whether 
 God ask of the quality, he seemeth to imply a secret 
 subjection, it is not well done of thee, thou hast no 
 just cause to be angry ; or whether of the quantity, 
 he thiuketli that there is as little reason that the spar- 
 ing of penitent sinners should move such stomach in 
 Jonah. The question is disputed throughout the 
 whole chapter, between God and the prophet, God 
 the opposer, Jonah the defender, whether he do well 
 to be angry ; God confuteth him both by word and 
 deed, and Jonah contendeth for it to the death. I will 
 not trouble you with the answering of the question 
 till we come to the ninth verse, whore the Lord doth 
 demand again in the same words ; and Jonah, though 
 he be silent in this place, yd there dissembleth not 
 his mind, for he answereth, ' I do well to be angry,' 
 and addeth measure sufficient, 'even unto death.' 
 Meanwhile, because this is the time wherein a general 
 forgetting of WTOngs, aiMvuierm, and laying malice asleep, 
 is professed, so far as the world is christened, partly 
 the canons of the church, and partly devotion itself, 
 leading us all to a thankful commemoration of the 
 death and resurrection of Christ, and to the commu- 
 nion of his bodj' and blood, which is a badge of our 
 Christian love and fellowship. The time inviting me 
 thereunto, which St Austin calleth the solemnity of 
 solemnities, and the uncourteousness of these our 
 
 * Suljesse debet iracuiulia, non praiesse. Non ut donii- 
 nando praeveniat, sed simulaudo subscquatur. 
 
 t fficolarap. % Lyra. § R. KimcUi. 
 
284 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 times requiring no less, give me leave, in few words, 
 to convert my speech mito that wbicb the celebration 
 of the feast itself doth easily exhort you uuto. The 
 blessed apostle thought not that any more effectual 
 persuasion to charity could be gathered than fi'om the 
 example of the Son of God himself, whose dying and 
 rising again is now solemnized ; for so he frameth his 
 exhortation to the Colossians, chap, iii., 'Now therefore, 
 as the elect of God, holy and beloved,' as you have 
 any part in these graces, election, sauctification, and 
 the love of God, if you have any argument and seal to 
 yom- own consciences that you are a part of his in- 
 heritance (for they are not marked for his chosen which 
 are without these marks), 'put on, iiovaaah, the 
 bowels of mercy, kindness, humbleness of mind, meek- 
 ness, longsufl'ering, forbearing one another, and for- 
 giving one another ;' let these be your robes and 
 coverings, wear them as you wear your garments, and 
 let them be as tender and inward unto you as j'our 
 ovm principal and most vital parts : ' Even as Christ 
 freely and bountifully forgave, ly^aplea-o, you, even so 
 do j-e.' How that was, I need not recite. The apostle, 
 Rom. v., collecteth sundry arguments to shew how 
 far forth that substantial and saving grace of God hath 
 gratified us : (1.) we were weak, aaOnsi; ; (2.) godless, 
 affsEs;;; (3.) sinners, a/j,d'JTu}.oi ; (-1.) enemies, sx^'o! ; 
 ■we had neither strength to endeavour, neither piety 
 to prociu'e, nor righteousness to satisfy, nor acquaint- 
 ance and friendship to deserve in the sight of God ; 
 ' yet,' notwithstanding all these impediments and de- 
 ficiencies, £-; ya^ Xwffro;, ' Christ died for us.' So the 
 other apostle speaketh, 1 Peter iii., Chi'ist ' sufl'ered 
 for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring 
 us to God :' the cause most odious, the persons most 
 unequal, the end most absolute. How, then, can I 
 better exhort you, to an imitation of the love of Christ, 
 than as St Paul cxhorteth the Philippians, chap. ii. : 
 ■'If there be any consolation in Christ,' so we may 
 render it, or ' if there be any advocation, Tc/.gdx>.>)(j/s, 
 in Christ' (as all the consolation and advocation that 
 we look for must bo drawn from that fountain), ' if 
 any comfort of love,' (as who fecleth not the use of 
 love, that hath not been nursed up with the tigers of 
 the wilderness ?), ' if any communion of the Spirit,' 
 by whom we are all knit together in the body of Christ, 
 lastly, ' if any bowels of mercy ; surely he meaueth 
 that there is or should be much of all this, much con- 
 solation in Christ, much comfort of love, &c. But if 
 there be any remnant and seed left, if all be not spent 
 to satisfy your rancorous malice, ' fulfil my joy,' and 
 your own joy, and the joy of the angels in heaven, 
 and the joy of the bride and bridegroom, to whom it 
 is a good and pleasant thing to sec brethren dweUing 
 together in unity, ' minding the same thing,' ro duri, 
 not the like, but the same, and ' having the same love,' 
 not equal, but the same, aud 'having the same sotils,' 
 eu/i-^u^oi, gi'owiug together Uke twins, concorporate, 
 coanimate, and being of one judgment, rJ iv ifmoiJuTeg. 
 
 Lastly, he forgetteth not the most exquisite pattern of 
 all loving-kindnesses, ' Let the same mind be in you 
 that was in Christ Jesus.' The same mind? I am 
 out of hope of it ; his love was as strong as death, 
 water could not quench it, yea, water and blood could 
 not put it out. He cried upon his cross for the Jews, 
 when he hung upon the top of a mountain, in the 
 open face of heaven, God, and angels, and men behold- 
 ing, hearing, wondering at it, ' Father, forgive them, 
 they know not what thej' do,' Luke sxiii. Let not 
 that mind be in you which is in lions and leopards ; 
 and good enough. I have heard of such peaceable 
 times prophesied, that ' swords should be turned into 
 scythes, and spears into mattocks,' but never so vrar- 
 like and furious wherein the tongues of men should 
 be turned into swords, and their hearts into wounding 
 and slaying instruments ; yet, though this were never 
 prophesied, we have fulfilled it. 
 
 To make an end ; the best remedy against injmies 
 is forgetfulness. Marcus Cato, on a time, being 
 smitten in the bath, to him that had done the wrong, 
 and was desirous to make him amends, answered, nan 
 mcmini me j.enussum, I remember not that I was 
 smitten. Shall Cato be wiser and patieutcr in his 
 generation than we in ours ? If we cannot forget the 
 time wherein we have been smitten, or otherwise 
 injm-ed, at least let us follow the counsel of the psalm, 
 to ' be angry without sinning,' Ps. iv. ; that is, if we 
 do that which is natm'al aud usual, and can hardly be 
 stayed, let us avoid the other, which can never be 
 justified. Or if we sin in our anger (as who in this 
 world is angry and sinneth not?), let the monition of 
 the Spirit of God in another place, Eph. iv., quickly 
 temper our heat, and let us beware that ' the sun go 
 not down upon it.' It was one part of the epitaph. 
 written upon Sylla his tomb, Nemojne inimicus inj'er- 
 encld iiijiiiid siipenivit, I never had enemy that went 
 bej'ond me in doing wi-ong. Let not our lives or 
 deaths be testified uuto the world by such monuments. 
 It was an honour fitter for Sylla of Rome, an heathen 
 and a tyrant, who dyed the channels of the streets 
 with blood, than for any Chi'istian. I will, by your 
 patience, enter a little way into the next verso, and 
 send, as it were, a spy to view at least the borders 
 thereof, before I proceed to examine the whole con- 
 tents. 
 
 So Jonah went out of llie citij, ver. 5. It is thought 
 by some that he offended no less in going forth than 
 when he first refused to come thither ; for he should 
 have continued amongst them, to have given them 
 more warning. The reason why Jonah went out, I 
 cannot rightly set down. Some conjecture, and it is 
 not unlikely, to avoid the company of wicked men ; 
 for so ho accounted the Ninevites, aud he was afraid 
 to bear a part of their plagues. The rule is good ; for 
 ' can a man take coals in his bosom, and not be 
 burnt ? or handle pitch, and not be defiled ?' or fly 
 with the ostriches and pelicans, and not grow wild ? 
 
Ver. 4.] 
 
 LECTURE XLIV. 
 
 2S5 
 
 or dwell in the tents of wickedness, and not leam to 
 bo wicked ? Or if Raliab abide still in Jericho, Lot 
 find his kindred in Sodom, Noah and his family in 
 the waste world, Israel in Babylon, shall those exe- 
 crable places and people be punished by the hand of 
 God, and these not partake the punishment? One 
 place for many. Josh, xxiii., ' If ye cleave unto these 
 nations, and make marriages with them, and go unto 
 them, and they unto you, the Lord will no more cast 
 them out, but they shall be a snare and destruction 
 unto you, and a whip on your sides, and thorns in 
 your eyes, until ye perish out of this good land which 
 ■the Lord your God hath given you.' But his en-or 
 was in the application of the rule ; for if the Xinevites 
 were so penitent as before we heard, the worst man 
 {for aught I know), was within his own bosom. 
 
 And sat on the east side of the city. His purpose 
 in choosing this gi'ound cannot certainly be perceived. 
 Arius Montanus giveth this guess, that he thought if 
 any plague were sent from God, it was likely to come 
 from west and south, because Judea in respect of 
 Nineveh was so placed ; and therefore, because God 
 ■was only known in Judea, and seemed to dwell no- 
 where else, he would surely punish them out of those 
 quarters ; for this cause, as if he had decreed with 
 himself. If a scourge came from God, it shall not come 
 near me, he taketh up his lodging in that part of the 
 city which was most safe. Others make this supposi- 
 tion : they say Tigris the river ran on the west side 
 of Nineveh, where, by reason of their haven, there 
 was daily concom'se of merchants and passengers to 
 and fro. This frequency Jonah avoided, and betook 
 himself to that part where the walks were most soli- 
 tary, and his heart might least be troubled. Others 
 think that he shunned the heat of the sun, which in 
 those countries is far more fervent than in ours ; and 
 because in the morning it is more remiss than at the 
 height of the day, when it is in the south ; or betw^een 
 the height and the decimation, when it draweth to the 
 west ; therefore he seated himself on the east side of 
 the city, where he might be freest from it. Haply he 
 went unto that side by adventure, quo pes tiilil, as his 
 mind and feet bare him, and it had been indifJ'eront 
 unto him to have applied his body to any other side ; 
 or it may be he was thither brought by the especial 
 commandment and providence of almighty God. As 
 when Elias had prophesied of the drought for three 
 years, he was willed to ' go towards the east,' 1 Kings 
 xvii., where he should find a brook to drink of, and 
 the ravens were appointed to feed him. It is not un- 
 lawful for me to add my surmise amongst other men. 
 In the east, because of the sun rising, there seemeth 
 to be greatest comfort ; and I nothing doubt but, in 
 this banishment of his, Jonah sought out all the 
 comforts he might. The garden in Eden, which the 
 Lord God planted for man, was planted eastward. 
 Gen. ii. Some say eastward in respect of the place 
 where Moses wrote the story, that is, of the wilderness 
 
 where Israel then was ; others, with more probability, 
 in the eastern part of Eden, the whole tract whereof 
 was not taken in for the garden, but the choicest and 
 fruitfullest part, which was to the east. It is true in 
 nature, which some applied to policy, and to the state 
 of kingdoms and families, that more worship the sun 
 in his rising than at his going down, plwes orienlem 
 solem ijuam occidenteni adorant. ' I saw all men hv- 
 ing,' saith the preacher, 'joining themselves with the 
 second child which shall stand up in the place of the 
 other.' Our Saviour, who was evermore prophesied 
 to be ' the Light of the Gentiles,' is by none other 
 name figured, Mai. iv., than of the sun rising : ' Unto 
 j-ou that fear my name, shall the Sun of lighteousness 
 arise ;' and in the song of Zacharias, Luke i., he is 
 called ' the Day-spring from on high.' Many rehgious 
 actions we rather do towai'ds the east, than any other 
 point of heaven. We h\vc\ our dead commonly, as the 
 Athenians did, their faces laid, and as it were looking, 
 eastward. And for the most part, especially in om* 
 temples, we pray eastward. So did the idolatrous, 
 Ezek.viii., turning their backs to the temple of the Lord, 
 and their faces to the east. Will you have the reason 
 hereof? Why was Aaron willed, Lev. xvi., to take 
 the blood of the bullock, and to ' sprinkle it with his 
 finger upon the mercy-seat eastward?' It was the 
 pleasure of God so to have it. And unless nature 
 direct us to these observations, whereof I have spoken, 
 I know not how we are moved. The rising of our 
 Sun, whose resurrection we now celebrate, the true 
 and only-begotten Son of God, was in the morning. 
 Matthew saith, ' in the dawning of the day,' Mat. xviii. ; 
 Mark, 'very early,' Mark xvi., when the sun was 
 risen ; not that he had yet appeared in their hemis- 
 phere, but his light he sent before him. John saith, 
 ' when there was yet darkness,' John sx. ; that is, 
 the body of the sun was not yet come forth. And 
 Thomas Aquinas* thinketh it probable enough, that 
 our resurrection shall be very early in the morning, 
 the sun being in the east, and the moon in the west, 
 because, saith he, in these opposite points they were 
 first created. You maj' haply marvel what the event 
 of my speech will be. I have seldomtimes carried 
 you away from the simplicity of the prophecy which I 
 entreat of, by allegories and enforced collections. 
 Yet I am not ignorant that many men's interpretations 
 in that kind are of many men gladly and plausibly 
 received. I hope it shall be no great oflence in me to 
 fit and honour this feast of the resurrection of the 
 Lord of lifet with one allegory. We are now walking 
 into the west, as the sun in his course doth : ' Behold, 
 we are entering into the way of the whole world,' 
 Josh, xxiii. And as the sun goeth down, and is 
 taken from our sight by the interposition of the earth, 
 so into the body of the earth shall we likewise descend, 
 and be taken from the company of the living. Christ 
 our Saviour, who was both the living, O ^^v, Rev. i., 
 * In Supplem. qusEst. 77, artic. 2. t Easter day. 
 
286 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 and life itself, H i^oir,, John xi., and had the keys of hell 
 and of death, and whose manner of protestation is 
 rifo ill sacnla, ' I live for ever and ever,' yet touching 
 his human nature, when he sojourned upon the face 
 the earth, had his setting and going down. In this 
 sense we might ask the spouse in the Canticles, ' 
 thou fairest amongst women, what is thy well-beloved 
 more than other men?' Cant. v. And though she 
 answered, ' My well-beloved is white and ruddy, the 
 chiefest of ten thousand,' yet in this condition of 
 mortal and natural descent, he is equal unto his 
 brethren. This passover we must all keep, and there- 
 fore let us truss up our loins, and take our staves in 
 our hands, that we may walk forwards towards the west. 
 Instead of other precious ointments, let us anoint our 
 bodies to their burial ; and for costly garments, let us 
 lay forth shrouds for our flesh, and napkins to bind 
 about our heads ; that is, let us remember our end, 
 and the evening of our lives, and we shall offend the 
 less. The death of the Son of God, if ever any man's, 
 was ratified and assured as far forth as either the 
 justice of his Father or the malice of men might 
 devise. If his body had been quickened with seven 
 souls, and they had all ministered life unto it in their 
 courses ; yet such was the anger of God against sin, 
 and the cruelty of man against that just one, that 
 they would all have failed him. And his burial and 
 descension into the lower parts of the ground was as 
 certainly confirmed. For you know what caution the 
 providence of God took therein, to prevent all suspi- 
 cion of the contrary. For his body being taken doN\n 
 from the cross, was not only embalmed, and ' wrapped 
 in a linen cloth, but ' laid in a new sepulchre,' where 
 never corpse had lain before, lest they might have 
 said, that the body of some other man was risen ; and 
 in a sepulclire ' of stone,' because the dust and softer 
 matter of the earth might easily have been digged 
 into ; and in a sepulchre of rock or one entire stone, 
 lest, if there had been seams and fissures therein, they 
 might that way have used some cavil against his 
 resurrection'; besidesa stone at the mouth of that stone, 
 and a seal, and a watch, and as sufficient provision 
 besides as the wisdom of worldly and ill-minded men 
 could think upon. Notwithstanding, as the bruit of 
 his death was universally spread and believed, for the 
 very air rang with this sound, Maniius Pan iiioiiiins est, 
 The great and principal shepherd is dead, and the 
 Bun in the sky set, or did more, at his setting, and the 
 graves opened and sent forth their dead to receive 
 him ; so the news of his resurrection w^as as plenti- 
 fully and clearly witnessed by angels, men, women, 
 disciples, adversaries, and by such sensible conversa- 
 tion upon earth, as that not only their eyes, but their 
 fingers and nails were satisfied. Behold, then, once 
 again, 'the Sun of righteousness is risen' unto us, 
 and ' the Duy-spring from on high,' or rather from 
 below, ' hath visited us ; ' for when Zacharias pro- 
 phesied he was to descend from the highest heavens. 
 
 but now he ascended from the heart of the earth. 
 Once again, we have seen ' our bright morning star,' 
 which was obscured and darkened by death, shining 
 in the east with so glorious a countenance of majesty 
 and power as shall never more be defaced. Even so, 
 the days shall come, when, after our vanishing and 
 disparition for a time under the globe of the earth, we 
 shall arise again, and the Lord shall bring us out of 
 darkness into the light of his countenance. Our 
 night, wherein we sleep awhile, shall be changed into 
 a morning, and after obscurity in the pit of forgetful- 
 ness, we shall appear and shine as the stars of God 
 in their happiest season. We shall go out of Nineveh 
 as Jonah did, a Gentile and strange citj-, a place 
 where we are not known, a land where all things are 
 forgotten (for whether we be in the flesh, we are 
 strangers from God, or whether in our graves, we are 
 not with our best acquaintance ; both these are a 
 Nineveh to right Israelites), and we shall sit in the 
 east; that is, we shall meet our Saviour in the clouds, 
 and be received up with him into glory, and dwell in 
 everlasting day, where we shall never know the west 
 more, because all parts are beautiful ahke ; nor fear 
 the decay of our bodies, because corruption hath put on 
 incorruption, and neither feel the horror of darkness, 
 nor miss the comfort of the sun, because the pre- 
 sence of eternal and substantial light enlighteneth all 
 places. 
 
 My purpose was not upon so easy an occasion to 
 prove] the resurrection, either of Christ (which I have 
 elsewhere assayed to do), or of his members that 
 belong unto him. For as it rejoiced Paul that he was 
 to speak before king Agrippa, who had ' knowledge of 
 all the customs and questions amongst the Jews,' 
 Acts xxvi., so it is the happier for me that I speak to 
 those who are not unsldlled in the questions of Chris- 
 tianity, and neither are Sadducees, nor atheists, nor 
 epicures, to deny the faith of these lively mysteries. 
 Only my meaning was, upon the Lord's day, whereon 
 he rose to life, and changed the long continued Sab- 
 bath of the Jews, and sanctified a new day of rest 
 unto us, to leave some little comfort amongst you, 
 answerable to the feast which we now celebrate. 
 Surely the angelical spirits above keep these paschal 
 solemnities, this Easter with great joy.* They 
 wonder at the glory of that most victorious lion who 
 hath triumphed over death and hell. It dooth them 
 good, that the shape of a servant is again returned 
 into the shape of God.-|- They never thought ♦o have 
 seen that star in the east, with so fresh and beautiful 
 a hue, which was so low declined to the west, and past 
 hope of getting up. Wo also rejoice in the memory, 
 and are most blessed for the benefit and fruit of this 
 day, the Sabbath of the new world, our passover from 
 
 * Agnnt in coclcstibua hsec paschalia gaudia ipsi angolici 
 spiritus, &c. — Cyprian. 
 
 t Uelectantur in eo quod forma servl reversa sit in formam 
 Uci.— /</. 
 
Ver. 5 ] 
 
 LECTURE XLV. 
 
 287 
 
 evei'Listing cleatli to life, our true jubilee, the first day 
 of our weeli, and chief in our calendar to be accounted 
 of, whereon our Phcenis arose from his ashes, our eagle 
 renewed his bill, the first fruits of sleepers awoke, the 
 first-begotten of the dead was born from the womb of 
 the earth, and made a blessed world, in that it was 
 able to say, The man-child is brought forth ; the seed 
 of Abraham, which seemed to have perished under the 
 clods, fructified, not by proportions of thirty, or sixty, 
 
 or an hundred, but with infinite measure of glory, both 
 to himself and to all those that live in his root. Him 
 we looli for shortly in the clouds of heaven, to raise 
 our bodies of humility out of the dust, and to fashion 
 them like to his own, to perform his promise, to finish 
 faith upon the earth, to perfect our glory, and to draw 
 us up to himself, where he reigneth in the heaven of 
 heavens, our blessed Redeemer and advocate. 
 
 LECTUEE XLV. 
 
 ^■liid there made him a houtli, and sat under it in the shadow. — Jonah IV. 5. 
 
 BEFORE, the Lord had begun to reprehend Jonah 
 in words, now he addresseth himself to reprove 
 him also by a sensible sign ; and because his ears 
 were uncapable, speaketh unto his eyes, and sheweth 
 him a life-glass, wherein he may see himself and his 
 blemishes. Words are oftentimes received as riddles, 
 and precept upon precept hath not prevailed, when a 
 familiar and actual demonstration hath done good. So 
 Ahijali the prophet rent the new garment of Jeroboam 
 the king in twelve p)ieces, and bade him reserve ten to 
 himself, in sign that the kingdom was rent out of the 
 hands of Solomon, 1 Kings xi., and ten tribes given 
 to Jeroboam. So Isaiah, by going barefoot, teachelh 
 Egypt and Ethiopia that they shall also go into 
 captivity in the like sort, Isa. sx. Jeremiah, by 
 wearing yokes about his neck, "Jer. xxvii., and send- 
 ing yokes and gyves to the kings of Edom, Moab, 
 Ammon, Tyre, Sidon, Judah, giveth them a visible 
 sacrament and representation of their captivity in 
 Babylon. Thus Ezekiel portrayed the siege of Jeru- 
 salem upon a brick, Ezek. iv. : thus Agabus taketh 
 the girdle of Paul, Acts xsi., and bindeth himself hands 
 and feet, and suith, ' So shall the man be bound that 
 owneth this girdle.' Andthus doth the Lord admonish 
 Jonah by a real apophthegm, a lively subjection to his 
 eyes, what it is that he hath just cause to dislike in him. 
 But before we come to the very point and winding of 
 the matter, wherein we may see the mind of God, there 
 are many antecedents and preparatives beforehand 
 to be viewed. 1, That Jonah goeth out of the city ; 
 2, buildeth him a booth ; 3, that God provideth him 
 a gourd; 4, sendeth a worm to consume it ; 5, that 
 the sun and the winds beat upon the head of Jonah till 
 he fainted. All this is but the protasis, an only proposi- 
 tion ; so far we perceive not whitherto the purpose of 
 God tendeth ; then followeth the narration, the anger of 
 Jonah once again, and once agam God's increpation, 
 first, touching the type or image, which was the gourd 
 (for the gourd standing and flourishing was an image 
 of Nineveh in her prime and prosperity ; the gourd 
 ■withered, of Nineveh overthi'own), then touching the 
 truth represented by that figure, which was the city 
 itself. For the meaning of God was, to lay open 
 
 the iniquity of Jonah before his tiice, in that he was 
 angry fur the withering of an herb, and had no pity 
 in his heart upon a mighty and populous city. The 
 order of the words from this present verse to the end 
 of the prophecy is this : in this fifth, Jonah buildeth 
 for himself; in the sixth, God planteth for him ; in 
 the seventh, he destroyeth his planting; in the eighth, 
 Jonah is vexed and angry to the death ; in the ninth, 
 God reproveth him in the figure ; in the tenth and 
 eleventh, in the truth, by that figure exemplified. 
 
 Of the antecedents, I have already tasted two 
 members : 1, his going out of the city, to shun their 
 company who did not so well like him ; 2, his sitting 
 on the east side of the city, either to be farther from 
 the judgment of God, which was likely to come west- 
 ward,* because Jerusalem stood that way ; or to be 
 out of the trade and thoroughfare of the people, which 
 was likeliest to be at their quay, for the river lay also 
 upon the west side ; or to be freer from the heat and 
 parching of the sun, which in the morning, and 
 towards the east, is less fervent ; or lastly, I told you 
 to take the comfort and benefit of the sun rising. 
 Now, the third in the number of those antecedents is, 
 that ' he maketh himself a booth.' Wherein I might 
 observe unto you, that a prophet is enforced to labour 
 with his hands for the provision of necessaries. And 
 surely, if it were not worth the noting, the apostle 
 would never have said. Acts xx., ' You know that 
 these hands have ministered unto my necessities, and 
 to those that were with me ;' di yji^^i duTai, these very 
 hands that break the bread of the Lord, these hands 
 that baptize, and that are laid upon the heads of God's 
 servants, ' these have ministered unto my necessities.' 
 Likewise the first to the Corinthians, and fourth, 
 ' We labour, working with our own hands,' Tai; 
 idiai; xk"'- ■'^"'^ '"^ '^'^ epistles to the Thessalonians, 
 twice he maketh mention of his ' labour and travail 
 day and night,' 1 Thes. ii., and 2 Thes. iii. But I 
 rather charge you at this time with these particulars : 
 1, what Jonah made, a hootii; 2, for what use, to sit 
 under the shadow of it ; 3, how long to continue, till 
 he might see what uvjs done in tiie cilij. 
 
 ■'■■ Qu. ' eastward ' or ' from tlie west ' '? — Ed. 
 
288 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 The first aiul the second shew unto us, the one the 
 nature, the other the use of all buildings. 
 
 1. By nature, they arc but booths and tabernacles, 
 and such as the apostle reporteth of Sion, that they 
 should ' remain as a cottage in a vineyard, and like 
 a lodge in a garden of cucumbers,' Isa. i. ; or as Job 
 speaketh in the twenty-seventh of his book, ' like a 
 lodge that the watchman maketh,' no longer to abide 
 than till that service is ended. I would be loath to 
 term them the houses of spiders and moths, as Job 
 doth, but compared with eternity such they are. 
 The patriarchs and people of ancient times dwelt but 
 in tents, easily pitched, and as easily removed ; and 
 as many other things in antiquity, so this amongst 
 the rest, was a figure to all the ages of the world to 
 come, that so long as they dwell upon the earth, they 
 have but a temporal and transitory habitation. The 
 earth which we dwell upon is but our place of sojourn- 
 ing, and wherein we are strangers, as God told 
 Abraham, Gen. xvii. In the forty-seventh of the 
 same book, Pharaoh asked Jacob ' how many were 
 the days of the years of his life;' Jacob, to express 
 our condition of travelling and flitting upon the earth 
 to and fro, answered the king, ' The whole time,' not 
 of my life, but ' of my pilgrimage,' or rather pilgrim- 
 ages (by reason of often removes), ' is an hundred and 
 thirty years. Few and evil have the days of my life 
 been, and I have not attained unto the years of the 
 life of my fathers, in the days of their pilgrimages.' 
 David, 1 Chron. sxix., giveth thanks unto the Lord 
 in behalf of himself and his people, that ' th.ey were 
 able to offer so willingly towards the building of the 
 temple, because all things came of him, and from his 
 own hand or liberality they arc given unto him.' For, 
 saith he, ' we are strangers before thee, and sojourners 
 like all our fathers ; our days are as the shadows upon 
 the earth, and there is none abiding.' Thus Jacob 
 and his fathers, David, and his princes, and his people, 
 and their fathers, all were pilgrims. Let us see now 
 what use the apostle maketh hereof. He saith of 
 Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, and the rest, 
 Heb. xi., that 'all these died in faith, and received 
 not the promises, but saw them afar off, and believed 
 them, and received them thankfully ; and confessed that 
 they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth, for 
 they that say such things declare plainly that they seek 
 a country,' it may be tlunr own, from whence the}' 
 were exiled. The apostle answereth, No; for ' if they 
 had been mindful of that country from whence they 
 came out, they had leisure to have returned. But 
 now they desire a better, that is, an heavenly; where- 
 fore God is not ashamed of them to be called their 
 God, for he hath prepared for them a city.' Likewise 
 he cxhorteth us, Heb. xiii., ' As Jesus, to sanctify the 
 people with his own blood, suffered without the gate, 
 so that we should go forth of the camp, bearing his 
 reproach ; for here we have no continuing city, but 
 we seek one to come.' And our Saviour told his dis- 
 
 ciples, John xiv., that ' in his Father's house there 
 were many mansions,' or settled dwellings, for here 
 we have but tabernacles. Houses, I confess, we have, 
 as foxes have their holes, and birds their nests, and 
 bees their hives, to be chased and driven from them ; 
 but till the promise be fulfilled which is mentioned, 
 Piev. xxi., that 'the tabernacle of God shall be with 
 men ;' that is, men shall be with the tabernacle of God, 
 and God dwell with us, and we with him in heavenly 
 Jerusalem ; we must trust to that other prophecy, 
 Micah ii., suirfite, et ite, ' Arise, and depart, for this is 
 not your rest.' 
 
 2. The use of buildings is, that we may sil. under 
 the shadow thereof. The posterity of Noah, Gen. xi., 
 having found out a place in the plain of Shiuar, said, 
 ' Go to, let us build us a citj' and tower, to get us a 
 name.' Was that the end of buildings ? Nebuchad- 
 nezzar, Dan. iv., built him a palace ' for the house of 
 his kingdom, and for the honour of his majesty,' to 
 vaunt of the mightiness of his power, and to forget 
 the God of heaven. AVas that the end of building ? 
 It seemeth by the words of Solomon, Eccles. ii., that 
 he ' made him great works, and built him houses, to 
 prove his heart with joy, and to take pleasure in 
 pleasant things.' Or was that the end of building ? 
 Some built wonders of the world, as the walls of 
 Babylon, set up by Semiramis, the house of Cyrus, 
 the tomb of Mausolus ; all which buildings, whether 
 they be ' summer parlours,' as Eglon's, Judges iii., or 
 ' winter-chambers,' bouses in the city, or Tusculan 
 fiirms in the country', were they as stately for height 
 as the spires of Egypt, or as the temple of the great 
 Diana of the Ephesians, which as they were wondered 
 at fur their buildings, so for their ruin and dissipation; 
 or were they as sumptuous for cost as that palace of 
 king Aleiuous, the walls whereof were of brass, the 
 gates of gold, the entries of silver ; they are all but 
 vanity ; and when we have all done, there is none 
 other use of building than to sit and shadow ourselves, 
 and to defend our bodies from the violence of the 
 weather, and other foreign injuries. It is a sickness 
 that some men have, to spend their time in build- 
 ing, as the epigram* noted Gellius, (rellius (rdijicat 
 semjier, Gellius is always building, or repairing, or 
 changing, or doing somewhat to keep his hand in. 
 If a friend come to borrow monc}- of hira, Gellius hath 
 uo other word in his mouth, but I am in buibiing. 
 
 Alas, to what purpose are these large and spacious 
 houses without inhabitants, chimneys without smoke, 
 windows, not for prospect, but for martens to breed 
 and owls to sing in ? Such are the tenants, instead 
 of families heretofore kept, and hospitality maintained, 
 now hedgehogs lying under the walls, and weasels 
 dwelling in the parlours. Jeremiah doth notably tax 
 the vanity of a great builder : Jer. xxii., ' He saith, I 
 will build me a wide house, and large chambers; so 
 
 ♦ Dum tamen .Tilificot, quidlibct ille facit. 
 
 TJnum illuil verbuni Gellius, icdifico. — Martial. 
 
Ver. 5.] 
 
 LECTURE XLV. 
 
 289 
 
 he will make himself great windows, and ceil thom 
 with cedar, and paint them with vermilion. But shalt 
 thou reign (saith the prophet), because thou closest 
 thyself in cedar ? Did not thy father (and thy grand- 
 father) eat and drink, and prosper when they executed 
 judgment and justice (kept houses, and relieved the 
 poor )'? But thine eyes and thy heart are but only for 
 covctousness and oppression,' and for vain-glory, and 
 to command and overlook the country round about, 
 and to leave a name behind thee, even to do this ; and 
 according to the ends thou proposest herein, so shall 
 the Loi'd visit thee. 
 
 3. Till he might see what should be done in the city. 
 But the proof hereof may seem to have been already 
 passed, and the forty days fully accomplished. Some 
 think * that Jonah went out of the city some three or 
 four days before that term expired, and there waited 
 the event, and that he was not displeased with 
 God till after the time fulfilled ; which seemeth not 
 probable unto me, that Jonah so lately and seriously, 
 with so much danger of his life, admonished of his 
 duty neglected before, would now again forsake the 
 Ninevites, and give over his preaching before the ac- 
 complishment of those days which God bath numbered 
 unto him. Others are of judgment that the time was 
 fully elapsed, and that Jonah knew well enough that 
 God was minded to spare Nineveh, touching their 
 final and utter overthrow, yet not to pardon them 
 altogether without the irrogation of some lighter pun- 
 ishment upon them. As ho dealt with Israel, Exod. 
 xxiii, when they worshipped the molten calf, saying, 
 ' These be thy gods, Israel,' &c., he threatened to 
 ' consume them;' yet, afterwards, though by the inter- 
 cession of Moses, ' he changed his mind from the evil 
 which he threatened unto them,' yet he forgave them 
 not wholly, but punished thom by the ' slaughter of 
 three thousand men.' Lastly, it is thought by a 
 third company, that Jonah saw by revelation the 
 sparing of Nineveh. In such variety of opinions, I 
 abridge not your liberty to take which best liketh you. 
 But howsoever you take it, Jonah, you see, bath the 
 thirstiest nature after the destruction of Nineveh that 
 might be. If Jonah had been armed with power, for 
 in this respect he wanted not the spirit and wish of 
 Elias, to have commanded fire against the Ninevites, 
 as Elias did against the captains and their bands, 
 2 Kings i., Nineveh had lain in ashes at the end of 
 forty days ; for nothing can please Jonah unless some- 
 what be done against the people of that place. But 
 his message being ended, why returneth he not to- 
 wards Israel -again ? No ; he will take an homely 
 <and comfortless habitation ; he will labour with his 
 hands, and put them to base seiwice; he will lie abroad 
 in the field, bearing the heat and burden of the day, 
 and wet with the dew of the night, and haply not fed 
 in that solitary place but with the waters from the 
 brook, and fruits of the earth of his own provision 
 * Eabbiiii putant die 36, vel. 37. 
 
 and dressing, only to stay the time, and not to miss 
 that opportunity when God should plague Nineveh, the 
 bruit and report whereof might not content, but ho 
 will see with his eyes, videret, his desire upon his 
 enemies ; for they that hear are able to speak but of 
 hearsay, they that see are out of doubt.* There was 
 some reason that Moses was so sharply bent against 
 an Egyptian oifering wrong to one of his countrymen, 
 Phinehas against adulterers, Peter against Malchus, a 
 servant against his master's enemies, Paul against 
 Elymas a sorcerer, other apostles against a village of 
 Samaria for refusing to entertain Christ ; but Jonah, 
 upon small reason, a prophet of the Lord, and but 
 lately his orator and headman in a capital danger of 
 his own, vou hear how his heart and eyes are^'fixed 
 in a merciless aft'ection against penitent and reformed 
 men ! 
 
 Ver. G. And the Lord God prepared a ijourd, and made 
 it to come up over Jonah. It seemeth that the booth 
 was withered, being built out of boughs or reeds, or 
 some other stufl', which the beat of the sun did easily 
 work upon ; for when the gourd was afterward smitten, 
 the sun and the wind beat upon the head of Jonah, 
 which argueth that his booth was defaced. Before, 
 you have heard of the building of Jonah, now God 
 buildeth, the one by art, the other by nature ; the 
 one a tabernacle of boughs, the other an arbor or 
 bower of a hving or growing tree, which the fatness 
 of the earth nourished, having seed and bud in it 
 according to the kind thereof; the one withereth be- 
 cause it is but propped up, having no juice in it ; the 
 other spreadeth her roots and strings in the ground, 
 having whereby to increase. I need not say how un- 
 profitable and barren the labour of man is, being left to 
 itself, without the favour of God to supply the imper- 
 fections thereof. This very place doth sufficiently 
 justify that of the psalm, ' Except the Lord build the 
 house, they labour in vain that build it,' Ps. cxxvii. 
 The fruits of the body, fruits of the field, fruits of 
 cattle, increase of kine, flocks of sheep, the basket, 
 and the store in the basket. Dent, xxviii., they make a 
 number and show of goodly commodities, but unless 
 you give them their blessing which is there annexed, — • 
 benedictns fnntiis rentris, ' blessed shall be the fruit 
 of thy body,' and blessed all the rest, — mourn as Esau 
 did when Jacob prevented him of the blessing, and as 
 the grass upon the house top,s which no man taketh 
 in his hand or blesseth in his heart, so do they lan- 
 guish, pine away, and come to nothing. The" Lord 
 must ' command his blessings ' to be with us in our 
 storehouses, and in .all that we set our hand unto, as it 
 is there added, or our labom- dieth between our fingers. 
 Zophar, Job xx., speaketh many things of the joy of 
 an hypocrite : ' His excellency mounting unto heaven, 
 and his head reaching up unto the clouds ; yet he 
 shall perish (saith Zophar) like the dung : and they 
 that have seen him shall say. Where is he ? He shall 
 
 * Qui audiunt, audita referunt ; qui vident, piano sciunt. 
 
 T 
 
290 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 flee away as a dream, and pass away as a vision of 
 the uight ; there is nothing left of bis meat, and no 
 man shall hope for his good ; yea, when he shall have 
 filled his belly, God shall send down his fierce wrath, 
 and rain even upon his meat.' You see there is no- 
 thing prospei'eth with him because he is an hj'pocrite ; 
 and when he went to his work, the blessing of the Lord 
 was commanded to slay behind. The blessing of the 
 Lord must be upon the building of our houses, watch- 
 ing of our cities, tilling of our ground, filling of our 
 bellies, training up of our children, or W'hatsoever pains 
 we bestow in all Ihese falleth into emptiness. This 
 was it that seconded and supplied the labour of Jonah ; 
 he built him a booth which withered, but ' God pre- 
 pared him a gourd,' an house of a better foundation, 
 because it lived by the moisture of the earth, which 
 the other was destitute of. 
 
 There is a great question and contention between 
 writers touching the plant that was here provided, 
 what it was by kind, and how to be termed. The 
 wisdom which God gave unto Adam, Gen. ii., was 
 very great in the naming of all those creatures that 
 God brought before him. But concerning the herb 
 or tree here mentioned, the most learned and wise 
 amongst the Hebrews, Grecians, Latins, Spanish, 
 French, Germans, Etrurians, have laboured and beaten 
 their brains to give it a name, but hitherto have not 
 found it; and unless there be some second Adam to 
 speak his mind, or another Solomon, ' who was able 
 to speak of the trees from the cedar to the hyssop,' I 
 think the controversy will never be ended. Notwith- 
 standing, as the best wine is that which is farthest 
 brought, for the more it is shaken in carriage the more 
 it is fined and made fit for use, so there is both pleasure 
 and profit to hear any point of learning sifted and moved 
 to and fro by the diverse judgments of learned men. 
 If I were as skilful in simpling as some are, I would 
 give you my simple opinion. But now I must speak 
 from mine authors. E. Esdras saith that the wise of 
 Spain called it Cucwbita or Cucwner, which is in 
 English a gourd or cucumber ; but withal he addcth, 
 ratio iiiiri nun potest, ut sclatiir quid sit, we cannot find 
 out the means to know what it was. The Latin vulgar 
 translation callcth it Hedcm, which in our English 
 sigiiifieth ivy. Jerome disproveth that, even against 
 himself, and saith that the Latins have no name for 
 it, for ivy and gourds and cucumbers (he saith) creep 
 upon the ground, and have need of tendrils and props 
 to bear them up ; but this tree sustained herself with 
 her own trunk, and had broad leaves like a vine, and 
 the shadow which it cast was vei-y thick. Some called 
 it Unjonia, bryony, or wild nop, and the wliite vino, 
 which groweth in the hedges with red berries, and 
 blistereth his skin that handleth it ; some, llajnim 
 silrcslre, the wild rape root. The Hebrews and the 
 Chaldees name it Kikaion, the Grecians K/z; and 
 Kgiruf, the Arabians Ellccrva, whereof ye have the oil 
 of kerva in the apothecaries' shops. Sometimes they 
 
 call it Cdtnputia viajor, great spurge, and Peiulac- 
 tylum, for the similitude it hath with the five fingers 
 of the hand; whereupon the French, by reason of 
 the joints and knots which are in the leaves thereof, 
 name it Valine de Christ, that is to say, Christ's hand. 
 The Etrurians call it Pliaseolwn, faselles, or long 
 pease, a kind of pulse rising so high that it served 
 them for arbors. Lastly, the Germans, for the ad- 
 mirable height of it, call it uoiidcr booiiie, that is, the 
 wonderful tree. Thus every nation, as it could get 
 any tree, which in their imagination came nearest unto 
 it, so they lent it a name. But we may conclude with 
 Q5colampadius, according to that of Esdras before, 
 Inrertuin qiialis frutc.v vd arbor. It is not known what 
 bush or tree it was. At length the Latins, the latest, 
 and in my judgment the skilfullest amongst them, have 
 all agreed to call it Riciiuts, which in propriety of 
 speech siguifieth a tick, a creature noisome to dogs,* 
 and for the likeness of the seed or grain that it 
 beareth, is applied to this tree. Dioscorides calleth it 
 iirborosiim friilicem , a bush, yet a tree, like unto a fig- 
 tree, but less,f with leaves like to a plane, but greater, 
 soft, and blackish, and bearing seed like unto ticks. 
 We may read of it in Pliny, J and of the oil that 
 Cometh there thence, riciiiiuni, together with the 
 variety of names that are given unto it.§ But all 
 with one consent agree that it suddenly spriugeth to 
 the height of an olive, and ditfusoth itself like ivy, and 
 that it hath scattering boughs and broad leaves, like 
 the plane-tree, where-under the}' were wont to feast, 
 and most commodious to give a shadow. For which 
 cause, R. Kimchi noteth they used to place it before 
 tavern doors. Whether we have lighted upon the 
 name or not, it sufRceth for the history to understand 
 that God provided a tree, wonderfully tall, plentifully 
 stored with boughs and leaves, and such as was most 
 convenient to give comfort unto Jonah. Oh how ad- 
 mirable are the works of God, the least whereof may 
 challenge so many commentaries and expositions to 
 be spent upon it ! AYhat shall we then think of all 
 nature, if the whole table and book thereof were set 
 before our eyes to be viewed and considered, when 
 one plant of the ground findeth not learning enough 
 amongst Jews, barbarians, nor Christians to unfold 
 it ? ' When we behold the heavens, the works of his 
 fingers, the moon and the stars which he hath or- 
 dained,' I say not then as the psalmist doth : ' Lord, 
 what is man, or the son of man, that thou shouldst so 
 visit him '?' But what is man, or the son of man, that 
 he should judge or give sentence of them ? And we 
 may both l)egin and end that psalm as the prophet 
 doth, ' Lord our Lord, how excellent is thy name 
 
 * Animal cfinibus iufcstum. 
 
 t Similem sicut. sed iniuorem, folia lialjcntem simillima pla- 
 tano sed majora, &c. 
 
 J Lib. XV., Nat. Hist., cap. vii. 
 
 § Crotoii, trixis, sesauium silvestre, &c. ; platanus gcue- 
 alis. 
 
Veu. -j.] 
 
 LECTURE XLV. 
 
 201 
 
 in all the world,' aud in the great buildings and trea- 
 sures thereof, when one small creature and parcel of 
 thy works breedeth such confusion in the wits of man ? 
 
 Prresentemque refevt quiclibet herba Dcum. 
 
 Much more deeply might the Lord oppose us, as ho 
 did his servant Job, with the greater wonders of 
 nature, when we strain at gnats and cannot conceive 
 of little things: Job. xsxviii, ' Hast thou entered into 
 the bottoms of the sea, or walked to seek out the 
 depth '? Have the gates of death been opened unto 
 thee, or hast thou seen the gates of the shadow of 
 death '? Hast thou perceived the breadth of the earth ? 
 Tell if thou knowest all this. And where is the way 
 that light dwelleth, and where is the place of dark- 
 ness ?' Anaxagoras being asked why man was made, 
 answered. To behold the heavens, and to magnify 
 God in his creatures. Surely, as our Saviour com- 
 mended the small mites which the widow cast into 
 the treasury, so there is not the least work that 
 God dolh, but deserveth the greatest admiration that 
 our hearts can comprehend. And, therefore, the 
 enchanters of Pharaoh, when they were come to try 
 their cunning in lice, the basest and most contempti- 
 blest creatures, they were enforced to cry out, ' This 
 is the finger of God,' Exod. viii. 
 
 To conclude ; as Christ made the comparison be- 
 tween the lilies and his servants, Mat. vi., ' If God 
 so clothed the grass of the field, which to-day is stand- 
 ing and to-moiTow is east into the oven, how much 
 more shall he do unto you, ye of little faith!' so 
 may we say. If God be so glorious in a mean plant of 
 the field, which in a night came up, and in a night 
 perished again, much more are his mightier works 
 highly to be marvelled at. 
 
 But in this Cth verse (to bring it into order) there 
 are two parts : 1, the creation of the gourd by the 
 hands of God ; 2, the acceptation of Jonah. The 
 former hath four joints and divisions in it : (1.) The 
 gourd was prepared by the Lord Gud, for who else was 
 able to create ? Some have gone about to imitate the 
 works of creation, as to make thunders and lightnings, 
 and to fly in the air ; but they have paid the price of 
 saying in their foolish hearts, I will be like the Most 
 High. (2.) It was made, to ascend ; (3.) to be a 
 shadow over the head of Jonah ; (4.) to deliver him 
 from his grief. The preparing of the gourd had little 
 pleasured Jonah, unless it had ascended to some 
 height ; nor the ascending on high, unless it had been 
 flexible, and bowed itself over his head ; nor the hang- 
 ing over his head, without such quantity of boughs 
 and leaves as were sufficient to shadow it : all these 
 gi'ow and ascend in my text higher, as the tree itself 
 doth, that we may know how wisely the works of God 
 are done, and they never miss the endwhereunto they 
 were addressed. Two of these four members, to wit, 
 the springing and climbing of the gourd, that in a 
 moment of time it was over the head of Jonah, shew 
 
 the omnipotent power and providence of the Almighty, 
 who, contrary to the rule of the philosophers, (ji(ini 
 de nihilo itihil, that nothing is made of nothing, with- 
 out some matter pre- existent, causeth a tree to arise 
 without either seed or stock to produce it, and hasten- 
 eth the work in such sort that whereas other plants 
 require the changes and seasons of the year to make 
 them sprout and yield their increase, not without 
 the kindness of the ground, dropping of the air, influ- 
 ence of the sun and stars, and other natural concur- 
 rences, this by the extraordinary hand of God, pi'e- 
 sently and immediately came to a full growth. For I 
 like not their opinion who think that the gourd was 
 there before ; and therefore Jonah applied himself to 
 that place, and there erected his booth, when the 
 judgments of so many learned, and the letter of the 
 text, is flatly against them. Besides, the word oi' jire- 
 parbvj, that is here and elsewhere used (for who but 
 the same Lord God prepared the fish before, or who 
 the worm and the east wind hereafter '?), noteth a 
 quick and speedy expedition in the working of God,* 
 when his pleasure is, and that all things in the world, 
 great and small, the winds in the air, the fishes in the 
 water, the plants in the earth, and under the earth 
 worms and creeping things, are subjected to his mighty 
 providence. The latter two declare the goodness of 
 God towards Jonah in his application of the gourd to 
 so acceptable an end. For by that means his body 
 was shadowed and his soul eased. I know there is 
 misery enough in nature, and that 'judgment some- 
 times beginneth at the house of God,' and they ' drink 
 deeply of the cup ' to whom it was not meant, 
 Jer. xlix. And the grief which Jonah hero feeleth is 
 but a portion of that grief which corruption and 
 mortality had addicted us unto. AtrI the far- 
 ther we go from God, the nearer we ever ap- 
 proach to misery; for neither land, nor sea, nor 
 city, nor field, nor air, nor earth, nor any worm of 
 the earth, shall favour us, no more than they favoured 
 Jonah. I am not ignorant, on the other side, that 
 all nature is provided for the comfort of God's elect. 
 And natiu'e shall even be changed, and made to run 
 faster than her manner is, to do them good. The 
 Lord shall not only do it, but do it with speed, when 
 we have little reason to look after it : sometimes by 
 rule and sometimes at liberty, sometimes by law and 
 sometimes by privilege and above his law, sometimes 
 by nature and sometimes by miracle ; but do it he 
 will, rather than his help shall fail. Who thought of 
 the ram in the bush, when Isaac lay upon the faggots? 
 The good will of him that dwelt in the burning bush 
 sent it. He came not upon his feet, but was brought 
 by special providence. Who dreamed that an east 
 wind should have filled the camp of Israel with quails? 
 It had blown often before, and sometimes hurtful and 
 unprosperous blasts, but never quails. Who looked 
 
 * PuUiilfire facit co momeuto. — R. Kimehi. Repente 
 aucto frutice. — Ar. ilont. Nocte extitit, ver. 10. 
 
292 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 for manna from heaven when they wanted bread in 
 the wilderness ? Many a dew and frost had they seen 
 upon the ground, but never with such effect. Who 
 durst presume to think that Jordan would run back, 
 or the Red Sea divide itself, till they saw it fulfilled ; 
 or would not have sworn that the lions would have 
 rent Daniel in pieces, and bruised every bone ; and 
 the fire of that oven in Babylon have burned those 
 three salamanders to powder, till they saw it other- 
 wise ? But these things have been done, we know, 
 and done on the sudden ; the Lord hath risen early 
 to do them, that is, hastened his act, and set wheel 
 as it were to his power and goodness, to make them 
 speed. And thus was this gourd provided, to the 
 growing whereof were required a spring and summer 
 at the least, but to such augmentation and largeness 
 the space of many years. These two companions, the 
 
 might and mercy of God, between which, as before I 
 said, those four members of my test divide themselves, 
 are his two wings, under the shadow whereof we shall 
 be safe. And as the disciples of Christ were sent into 
 the world ' two and two before his face,' to preach the 
 gospel and to heal diseases, so these two hath the Lord 
 joined together; and they go before his face as far as 
 the earth is bounded, to assist his chosen in all their 
 griefs. And rather than any temptation shall wax too 
 strong for them, and put them in hazard, he will be 
 Adoiiai, Adomii, twice a God as it were, and double 
 his Spirit, strong and strong, merciful and merciful; 
 and as his goodness is infinite, so it shall draw for- 
 wards his infinite power to some extraordinary and 
 untimely work, which nature without leisure and tract 
 of time could not have produced. 
 
 LECTUEE XLVL 
 So Jonah iras exceciliiii/ glad of the r/oiiid. — Jonah IV. C. 
 
 IN the building of God, after the building of Jonah 
 withered and defaced, I noted, 1, the provision 
 that the Lord made for him; 2, his own acceptation. 
 The former, with the branches thereto belonging, viz., 
 the creation and propagation of the gourd, wherein 
 the power of God was manifested, together with the 
 shadow, and end of the shadow, wherein his goodness 
 shewed itself, we have already treated of, and are now 
 to consider the acceptance and applause that Jonah 
 gave unto it. It oftereth unto us these two things : 
 1, his afleetion, joi/; 2, the measure of that affection, 
 exceedinii f/rcat joy. 
 
 1. Many things there were which might provoke the 
 rejoicing of Jonah: (1.) The fanning of the leaves, 
 which was a gi'eat comfort to a man that sat in the 
 snn, and was parched with the heat, as a cake in | 
 the hearth ; for the sun is a marvellous instrument, 
 as the son of Sirach speaketh, Ecclus. xliii., it bunieth 
 the mountains three times more than one than keepeth 
 a furnace ; it casteth out fiery vapours, and with 
 shining beams blindeth the eyes. And we know that 
 ' burning heat,' ardor ct irstia, is in the number of the 
 plagues threatened. Dent, xxviii. and Rev. xvi., ' The 
 fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun ; and it 
 was given him to torment men with heat of tiro. And 
 men boiled in great heat, and blasphemed the name 
 of God for it.' This was the grief wherewith it is said 
 before that Jonah was perplexed, for it is not a mean 
 plague to lie open to the scorching of the sun without 
 shadow and protection ; so much the rather, if (as the 
 Rabbins imagine) the skin of Jonah was waxen more 
 tender since his inclosure in the bowels of the fish 
 than before. (2.) The gourd saved him the continual 
 renewing of his booth ; for it was likely enough that 
 his natm-al house, built by the hands of God, should 
 
 longer have continued than that artificial tabernacle 
 which himself had erected of such slender stuff. 
 (3.) It is thought that the colour of his arbor being 
 green and fresh, pleased well his eyes. (4.) That the 
 scent of the leaves was not unwelcome to his nostrils. 
 Paulus de Palatio addeth other reasons of his joy : 
 (1.) He thinketh that Jonah was sick through grief of 
 heart, and that it much revived his soul to see the 
 care which God had over him; (2.) he imagineth 
 that Jonah persuaded himself, even for this miracle's 
 sake, that the people of Nineveh would not esteem 
 him as a false prophet; (3.) lastly, he acccordeth to 
 St Jerome, and supposeth this tree to have been 
 common in Judea, and therefore it much delighted 
 Jonah to behold a tree of his own country. They 
 add, moreover, the suddenness of the miracle, and 
 that the gourd was so much the more grateful unto 
 Jonah because it came uulooked for. But the most 
 of these before alleged are but sensible pleasures; and 
 there is no question but that which most affecteth him 
 was the presence and favour of God, so miraculously 
 and extraordinarily shewed. For that argument which 
 Gideon asked of God, ' If God bo with us, where ara 
 his miracles'?' Judges vi., to seal up his mercies to- 
 wards him, the same doth the Lord bring in this place 
 for the confirmation of Jonah. 
 
 That Jonah rejoiced for the gourd, I cannot dislike; 
 it argueth that he weighed and esteemed the blessings 
 of God as they deserved. Many, though they fall upon 
 their heads as the dew of heaven upon their ground, 
 yet are more senseless in them ; and as they meet the 
 motes in the sunbeams, so they entertain the gifts of 
 God as if they came by chance, scarcely lending a 
 thought to consider them. Others are joyful enough 
 of that which they are possessed of ; sometimes inso- 
 
Ver. 6.] 
 
 LECTURE XLVI. 
 
 293 
 
 lent and proud, tbeii' looks and their gait have majesty 
 and disdain in them against those who are not so 
 plentifully visited ; but they little regard the Author 
 of those benefits, who hath sent this ticket or remem- 
 brance to every man upon the face of the earth, 'What 
 bast thou that thou hast not received ? ' Let Nabal 
 bo the person and parable in whom I report (only 
 changing the name) the history of all worldly men, 
 who, having the riches of the earth, take them as in- 
 heritance or due debt, and spend them like lords, to 
 fulfil their lusts ; meanwhile, not minding either sac- 
 rifice to God, or relief to the poor, or any way apply- 
 ing themselves to those ends for which they were 
 enriched. Nabal, 1 Sam. sxv., bad riches enough, 
 and mirth enough : ' He made a feast after his shear- 
 ing like a king, and his heart was merry within him ;' 
 the reason was, 'for he was very drunken:' there is 
 the use of his riches. Besides, the opinion of his 
 mightiness and wealth made him as drunk otherwise ; 
 for the usage of himself, in the dispensation of his 
 riches, was so base everj' way, that neither servant, 
 nor wife, nor stranger gave good report of bim. The 
 sercant uttei'etb his complaint, ' He is so wicked, that 
 a man cannot speak unto bim ;' the wife concealetb 
 not hers, ' Let not my Lord regard this wicked man, 
 for as bis name is, so is be ; Nabal is bis name, and 
 folly is with bim.' David oftentimes fretteth at his 
 churlishness: 'He hath requited me evil for good,' 
 who would not bestow a little portion of bis substance 
 to refresh the servants of David, ' that walked at the 
 feet of their lord, though they were a wall unto him 
 by day and by night, and safeguarded all that he bad 
 in the wilderness.' But his end was answerable to 
 bis deserving, for it is said in the text, ' The Lord 
 smote him within ten days that be died,' and before 
 that death of his body, ' his heart died within him, 
 and he was like a stone.' The best instruction is, as 
 we rejoice in those temporal blessings of God, so to 
 use them that they may be our joy (for to some they 
 are snares and destructions), to receive them with 
 thanksgiving, embrace them in measure, and dispense 
 them with wisdom, to the honour of our bountiful 
 God, relief of afHicted Joseph, and a furtherance unto 
 us to discharge those Christian duties whereunto we 
 are bound. 
 
 Besides the acknowledging of the author, the plea- 
 siu-e which Jonah took in the gourd was a sign that 
 be felt the sweetness and use of the benefit, which (if 
 you observe) is a blessing upon a blessing ; for as the 
 wise preacher noted, Eccles.v., ' To every man to whom 
 God bath given riches and treasure, and giveth bim 
 power to eat thereof, and to take his. part, and to en- 
 joy his labour, this is the gift of God ;' the other are 
 bis gifts, but this is a double gift. Surely ' be will not 
 much remember the days of his life, because God 
 answereth the joy of bis heart ;' without which joy 
 and comfort of heart he will remember not only the 
 days, but the hours and minutes of his life ; and every 
 
 one is more bitter than other unto bim. All the meat 
 that be eatetb seemeth to be mingled with gall, and 
 his drink spiced with wormwood ; his clothes sit so 
 strait upon his body, bis bodj- is a prison to his soul, 
 and his soul a burden and clog to itself. Therefore 
 the preacher addeth, chap, vi., ' There is an evil which 
 I have seen under the sun, and it is much amongst 
 men : a nCan to whom God bath given riches, and 
 treasure, and honom', and he wanteth nothing for bis 
 soul of all that it desireth, but God giveth him not 
 power to eat thereof, but a stranger shall eat it up : 
 this is vanity, and this is an evil sickness.' Jonah 
 was not sick of this disease ; for he both enjoyed the 
 gourd, and perceived those comforts and pleasures for 
 which it was provided. 
 
 2. But what meaneth the immoderate and exces- 
 sive joy that Jonah took therein ? for I come now to 
 the measure of his afl'ection. It is true oftentimes 
 which the poet bath, 
 
 Dum vitiint stulti vitia, in contraria currunt.* 
 
 So foolish are we, that while we avoid one fault, we 
 fall into the contrary. Jonah is quickly angry, and 
 quickly pleased, and very angry, and very well pleased. 
 Whatsoever be is, or doth, he putteth full strength 
 unto it, qidcquid af/it, valdc aijit. It is a great mas- 
 ten-, saith Seneca, to play a man kindly. Of one 
 whom thou sawest but yesterday, thou mayest ask the 
 next. Who is this ? be is so much changed. f Would 
 a man know Jonah to be Jonah, that had seen him 
 before in his exceeding wTath, and now should find 
 bim so exceedingly well pleased ? 
 
 Iram 
 Colligit et ponit femere, &c4 
 This were enough for a child, whose limber and incon- 
 stant passions are every hour altered ; yet Jonah be- 
 wrayeth his weakness in the like mutabilitj' of manners ; 
 sometimes boihng like a sea, or like the river in Isaiah, 
 ' mighty and great,' Isa.viii., with abundance ofcholer; 
 sometimes as strongly overborne with a contrary afl'ec- 
 tion, § constant in nothing but in bis inconstancy, and 
 never moderating himself with a mild and sober car- 
 riage, as those ' waters of Sbiloah, that ran softly.' 
 Peter Martyr, writing of the aflections of man, sor- 
 row, joy, hope, fear, anger, and the rest, compared 
 them to the winds wherewith a ship is driven ; they 
 may be helps to the ship, and they may overthrow it. 
 The passions, I think, wherewith Jonah was driven to 
 and fro, were more vehement than that wind which 
 raised the former tempest ; for when he is angry, he 
 is sore grieved ; when be is glad, he is over-much 
 afraid ; and when he is angrj' again, he is angry to the 
 death. So he is not only variable in his affection, as 
 
 * Hurat. in Sat. 
 
 t Maguum est hominem agere : de aliquo quem vidisti 
 heri, merito potest dici, hie quis est? tanta mutatio est. 
 I Horat. in ar. Poet. 
 i Vitsa disconvenit ordine toto. — Hot. in Epist. Ibid. 
 
294 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 Proteus was in Lis shapes, \vroiii,'lit like -svax upon a 
 sudden, but he is also as intemperate in them, not 
 able to contain himself within the lists of any mode- 
 ration. 
 
 That you may know what vessels they are which 
 God doth use in the ministration of his holiest work, 
 in bearing his name before the world, and preaching 
 the gospel of Christ, the richest treasure that ever the 
 earth received ; they are earthly vessels, made of clay, 
 andshaped of the self-same mould whereof all mankind 
 is ftishioned. Prophets they are, but as Moses spake, 
 ' hke unto then- brethren,' not only in similitude of 
 flesh, as Christ only was, but in similitude of sinful 
 and infu-m flesh ; apostles they are, and Christ chose 
 twelve of them, but Judas was a devil incarnate, and 
 Peter was a Satan in his kind, and none were angels ; 
 thej' are also the men of God, yet men ; or if they be 
 angels by a more honourable style than their natm-e 
 can bear, Rev. i. ; ' Behold, he hath not found sted- 
 fastness in his angels,' Job iv. ; or if they be stars, in 
 the same vision, ' behold the stars are not pure in his 
 sight,' Job xsv. ; from both which places of Job is 
 infen-ed by way of comparison, ' much less they that 
 dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the 
 dust, and they are consumed before the moth : much 
 less man, that is but rottenness ; and the son of man, 
 that is a worm.' He scarcely beareth a tongue in 
 these days, that frameth not this, or such like objec- 
 tions against us : ' They say and do not,' Mat. sxiii. : 
 ' Physician, first heal thyself;' ' You that preach that 
 a man should keep the law, by breaking the law dis- 
 honoiu' you God "?' What then ? K we be not worse 
 in your opinions than the Scribes and Pharisees, 
 do you the part of dutiful auditors ; ' all that we shall 
 bid you observe, that observe and do.' So long as we 
 sit in the chair of Moses, and Christ, and his apostles, 
 and teach you no other doctrine and precepts than 
 they have deHvered, you need not fear us. If we live 
 well, it is our own, t mean not only our praise, but 
 our crown also : if wo teach well, it is yours ;* take 
 you the portion which belongcth unto you, and leave 
 the other to om-selvos. If we be careless of our own 
 sores, when your wounds are healed and bound up by 
 us ; if we, as unprofitable salt, good for nothing but 
 to be thrown to the dunghill, be thrown out indeed, 
 and you seasoned ; if we be cast into darkness, and 
 you illuminated by our light ; if, when we have preached 
 unto you, ourselves become reprobates ; if, when we 
 have shone like lamps and candles in the house, our- 
 selves go out in smoke ; if, when we have built you an 
 ark, ourselves be drowned ; if, when we have guided 
 you into the land of promise, ourselves die short of 
 it; if, when we have served in the temple of the Lord, 
 as that plate of silver and gold, ourselves be carried 
 captive into Babylon, or some stranger land ; if, when 
 we have sowed you fields, we reap them not ; and 
 
 ♦ Si bone vi.ierimus, nostrum est. Si bene dixerimus, 
 vcstrum. &o. 
 
 planted you vineyards, we drink not of the wine ; and 
 when we had preached salvation unto you, we taste 
 not of the fruits thereof : be it unto us as we have de- 
 seiTed. Be not you om- judges ; leave us to stand or 
 fall to our own Lord ; only, itse you the benefit of our 
 labour and travail as God hath appointed it. Jonah 
 (to apply my speech), when he rebelled, he rebelled 
 without measm-e, and when he slejit he slept without 
 measure ; his anger before and afterwards is without 
 measure, and his joy in this place as much without 
 measure. There was never any thing so imlike itself. 
 Nil fuit uiiqiiam 
 Sic impav sibi. 
 
 Behold (as the Gospel spake), ' more than Jonah is 
 here.' I mean, worse than Jonah is amongst us, if you 
 come to examine the lives of ministers. AVe trans- 
 gress the commandments of God more than even Jonah 
 did ; and we are more sleepy than he was, in the ha- 
 zard of the ship, that is, in the danger of Christ's 
 church ; and our passions of anger, eny\-, and joy, 
 bear us away with more ■\dolence. If any be offended 
 with us for such infirmity and frailty grafl'ed in our 
 flesh, let them ask the reason of the potter, ' Qnare 
 fccisll sic r Why hast thou done it thus, and not 
 rather appointed that the perfecting of om* salvation 
 should have boon WTOught by stronger instruments '? 
 
 But I turn to my matter in hand. How exceeding and 
 uumoasurable the joy of Jonah was, appearcth, (1.) by 
 doubling the afl'ection, latahatnr Imlilin, ' he rejoiced 
 with joy ;' (2.) by adding an attribute, nuujnd hctitid, 
 ' with gi'eat joy,' so it was joy, and joy, and gi-eat joy, 
 such as Isaiah describeth in the ninth of his prophecy, 
 ' According to the joy of haiTest, and as men rejoice 
 when they divide a spoil ;' or as one that ' cometh 
 with a pipe, to go unto the mount of the Lord,' 
 Isa. XXX. The nature of joy, as also of love and 
 liking to any thing, is to dilate and stretch out the 
 heart ; for when it taketh pleasure in the object, it 
 openeth itself, as a friend his bosom and amis, to em- 
 brace a friend ; so this, the chambers and rooms 
 thereof, to welcome that pleasure which is come unto 
 it. So doth Isaiah prophesy unto Jerusalem of the 
 joy that shall bo unto her for the coming of the Gen- 
 tiles: Isa. Ix., ' Thine heart shall bo astonished and en- 
 larged, because the multitude of the sea shnll be con- 
 verted unto thee,' &c. The apostle uscth the same 
 kind of speech to the Corinthians : 2 Cor. vi. ' ye 
 Corinthians, our mouth is open unto you, our heart is 
 made largo. You are not kept strait in us, but you are 
 kept strait in your own bowels. Now, for a recompcnce 
 (I speak as to my children), be you also enlarged.' 
 That is, as I have opened all the affections of my 
 soul to receive j-ou, so be you as willing and joyful 
 on the other side to receive me again. And after- 
 wards, 2 Cor. vii. ' Receive us ; for I have said that 
 _ye are in our hearts to die and to live together: I re- 
 joice greatly in you ; I am filled with comfort, and 
 am exceeding joyous in all our tribulation.' Such 
 
Ver. G.J 
 
 LECTURE XLVI. 
 
 295 
 
 is the force of joy, it so iDOSsessetli and replenisheth 
 the heart, that while a man liveth, he cannot forsalie 
 the thing which he is fond of. I leave it to physi- 
 cians to examine the cause ; but if histories deceive us 
 not, some have died through immoderate joy, as I'ia- 
 goras of Rhodes, in the arms of his three sons, re- 
 turning rictorers from the games of Olympus. The 
 highest degi'ce of joy is that which they call jubilee, 
 described by Gregory thus,* when an unspeakable 
 gladness is conceived in the mind, which neither can 
 be hid, nor by speech uttered ; and although it be not 
 expressed by any proprieties, yet it is signified by some 
 kinds of gestm-e ; or when the abundance of the heart 
 is not answered by sufficiency of words, f but he which 
 rejoiceth is neither able to rule his joy, nor to fulfil it. 
 I think the joy of Jonah was a jubilee ; he is so ra- 
 vished and overcome with the pleasure of the gourd, 
 that he knoweth not how to contain himself. Alas, a 
 gom-d was not worth thus much, if the rule be true, 
 that the measure of our joy should be according to 
 the news that is brought, ■ and the cheerfulness of the 
 mind no more than is the thing which we rejoice for. 
 If Jonah had received tidings of deliverance from the 
 belly of the fish, or of redemption ft-om eternal death; 
 if a prophet had sung unto him, as he did unto Sion, 
 ' Rejoice and be glad, Jonah, behold thy King cometh ;' 
 or angels had brought him word, as they did the 
 shepherds, ' Behold, we bring thee news of great joy 
 that shall be to all people ; ' what could Jonah more have 
 done ? For these, and such like, are the things wherein 
 our greatest joy should be placed, and there can be no 
 intemperancy of rejoicing where these are aflected. 
 So witnessed one apostle: Gal. vi., 'God forbid that I 
 should rejoice in anything but in the cross of Christ ; 
 and the other agreeth unto him: 1 Pet. i., ' In whom, 
 though you see him not, yet do you believe, and 
 rejoice with joy unspeakable and glorious.' For that 
 is the true and principal joy, which is conceived, not 
 from the creature but from the Creator,§ which, when 
 thou hast received, no man can take from thee ; where- 
 with, compare what pleasure soever, it is grief, all 
 sweet is sour unto it, and there is nothing that may 
 delight but seemeth troublesome and ofi'ensive. ' There 
 are many 'that say. Who will shew us any good ?' 
 They are answered by the prophet in one word, 'Lord, 
 lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon us ;' 
 open but our eyes that they may behold thy mercies, 
 ' For thou hast given me more joy of heart by the 
 light of thy face ' than worldlings liave felt ' when their 
 wheat and their wine hath most abounded.' Ps. iv. 
 And therefore ' blessed is the man whose strength is 
 
 * Ineffabile gautlinta raente concipifur, quod nee abscondi 
 potest, nee sermonibus aperiri, &c. — Lib. Moral, xiv. 
 
 t Cum cordis Isetitia oris efficacia non expletur, &c. — 
 Ibid, xxviii. 
 
 X Mensura Ijefitioe de magnitudine nuntii veniat. — Cas- 
 siod. Episl., lib. i. 
 
 g Illud est verum gaudium, quod non de creatura sed de 
 Creatore concipitur, &c. — Bern. 
 
 in thee, whose heart is in thy ways, who, going 
 through the vale of this world, make wells therein,' 
 Ps. Ixxxiv. ; that is, use such commodities as this 
 valley of tears aft'ordeth them to relieve their present 
 wants, but stay themselves upon the hope and expec- 
 tation of better things to come. The Scripture doth 
 everywhere call us to higher pleasures ; so doth Wis- 
 dom. Prov. viii., 'With me are durable riches;' the 
 riches of this world are variable. So doth Isaiah in 
 the 55th of his prophecy : ' Why lay you out your 
 money, and not for bread,' but bestow it upon acorns 
 and bran that cannot feed ? So doth the Son of God : 
 Mat. vi., ' Lay up treasures for yourselves in hea- 
 ven ;' and John vi., 'Labom- not for the meat which 
 perisheth, but for the meat which endnreth unto ever- 
 lasting life.' So likewise he advisoth the church of 
 Laodicaja : Rev. iii., ' I counsel thee to buy gold of 
 me, that thou mayest be made rich ; and white raiment, 
 that thou mayest be clothed, and that thy filthiness 
 appear not.' As for the mutable and transitory either 
 pleasures or profits of this life, which are ever coming 
 and going, it shall be good for a man so to love them, 
 as that he may find in his heart to leave them when 
 need requu-eth. Ames ta/iquaiii osunis. And, as Fa- 
 bricius told Pyrrhus, who one day tempted him with 
 gold, another day terrified him with an elephant which 
 he had never seen before : Yesterday I was not moved 
 with thy money, nor to-day with thy beast ; so, whe- 
 ther we were tempted with the gain, or terrified with 
 the loss of these worldly commodities, we do not 
 trouble ourselves either way, because they were given 
 us but for use, and not everlastingly to enjoy. Vtiniur 
 mundo, fruimur Di'o.* 'No man knoweth either love 
 or haired by all that is before him, for all things come 
 alike to all, and the same condition (I mean in these 
 outward things) is both to the just and the wicked,' 
 Eccles. ix. And, therefore, happy are we if therein 
 we can compose ourselves to that iudlfl'erent resolu- 
 tion that David had when he fled from Absalom, his 
 son, touching his coming or not coming back again to 
 Jerusalem to take his former comforts: ' Behold, here 
 am I ; let him do to me as it seemeth good in his 
 eyes,' 2 Sam. xv. 
 
 But God prepared a icor)ii wlten the mornhuj rose 
 the next da;/, and it smote tlie (jourd that it irithered, 
 ver. 7. The pleasure of Jonah is quite dashed ; he 
 little thought of so speedy an alteration, who seemed 
 to say in his heart not long before, I shall never be 
 grieved ; but ' the Lord hath given, and the Lord hath 
 taken away,' and he that hath power over the bless- 
 ings, hath power also over the plagues. Rev. vi. ; and 
 as ' every good gift cometh do\Mi from above,' so there 
 is ' not an evil in the city,' nor in the world, ' that the 
 Lord doth not.' And his providence is as mighty in 
 using the service of a worm as of leviathan. I need 
 not trouble you either with the author, whom I have 
 often mentioned before, or with his manner of work- 
 * August. 
 
296 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 ing, for he doth uot oulj' create all things, but he 
 ordereth and fittelh them in sucli sort, that they are 
 read}' at all times to work his will. There is nothing 
 sudden, or new, or unprovided unto him, but all his 
 creatures, both great and small, as if they watched 
 their turns, stand forth to give their attendance. The 
 instrument that God useth to afflict Jonah with is very 
 vile and contemptible. He that could have sent a vpind 
 to have turned the gom-d upside down, or lightning 
 to have blasted it, or an whole army of worms and 
 caterpillars to have devoured it, or withered it with 
 his word, as Christ did the fig-tree — ' Never bear leaves 
 henceforth', — prepareth a worm, and but one worm, to 
 esecute that business. The Scripture nowhere speak- 
 cth of worms, but with a kind of contempt, as of a base 
 and silly creature, as Ps. xsii. ' But I am a worm and 
 no man, the reproach of men, and the scorn of 
 people,' where the latter expoundeth the fonner; and 
 Isa. xh., ' Fear not, worm Jacob,' though thou art the 
 least amongst the nations, all the people of the earth 
 set themselves against thee. The Hebrews have an 
 opinion, that enchanters cannot shew their skill in 
 little things, if they be less, they say, than a barley- 
 corn, in iisis qiice sunt minora f/ranohordei, and therefore 
 the sorcerers of Egypt failed in producing lice. But 
 our God is as cunning and artificial in the smallest 
 creature of the world as in the greatest ; the organical 
 body of a little ant, is no less to be wondered at, than 
 the huge body of behemoth. And as Yulcau is com- 
 mended in the poet, for beating out chains and nets so 
 thin, that the eye could not see them, smaller than 
 the smallest thread, or than the web of the spider,* 
 so the smaller the creature is, the more is the work- 
 manship of God to be admired, both in the shaping 
 and in the using thereof. We all know that God hath 
 scourged the mightiest tyrant in the earth, as much 
 with n-orms, as if he had sent out whole armies against 
 him. As he plagued Sennacherib with an angel from 
 heaven, the Sodomites with fire and brimstone, Korah 
 and his conspirators with the opening of the earth, so 
 he destroyed Herod with worms, Antiochus with 
 worms, and against many other bloody persecutors of his 
 church used none other executioners. And bo it spoken 
 to the daunting of all flesh, to pull down the pride there- 
 of, that the day shall come when ' wonns shidl cover 
 them,' and they shall ' say to the worms, You are our 
 brethren and sisters,' and to the confusion of all the 
 wicked and damned of the earth, that ' their wonn dieth 
 not,' whereby, though an infinite tonnent be meant, 
 yet the gnawing of a poor worm is made to express it. 
 The time which God chose for smiting the gom-d, 
 was in the rising of the morning, a little before the 
 sun came forth of his chamber, when the shadow of 
 the gourd should most have pleasured him ; for in the 
 night season, the air was cold enough, and Jonah 
 
 ■-' Quce lumina fallere possiiit. 
 Non iffud opus tenuissimii vincuut 
 Stamina. 
 
 passed it with sleep, so that the covering of the boughs 
 was superfluous for that time. But tvhen the mornimj 
 arose, the rightest hour that the cross could have fallen 
 upon Jonah, the worm is sent. They say in Isaiah, 
 chap, v., ' Let the counsel of the Holy One come.' 
 What need they call for it. It shall not only come, but 
 come in a time which God hath appointed fittest for 
 their smart. All the judgments of the Lord are num- 
 ber and measure ; he reckoneth the horn-, and the 
 minute of the hour, when it is most convenient to in- 
 flict them. Sisera shall not die in an army, nor by 
 the hands of a man, nor any bow bent, nor sword 
 drawn against him ; the Ljrd hath resei"s-od him to a 
 tent, and to a tenpenny nail to be driven into his 
 head by the hands of a feeble woman. This \Yas the 
 time, and these the means, which the Lord made 
 choice of to punish him. Sennacherib shall not be 
 slain in the field, nor by the angel of the Lord which 
 smote a great part of his army, but at home, in his 
 own city, and in the temple of his idol, and by the 
 hands of his sons that sprang from his bowels. This 
 is the time, and these the means, that the Lord hath 
 kept him unto, to shew his justice. Therefore the 
 day of vengance and destruction is evermore called 
 ' the day of the Ijord ;' not that the rest are not his, 
 but these he hath specially marked out, and allotted 
 to exercise his judgment in. ' There is a time to plant, 
 and a time to root up that that hath been planted.' 
 Babj'lon is as a threshing-floor, saith the prophet, 
 ' the time of her threshing is come, yet a little 
 while and her harvest is come,' Jer. ii. So Babylon 
 (you see) hath a time for her threshing. Our Saviom-, 
 Rev. iii., speaketh of an ' hour of temptation which 
 shall come upon all the world, to tiy them that dwell 
 upon the earth.' And in the fourteenth of the same 
 book, the angel flieth iu the midst of heaven, ' saying 
 with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him, 
 for the Iwur of his judgment is come.' And another 
 angel 'cried unto him that sat upon the cloud. Thrust 
 iu thy sickle, and reap the harvest of the earth, for 
 the time is come to reap it.' God suffered the gourd 
 iu the night time, when Jonah had little benefit b}- it ; 
 but ' when the morning arose,' and when his soul most 
 desired the comfort thereof, then it withered. Rich 
 men shall have riches when they have least use of 
 them, but when the evil day cometh, they shall cast 
 them awaj' to the moles of the earth ; and epicures 
 shall have theii- pleasures for a time, but when they 
 shall say unto pleasures. Stand up and help us, they 
 shall fl)' away from them. 
 
 And as he chose the unhappiest time for the 
 plaguing of Jonah, so he made speed to plague him ; 
 for how short a time did Jonah enjoy the pleasure of 
 the gourd ! God prepared a worm the very next day 
 to smite it. Where are those greedy dogs "that never 
 have enough of pK'asnre ? who say, ' Come, wo will 
 bring wine, and we will fill ourselves with strong drink, 
 and to-morrow shall be this day, and mucTj moro 
 
Yer. 6.] 
 
 LECTURE XLVI. 
 
 ?97 
 
 abunclant, Isa. Ivi. What else is this drunkenness of 
 yours in wine and slrong diink, and fulfil of pleasiu'es, 
 but the merry madness of one hour, unius hone hilaris 
 iiisania, to be recompensed with sorrow for ever and 
 ever ; James iv., ' Go to, you that saj' To-day, and to- 
 morrow we will do this and that, and yet ye cannot tell 
 what shall be to-morrow ; for what is your life ?' or what 
 is your pleasm'e intended ? ' It is even a vapour that 
 appeareth for a little time, and afterward vanisheth 
 away :' Prov. xsvii. 1, ' Boast not thyself of to-mor- 
 row, for thou knowest not what a day may bring 
 forth!' Nescis quid serus vesper ferat, thou knowest 
 not what a change the next evening may make. Did 
 Elah the king of Israel think, when he was feasting 
 in his steward's house, 1 Kings svi., that his time had 
 been so short, and that a captain of his own should 
 have slain him ? Did the sons and daughters of Job, 
 when they were banqueting in their eldest brother's 
 house. Job. i., dream of the wind that came from the 
 wilderness, and smote the fom* corners of the house 
 that it overwhelmed them '? Did Babylon, which was 
 called ' tender and delicate, and the lady of kingdoms,' 
 which assumed to herself, ' I am, and there is none 
 else ; I shall not sit a widow, nor know the loss of 
 children,' Isaiah xlvii. ; she that trusted in her wicked- 
 ness, and said, None seeth me ;' did she imagine how 
 near they wei'e that came with contrary news, advenit 
 finis tuHS, 'Thine end is come"? Jer. li. Dumah 
 calleth to the prophet in scorn, Isa. xsi., ' Watch- 
 man, what is in the night ? watchman, what is in the 
 night ? The watchman answereth, The morning 
 cometh and also the night ;' that is, thou hast had a 
 time of light, and delights, thou shalt also have a 
 time of darkness. Thus the Edomites and epicures 
 of our days mock then- prophets and watchmen. You 
 speak of a night, ye watchmen, and of a day of judg- 
 ment ; but when cometh that night ? or ' where is 
 the promise of his coming ?' We tell you again, 
 ' The morning cometh, and also the night.' ' If ye 
 will ask, ask,' to amendment of life, ask not to scoff us 
 and to deceive yourselves ; ' inquire, return, and come ;' 
 that is, continue not still in your former abominations. 
 The time is verv' short, it is but mane and respere, which 
 is the measure of one day. ' Yet a very little while, and 
 he that cometh, cometh.' ' Sudden destruction shall 
 come upon the wicked, as fear upon a woman that 
 travaileth with child,' 1 Thes. v. ' How suddenly 
 are they destroyed, perish, and come to a fearful end,' 
 Psa. Ixxiii. 
 
 The service that God put the worm unto, was to 
 smite the gourd ; as a messenger sent from heaven, like 
 his angel to Nebuchadnezzar's tree, with this commis- 
 sion, ' Hew down the tree.' The little worm with his 
 teeth, or rather no teeth, but such feeble grinders as 
 nature had armed it with, smiteth the gourd, and 
 giveth it a mortal stroke, as if a workman had come 
 of purjjose to lay an axe to the root of it. Consider, 
 I beseech you, the miraculous working of God, as in 
 
 the planting of this creature, so in the overthrow of it. 
 It dieth not with age, or continuance of time, as 
 annosa quercus, the long lasting oak, or for lack of 
 soil and mould to the root, or because the spouts of 
 the air restrained their dew fi'om it ; but a little and 
 base messenger, with weapons of no power, but that it 
 was strengthened by the will and might of God, giveth 
 it a blow, and taketh the vegetation and hfe from it. 
 
 For the eflect of all is, that it withered. So the 
 author of all is Cod ; the readiness of his working, 
 preparation, as of one never unstored ; the minister, 
 a worm ; the time, tlie mornimj; the speed, the next, 
 day ; the work, smilini/ the gourd ; the eftect, wither- 
 ing. Thus is the life of man tempered, as the con- 
 dition of Jonah was without the walls of Nineveh ; like 
 a garment jiieced together of old and new cloth, so 
 this of sour and sweet, and there are many and sore 
 rents in it. Sometimes pleasure assuage th pain, but 
 most commonly pain killeih pleasure. If our days 
 were distinguished, the good with white, the evil with 
 black stones, at the end of om- hves we should find 
 more black than white. Take a pattern from Jonah, 
 and see how the blessing and scourges of God kiss 
 one the other, in this his banishment, and rather the 
 scourges exceed. He buildeth a tabernacle, but it 
 falleth ; is provided of a gourd, but it withereth. And 
 instead of that little momentary joy which he took 
 therein, cometh a worm, and the sun, and a fervent 
 wind, and fainting in his body, and in his mind most 
 intolerable languishment. Behold this image of 
 alteration in the state of Jonah, especially this of the 
 gourd, and tell me if all the pleasures of our life are 
 not fitly exemplified by it. The pleasure in the days 
 of Noah, their eating, drinking, marrying, and giving 
 in marriage. Mat. sxiv., what was it but a gourd? 
 and came there not a worm from God that smote it, 
 a ' flood that took them all away''? The mirth of the 
 Philistines, Judges the sixteenth, when Samson was 
 their laughing-stock, and must be called in to make 
 them pastime, was it more than a gourd, wherewith 
 their hearts were merry for a while and they exceed- 
 ingly rejoiced ? And how quickly came a worm that 
 smote it, when the pillars of the house were shaken, 
 and fell upon the princes and all the people that were 
 therein ! The ' peaceable days ' of the wicked. Job 
 the one and twentieth, their freedom from the rod of 
 God, their dancing to the tabret and harp, all is but 
 a gourd ; ' in an instant of time they go down to hell :' 
 there is the worm that smiteth it ; but iu the four and 
 twentieth of Job, ' they shall be broken like a tree ; ' 
 they come nearer to the smiting of the gourd here 
 spoken of ; and in the fifteenth before, ' their branches 
 shall not be gi-een, but they shall be cut ofl' before 
 their day. God shall destroy them as the vine her 
 sour grape, and shall cast them off as the olive doth 
 her flower :' there are the right gourds and the worms 
 expressed. The young man hath his goui'd to rejoice 
 in, Eccles. xi., the days of his youth, the cheerfulness 
 
298 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 of bis heart, the hists of his own eyes ; but let him 
 remember the worm of judgment that shall smite that 
 gourd. The rich mau hath his gourd, Luke xvi., 
 ' purple and fine linen, and delicious fare every day,' 
 and he rejoiceth unmeasurably in this gourd, for he 
 knoweth not what the grief of Lazarus meaneth ; but 
 he hath a worm that smiteth his gourd : bis pleasure 
 withereth with himself, he dieth, and lieth in the 
 grave, and crieth in hell for one di'op of rain to 
 cherish his decayed gourd ; but he is answered by 
 Abraham, o.'iTsXajSi; to, dyaid aov, Thou hadst thy 
 gourd in thy hfetime ; now it is dead, and can never 
 be revived. The goodly tabernacle of king Ahasucrus, 
 Esther i., in the ' garden of his palace, under an 
 hanging of white, green, and blue cloths, fastened 
 ■with cords of silk and purple, in silver rings and 
 pillars of marble, the beds of gold and silver, upon a 
 pavement of porphjTV, and alabaster, and blue colour,' 
 was but a tabernacle like the tabernacle of Jouah. 
 His 'hundred and seven and twenty provinces,' and 
 his ' princes and captains thereof;' his • throne in the 
 palace of Shushan ;' his feasting according to the 
 powcrof a king, and to shew the glory of his kingdom ; ' 
 his ' abundance of royal wine, and changes of vessels 
 of gold, aud the beauty of Vashti his queen :' all these 
 were but a gom-d, aud had their worm to consume 
 them. The treasures of Hezekiah, ' his silver, and 
 gold, and spices, and precious ointment, and armoury, 
 and all the store of his house which he and his 
 fathers had laid up,' Isa. xxxix. ; the soldiers of David, 
 a million and half of fighting men, 1 Chrou. xxi. ; 
 Bclshazzar his ' thousand princes, wives, and con- 
 cubines ;' Abasuerus his ' hundred and seven and 
 twenty provinces,' &c. : oh what glorious shadows do 
 they cast over the heads of men, with their hundreds, 
 and thous.ands, and millions of branches to give com- 
 fort unto them ! how willingly do they say within 
 themselves, under the covert of these gourds. We will 
 sit and be at rest ; but they forget the worm, some 
 messenger from the Lord, either sickness, or bauds, 
 or death, to smite these gourds : 
 
 M<.(lio do foute loporum, 
 Snrgit aiiiiiri aliquid. 
 
 From the fullest fountain of worldly joys floweth 
 some bitterness. Adam wanted not a serpent in 
 the garden of God, nor Jonah a worm on the east 
 side of the city, where ho rathest* delighted. Hearken 
 unto it, ye that are ' bond-slaves to the sundry 
 pleasures ' of tliis world, AouXsuovrEj tjSovarc, Titus iii., 
 you that suffer the good seed of admonition and 
 instruction to bo ' choked with these thorns, the 
 pleasures of this life,' Luke viii., for this is one of 
 the thorns there spoken against ; you who esteem ' to 
 bo called the sons of Pharaoh's daughter,' to bo the 
 dearlings of the pleasure of Lgypt, and bo set upon 
 the knees of the Delilah of this world, and to ' cnjov 
 * Tliiit is, ' especially,' tlio superlative of rather. — Ed. 
 
 the rejoicing of sin for a season,' ArroXauai; diia^rlus 
 <!r^6(!-/ia:>o; ; or rather as the apostle, in the spirit of 
 prophecy, long since noted you, you that are (piy.r,oovoi 
 /m'/J.o'j n (piXljH-oi, ' lovers of pleasure, more than of 
 God,' 2 Tim. iii., or if yon love it no more than that 
 it maketh you to forget God, ' in whose presence is 
 the fulness of joy, and at his right baud pleasure for 
 evermore, Ps. xvi. ; and who ' giveth us drink out of 
 a whole river of pjeasm-es,' Ps. xxxvi. ; contemn these 
 transitory gourds, and reserve yourselves for a better 
 building in heaven, where is neither sun nor wind to 
 beat upon j'our heads, nor worm to alter your happi- 
 ness ; where your joy shall ever be present, yet can 
 you not be tilled, rather you shall be filled, but cannot 
 be satisfied. Or if I say that you cannot be satisfied, 
 then there is hunger; or that you may, then there is 
 loathing. I know not what to say ; Dais hahet quod 
 c.rliiheat* God hath somewhat both to reveal aud to 
 bestow upon you, which I know not ; but ibi heata 
 vitii in fonte, there is blessedness at the head of the 
 spring, not in cisterns or brooks ; that I am sure of. 
 Were you able to drink up the pleasures of the world 
 in as plentiful manner as Cleopatra drank the riches 
 (the value of fifiy thousand pound at a draught), 
 yet remember that it is but a draught, and quickly 
 down the throat. The length of the throat (saith 
 Bernard) is but two or three inches at the most ; or, 
 if it were as long as a crane's neck, which Philoxenus 
 the epicure wished, that the sweetness of his meats 
 and drinks might the longer abide with him, the 
 matter were not much. But when they are drunk 
 and digested, then what bocometh of them, more than 
 of your meats and di'inks, to be ' cast out into the 
 draught,' so these to perish with their use, and not 
 without shame and sorrow of heart to be thrown away 
 as unhappy superfluities ? Wlioreas the pleasures of 
 eternity, before the face of God, deserve that com- 
 mendation which Boaz gave to Ruth (and with his 
 words we may bless it), ' Blessed art thou, my 
 daughter, for thou hast showed me more goodness in 
 the latter end than at the beginning,' Ruth iii. 
 
 To conclude ; the blessedest tree is ' in the midst of 
 the paradise of God,' neither on the east nor on the 
 west side of Nineveh, nor any other city of the world. 
 And the leaves of the tree are not only for shadow, as 
 these of the gourd, but ' to heal the nations 'nith,' 
 Rev. xxii. and it hath both leaves and fruits to 
 satisfy our hunger, and ' twelve manner of fruits every 
 month brought forth,' to satisfj- our pleasure; audit 
 growetli by ' a river side, clear as crystal, proceeding 
 out of the throne of God,' that it cannot possibly 
 wither. For it let us keep our better appetites ; and 
 let us beseech him who hath planted it with his own 
 right hand, that wo may live to taste how wholesome 
 and pleasant that tree is. 
 
 • August, homil. iii. in Joa. 
 
Ver. 8.J 
 
 LECTURE XLVII. 
 
 299 
 
 LECTURE XLVII. 
 
 And u-licn the sun did arise, God also prepared aferrent cast tcind ; and the sun beat upon the licad of Junah, dc, 
 
 —Jonah IV. 8. 
 
 ri'^HE temporal'}' joy which Jonah eutertained for tho 
 J_ gourd is as quite forgotten as if it had never been ; 
 and buried under a heap of succeeding griefs, as the 
 fruitful years, Gen. xli., were buried under the years 
 of famine ; for so said Joseph, ' Tho famine shull be 
 so great, that the years of plenty shall not be thought 
 upon.' It followeth in the line of those afflictions 
 which God stretched out upon the head of Jonah, 
 that ' when the sun did arise, God prepared also a 
 fervent east wind,' &c. For it did not suffice him to 
 have sent a worm which smote the gourd, but he ad- 
 joineth new corrosives and calamities to afflict the 
 soul of Jonah. For as his blessings, when he ' watcheth 
 to do us good ' (as the prophet speaketh), the foot of the 
 one shall even be treading upon the heel of the other ; 
 so also in his chastisements and corrections, he doth 
 not desist to inflict them lill he have left an inward 
 sense in those who are his patients. Thus he dealt 
 in the scourging of Job, though a servant dearly 
 beloved, as appeareth by his complaints : Job vii., 
 ' How long will it be ere thou depart from me ? thou 
 wilt not let me alone while I may swallow my spittle.' 
 Again, chap, x., ' Thou reuewest thy witnesses;' that 
 is, thy plagues, witnesses of thy displeasure against 
 me,' vices et crercilus, ' changes and armies of sorrow 
 are against me.' Surel}- God is wiser in handling our 
 sins than any physician in dealing with sicknesses ; 
 therefore he best knoweth both what medicine is fittest, 
 and how long to be applied. 
 
 1. TJie sun ariscth, as a giant refreshed with wine 
 to run his race, or rather as an enemy "prepared to 
 the battle, the only enemy which Jonah had cause to 
 fear, his fortress and castle of boughs being taken 
 from him. 2. After the sun, a uind ; and that fight- 
 ing under the banner of the sun, and confederate with 
 him, an east uind ; and for the quality of it, « fervent 
 cast ivind. 3. The sun is not sent to shine, and to 
 cast forth his beams, but to heat. 4. Not any inferior 
 part, but that which was highest and next to heaven, 
 the head of Jonah. 5. The effects that follow all 
 these are, (1.) his faint in;/ in his body; (2.) in his 
 soul, ivishiny to die ; (3.) professing it with his tongue, 
 it is letter for me to die tlutn to live. 
 
 1. And when the sun did arise. Tho arising of the 
 sun noteth no more than the opportunity of time 
 which God taketh to punish Jonah. He beginnoth 
 with the beginning of the day; the shadows of the 
 night are gone, the fresh dews of the morning soon 
 dispersed, and the sun at his first discovery hath a 
 charge from God to assault the head of Jonah : no 
 part of the day, and as it seemeth, not the coolness 
 and temperature of the morning, are friendly unto 
 
 him. He rather wished in his heart, as Job did, 
 chap, iii., ' Let the day be darkness still; and let not 
 God regard it from above, nor the light shine upon it. 
 But let darkness and clouds and the shadow of death 
 stain it ;' that is, let there be an everlasting night, 
 rather than the beams of tho sun should come forth to 
 do me this violence ; and as the sun did once go back 
 in the days of Hozekiah upon the dial of Ahaz, 
 2 Kings XX., so it would have rejoiced him if it had 
 gone back again to the north, or stood immoveable in 
 a place, that the earth might have been as a pillar be- 
 tween him and the heat thereof. 
 
 2. God prepared also a fervent east wind. I should 
 but roll the same stone once again and too often, to 
 speak of the author of this whole business, and his 
 speedy expedition therein, which I have told you before 
 is noted in the word of preparation, whose mighty and 
 overspreading providence is as the soul of the world, as 
 inward and familiar to all the actions there, in gre.at and 
 small, as the spirit to our reins ; and better may a body 
 live without breath, than any counsel or work under 
 heaven proceed without it. But I leave those repeti- 
 tions. The sun and tho wind, we see, rise together, 
 and set themselves against Jonah ' as the two smok- 
 ing fire brands,' Isa. vii., Kezin and Pekah, against 
 Jerusalem, combining and binding themselves not to 
 give over till they have both done their part in the 
 vexing of the prophet. 
 
 3. The wind here mentioned is described by two 
 attributes : the one of the quarter or coast from 
 whence it blew, an east wind ; the other of the quality 
 which it had, a fervent east u-ind. The cardinal and prin- 
 cipal winds, as appeareth both in many places of the 
 Scripture and in foreign authors,* are but four, breath- 
 ing from the four quarters or divisons of heaven : as 
 in the 37th of Ezckiel, ' Come from the four winds, 
 breath ;' and Mat. xxiv., ' God shall gather his 
 elect from the four winds.' Afterwards they added 
 four more, which they call collateral or side winds, 
 subordinate to the principal, and thence proceeded to 
 the number of twelve. In these days we distinguish 
 thirty-two ; between every two cardinal winds seven 
 inferior. We may read. Acts x.\vii., that Paul was 
 very skilful of the sea-card used in those days ; for, 
 describing his voyage to Rome, he maketh mention 
 not only of east, and west, and south, but of south- 
 west and by west, and of north-west and by west, as 
 the western wind blew either nearer or further ofl'. 
 But not to trouble you with these things, the wind 
 that is here spoken of some take to bo Enrus, or Vul- 
 turnus, which is the south-east and by east, and ful- 
 
 ^ Plhiy. 
 
300 
 
 KING OX JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 loweth the sun in his winter rising ; others to be the 
 principal and high east wind, followiug the sun when 
 he riseth in the equinoxial, Ac7?iX(wr?;;, subsohiiiiis, 
 Now, the nature of an east wind in an_y point thereof 
 is to be hot and dr_y, and for the most part a clearer 
 of the air, seieiialor ; but this of all the rest being so 
 serviceable to the sun, going forth so right with it, and 
 walking in the same path which the sun walketh in, 
 must needs be an hotter wind than if it hr.d crossed or 
 sided the sun in any way. 
 
 4. Touching the quality or the effect which it 
 wrought, it is called a fervent east uiiid. Some turn it 
 vehcmcnl, not for the sound and noise that it maketh, 
 but for the excessive heat ; for no doubt it is distin- 
 guished from CiEcias, north-oast and by east, which is 
 a more sounding and bkisteriug wind, and not so tit 
 for the purpose of God in this place. Of that ye have 
 mention, Exod. sir., where it is said that ' the Lord 
 made the sea run back with a strong east wind all the 
 night, and made it dry land.' Some translate it 
 silent and quiet, to put a diflerence betwixt this and 
 the former east wind, albeit others give the reason, 
 because it maketh men silent and deaf with the sound 
 that it hath, silenles et siirdos homines facit ohslirpcndo ; 
 others, because it maketh the rest of the winds silent 
 and quiet when itself bloweth, silere facit reliquos ten- 
 tos a coiispectu suo. Howsoever they vary otherwise, 
 they all agree in the heat, for it is a gentle and soft 
 wind, which, when the air is inflamed by the sun, is 
 so far from correcting the extremity thereof, that it 
 rather helpeth it forward, and becometh as a waggon 
 to carry the beams of the sun forth right. It is mani- 
 fest by many places of Scripture, that it is an eastern 
 wind, which burneth with his heat, not only the fruits 
 but the people of the earth : the seven thin ears of 
 corn, Gen xli., were ' burnt with an east wind ;' so 
 are the 'fruits withered,' Ezek. xix. ; so is the ' foun- 
 tain dried up,' Hosea xiii. The vulgar edition doth 
 evermore translate it, iirentem rentuin, by the name of 
 a hurninfi xcind, and wheresoever it is mentioned in 
 the book of God, the property of it is to exsiccate and 
 dry up. Columella writeth, that at some time of the 
 year, and especially in the dog-days, men are so 
 parched with the east wind, that unless they shade 
 themselves under vines, it burneth them like tlie reek- 
 ing of flames of fire* 
 
 C. I have now shcwid you both the nature and the 
 quarter of this wind, that, albeit it were a wind, yet you 
 may know it was not prepared to refrigerate but to 
 aiilict the head of Jonah. When the sun and the 
 wind are up, what do they ? The sun, not without 
 the help of the wind, which was in manner of a sling 
 or other instrument to cast tlie beams of the sun more 
 violently upon them, although created for another end, 
 ' to govern the day, and to separate it from the night, 
 and to give light in the cartli,' Gen. i., yet here re- 
 ceiveth a new commaudmeut, and is sent to beat, all 
 * Vento uruntur velut liulitu Uummoo. 
 
 other inferior parts omitted, even the head of Juuuli, 
 wherein is the government of the whole creature, the 
 seat of the mind, the top of God's workmanship, from 
 whence the senses and nerves take their begin- 
 ning.* In this assault of the principal part, the dan- 
 ger was no less to the body of Jonah than if an enemy 
 had besieged the capitol of Kome, or the mount 
 Sion and Anthony's Tower in Jerusalem. 
 
 C. But we shall the better conceive the vexation of 
 Jonah, if we join the efifects which these two enemies 
 drave him into. (1.) It is said he fainted. I marvel 
 not, for the force of heat is intolerable when the plea- 
 sure of God is to use that rod ; so he telleth them, 
 Amos iv., percu-ssi ^-os uredine, ' I have smitten you 
 with blasting or burning, and you returned not.' On 
 the other side, it is numbered amongst the blessings of 
 God which Christ shall bring unto his people : Isa. 
 xlix., ' They shall not be hungry, neither shall they 
 thirst, neither shall the heat smite them, nor the sun,' 
 which is spoken, I grant, by translation; but that 
 from whence is is transferred in the natural sense, 
 must needs be very commodious, because it is applied 
 to the highest mercies. So, likewise, in the 3d of 
 Acts, the state of everlasting life is called ' The times 
 of refreshing or respiration ;' and Hag. ii., xai^oi ava- 
 •vJ/igsMj. (2.) He xiislied in Iiis Iteait to die. My text 
 saith not so in terms, though in effect; but he desired 
 his soul, or he made petition and suit to his soul to 
 die, expetiril aniiitam suain mori; that is, to relinquish 
 and give over his body, or ho desired death to his 
 soul, jiiiirit aninuc smr mortem ; as a man forlorn and 
 forsaken, having no friend to make his moan unto, 
 he uttereth his grief to his private spirit, speaking 
 thereunto, (dloquutus est animam siiam, that if it were 
 possible, some remedy might be had. (3.) Though 
 the ear of jealousy, which heareth all things, heard 
 the wishes and desires of his heart, yet he is not con- 
 tent with secret rebellion, unless his tongue also pro- 
 claim it, for he saitli, it is better for uie to die than to 
 lire. 1 shewed the madness of Jonah before in this 
 very wish ; it was not better for Jonah to die than to 
 live, nor for any other in his case ; a millstone about 
 their necks, to have drowned them in the bottom of 
 the sea, had been less unhappiness. When they die, 
 let them pray to the Lord of life to close up their eyes, 
 and to take them to his mercy in peace ; let them agree 
 with their adversary in the way, much more be at 
 one with God, that neitlier their hearts nor tongues 
 murmur at his judgments. Death (I confess) is an 
 advantage to some men ; but such as with an obsti- 
 nate heart, and sinews in their forehead, strive against 
 the Lord their Maker, and go to law with one 
 mightier than themselves, not caring to make an end in 
 time of the controversies between them, their death is 
 a death indeed, and little profit or ease to bo found 
 
 • In quo rcginem totiu3 aiiimalia. Ubi seJes mentis. 
 Totius divini operis quiisi culmen. — Lactant. de opific. Dei. 
 Cajml, ipioJ liiuc capiant iuitium scusua et nervi. — Varro^ 
 
Ver. 8.] 
 
 LECTURE XLVII. 
 
 ?01 
 
 in it. The purpose of this verse in hand, was none 
 other than to set forth unto us the afflictions of Jonah, 
 and undoubtedly they are very great. For as Xaomi 
 answered her people in the first of Ruth, when thoy 
 ■asked, ' Is not this Naomi '? Call me not Naomi 
 (that is, beautiful or pleasant), but call me Marah, for 
 the Almighty hath given me much bitterness. I went 
 out full, and the Lord hath caused me to return 
 empty ; why, then, call ye me Naomi, seeing the Lord 
 hath humbled me, and the Almighty hath brouglit me 
 to adversity ?' So Jouah might have answered to 
 those that had asked. Is not this Jonah ? Call me not 
 -Jonah (a dove), but call me a pelican or owl in the 
 •desert ; I was full of pleasure and amenitj-, and my 
 heart replenished with exceeding joy, but the Lord 
 .hath emptied me. Many things there are in our lives 
 for which we may change our names (as Naomi did), 
 .from beauty or pleasure to bitterness. But if we re- 
 jnember withal, that it is the work of the Lord to 
 -humble us, and the hand of the Almighty that bringeth 
 ■us to adversity, that one cogitation will suffice to teach 
 us patience. For to whom do we rather owe the 
 •quietness and subjection of our spirits, than unto him, 
 who, as Theodoret somewhere excellently spake, 
 both giveth his benefits unto us, to teach us how 
 ■easily he can bestow them, and taketh them away, 
 that we may know how little we deserve them. Thus 
 have the children of God evermore begun their con- 
 sultations in their days of temptation, and as it were 
 beckoned to themselves for silence, Dominus est, ' it 
 is the Lord,' take heed of repining at his judgments ; 
 it is not mine enemy, for then I would have hid my- 
 self ; it is not the son of man, for then I would have 
 resisted him ; it is not any creature of God, I would 
 then have devised some means to redress my gi'iof ; 
 it is the Lord himself, who hath more right to my soul 
 than that he may be contraried ; for both he hath 
 been beneficial unto mo heretofore, and may again 
 hereafter. Patience was the shield wherewith that 
 notable achiever of the victories of God* repelled all 
 those venomous darts, which, either in the death of his 
 children, or in the loss of his substance, or in the 
 runnings and sores of his body, or in the cursed per- 
 suasions of his wife, miserable comforts of his friends, 
 malicious and importunate accusations of Satan, were 
 thrown against him. Oh, what a glorious banner set 
 he up against the enemy of God and man, f when, for 
 every calamity that was cast upon him, there came 
 nothing from his mouth, but ' Thanks be to God.' 
 Satan expected that he should have accursed God ; 
 and hisvnfe, another Satan in his bosom, so persuaded 
 him ; but the witness is true, which is there given, 
 noil peccavlt lahiis siiis, ' He ofl'endcd not with his lips.' 
 I conclude, therelbre, with Tertullian, Totuiii licet 
 seciihim pereat, clwn patieiitiam hicrifnciain, I care not 
 
 * lUe operarius victoriarum Dei. — TiH I 
 t quale vexillum tulit, &c. — Terlul. 
 
 though all the world perish unto me, so I may gain 
 patience. 
 
 And God said to Jonah, Doeat thou irell to he onqnj 
 for the fjourd ?' &c., ver. 9. The gourd prepared by 
 God had a double use : the one natural and open, to 
 cast a shadow over the head of Jonah ; the other, 
 typical and secret, to demonstrate the iniquity of his 
 judgment, which use we are now coming unto. In 
 this actual reprehension, which God is framing against 
 him, there were many antecedents (I told you) which 
 made the way thereunto, all which we have already 
 examined. Now we are descended to that end where- 
 unto God disposed them. 
 
 The words here spoken by God, DoeU thou irell to 
 he (inrfii/ / are the S'lme which were used in the former 
 insimulation ; and the same provocation of the words, 
 to wit, the anger of Jonah. Who woidd not have 
 thought but one reprehension might have served one 
 kind of sin ? But so is sin to the soul of man, in 
 some part of comparison, as Jacob was unto Esau, 
 Gen. xsvii., of whom Esau complained, 'Was he not 
 rightly called Jacob ? For he hath deceived me these 
 two times : first, he took my birthright from me ; and 
 lo, now he hath taken my blessing.' And surely sin 
 will supplant us twice, and ton times together, unless 
 God preserve us. Jonah oifendeth once more in the 
 same perturbation, and the Lord reproveth him once 
 more in the same form of reprehension. AVhat 
 else shall I say hereof, but as Joseph said to Pharaoh 
 touching his two dreams, the one of the kine, 
 the other of the ears of corn: Gen. xli., 'Both 
 Pharoah's dreams are one ; therefore, the dream is 
 doubled to Pharoah the second time, because the 
 thing is established by God, and God hasteth to per- 
 form it' ? So both God's reprehensions are one, and 
 therefore is the reprehension doubled unto Jonah the 
 second time, that Jonah might beware to ofi'end in the 
 like 'transgression. Nehemiah told the merchants 
 that abode about the walls of the city, ' Why do you 
 stay here all night ? Si itenini feeeriti^, injiciam in vos 
 manus ; if j-ou will do it again, I shall lay hands upon 
 you,' Neb. xiii. It is marvel that God laid not hands 
 upon Jonah, nor at leastwise corrected him with some 
 sharper castigation, whom he had taken and warned 
 before for the same offence. 
 
 To that which heretofore I have said of reprehen- 
 sion, I will add no more than the rule and practice of 
 Bernard, as I find it mentioned in his life. His rule 
 of observation is this : * Where there resoundeth on 
 both sides between the reprover and him that is re- 
 proved, modesty and mildness of speech, it is a sweet 
 conference ; where it is held on the one side only, it 
 is profitable ; where both parts lay it aside, it is per- 
 nicious ; but where there is hardness and bitterness 
 from them both, jiin/ium est, non correetio, nee disci- 
 
 * Ulii vesonat utrimqiie modistin. dulce est cilliiquinni ; 
 ubi vel ex parte altera, utile ; ubi ex neutril, pcniicio- 
 sum ; x;bi bine inde durifia sonat, jurgium, &c. 
 
302 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 plina, sed ri.rn, it is not correction and instruction, but 
 chiding and brawling ; and (to adjoin the words of 
 Anselm) liiiic iioii Veritas rjiuiritui; sed aniniositas fati- 
 (jatur, then is not the truth sought for, but men exer- 
 cise and weary their stout hearts. Therefore, the 
 manner of St Bernard, because he would be sure to 
 retain this modesty on the one side, w\as, to be very 
 urgent upon him that yielded, and as yielding another 
 time to him that resisted.* Albeit Jonah behaved 
 himself very unmodestly and undutifuUy towards God, 
 yet God is otherwise afleoted towards Jonah ; and 
 rather than the strife between them shall vanish with- 
 out profit, shcweth more mildness than Jonah bad 
 deserved. His kindness appeareth in three things : 
 1, in reproving and repressing his rage ; for which 
 cause David blessed Abigail : 1 Sam. xsv., ' Blessed 
 be the Lord God of Israel, which sent thee this day 
 to meet me, and blessed be thy counsel, and blessed 
 be thou, which hast kept me this day from coming to 
 shed blood.' 2. In reproving him twice for one 
 thing, who, with one angry word of his lips, could 
 so have abated his passion at the first, that there 
 should have been no place for a second ; as Abishai 
 spake to David of smiting Saul: 1 Sam. xxvi., 'Let 
 me smite him once to the earth with a spear, and I 
 will not smite him again.' 3. In reproving him so 
 friendly. I am sure, servants with their fellow-ser- 
 vants have dealt otherwise. John Baptist with the 
 Pharisees, Peter with Ananias and Sapphira and with 
 Simon Magus, Paul with Elymas and Ananias the 
 high priest, Stephen with the rulers of the Jews, ' 
 ye hard necks, and uncircumcised hearts ;' yet God 
 the creator of all things, with his sinful creature, or 
 more properly, as David termed himself before Saul, 
 ' with a dead fly,' demeaneth himself with favourable 
 speeches. ' Doest thou well to be angry for a gourd ?' 
 The interrogation ariseth by degrees, and accuseth 
 Jonah in many oversights. 1. Art thou Mii/n/, Jonah ? 
 Thou shouldst rather humble thyself, acknowledge 
 thine ignorance and weakness, presume the judgments 
 of thy judge to be righteous ; thou shouldst rather 
 bless, and pray, and give thanks (for Ibis is the man- 
 ner of prophets), and art thou angry ? "What is 
 anger, but a desire of revenge for contempt or wrong 
 done ? t And whom desirest thou to be revenged of ? 
 The worm, or the sun, or God that hath sent them ? 
 2. Art thou not only angry, but art thou very aiu/ri/ ? 
 For if irell, bene, do note the measure of his anger, 
 the exprobation is the greater, because passions oflend 
 not commonly, but in excesses and extremities ; or if 
 the quality, /'ofs( thou tcell atid justly to be aminj ? 
 Wilt thou defend and patronage thy wrath ? it is 
 then a greater fault than the former. 3. And art 
 thou anriry for a fjoiird .' so small a matter. Par 
 be such corruption from the servant of Christ, that 
 
 * Cedent! insistere, cedcro rcsistenti. 
 t Appctitus ultionis propter contempt'uncm. — Arisl. ct 
 Aquin. 
 
 his patience, prepared for greater things, should fall 
 away in trifles. * Thou hast lost but a poor gourd, a 
 little plant of the earth ; what if thou hadst lost a 
 vineyard full of trees, as Naboth did, of far greater 
 value than a gourd '? or thy life, more dear than a 
 vineyard ? What if thine one and only sheep, as 
 Uriah did, the wife of thy bosom ? or thy life, more 
 precious than thj' wife ? ' Art thou angry for a 
 gourd '?' 
 
 Jonah answered, I do well to be angry unto the death. 
 Thou hadst done better if thou hadst held thy peace, 
 if (as before) thou hadst passed the demand of God 
 without answer. Was Balaam fit to speak unto an 
 angel of the Lord, being so blinded and overcast with 
 the clouds of wrath, that he saw not so much as the 
 dumb ass under him ? Is Jonah fit to speak unto the 
 Lord himself ? Bather as Plato said to his servant, 
 I would have killed thee, but that I am angry ; so 
 he should have said unto the Lord : I would have an- 
 swered thee, but that my passions have set me besides 
 myself. He that knoweth not his faults, will never 
 be amended, t There is little hope that the speech of 
 God can do good upon Jonah, who rather becometh 
 a patron of his sin, than a suitor for pardon. 
 
 The answer justly foUoweth the steps of the interro- 
 gation, and indeed over-runneth it. ' Art thou angry ? ' 
 ' I am angry ; ' I dissemble not, I blush not to confess 
 it ; though I concealed it before at thy first asking, yet 
 now be it known unto thee, I am angry. ' Art thou 
 very angr}- ? ' Yea, I put not a counterfeit person 
 upon me ; I am on fire with my wrath ; I burn like 
 resin or pitch that cannot be quenched. ' Dost thou 
 well to be angry '? ' I do well to be angiy. It doth 
 not repent mo, and more than before thou over hast 
 demanded : ' I do well to be angry unto death.' Thus 
 an evil cause is made much worse by evil handling ; 
 and the defence of the fault waxeth more unpardon- 
 able than the fault itself. J Prov. ix., 'Give admoni- 
 tion to the wise, and he will be the wiser ; teach a 
 righteous man, and he will increase in learning ; but 
 he that roproveth a scorner, purchaseth unto himself 
 shame' ; and he that rebukcth an angry man hcapeth 
 more coals of anger upon him. To admonish the fro- 
 ward is to set goads to one that is mad cnougli alreadj', 
 and to pour oil into the chimney. § Nothing under- 
 taken with impatience can bo done without violence ; 
 and whatsoever is violently done, either miscarrieth, 
 or falleth, or flieth headlong away.|| 
 
 Hitherto I have deferred to handle a question which 
 
 * Absit a servo Cliristi tale iuquinamentum, ut patieniia, 
 majoribus preparata, in frivolis cxcidat. — Tertul. 
 
 t Qui peccare se nescit, corri<;i non vult. — Epicxinis. 
 
 X Causa patrociuio uon bona pojor erit. Quoties instan- 
 tia facta est duterior caiisis suis? — Tcrtull, 
 
 J Perversum corri]H're, est stimulare insauum, et oleum 
 camino adliibere. — I'elr. liavcn. 
 
 II Niliil impalieiitia suscoplum, sine impetu transigi novit; 
 quicquid impetu fit, aut offeiidit, aut corruit, aut pra;ceps 
 a.\)iii.—Tert. 
 
Ver. 8.] 
 
 LECTURE XLYII. 
 
 Of o 
 
 this whole contention between God and Jonah leadeth 
 me unto, Whether it be lawful to be angry '? For 
 answer whereof, we must know that anger is in the 
 number of those afl'ections which God hath engrafted 
 in nature, and given (hem their seats in man, and fitted 
 them with their instruments, and both ministered their 
 matter from w'hence they proceed, and provided them 
 hnmours wherewith they are nourished. They were 
 ordained to be spurs unto us for the prosecution of 
 virtue ; and as the body hath his nerves, so hath the 
 soul hers, whereby she is moved either with a slower 
 or speedier carriage. 
 
 The Stoic philosophers hold a vacuity of aflections, 
 A'jdkia, and condemn them all as vicious. Why '? 
 Because they drive us to disorder, and exceed their 
 compass. I grant it. But this is not the nature of 
 the aflections themselves, but the afl'ection of our cor- 
 rupt natures. Christ himself was not without aflec- 
 tions ; he was angry when he cast the merchants out 
 of the temple ; pitiful when he saw the people scat- 
 tered like sheep without a shepherd ; sorrowful when 
 he shed tears over Jerusalem ; and we know that 
 anger, repentance, mercy, hatred, and the like, are 
 attributed to God in the Scriptures, which, if they 
 were simply and by nature evil, should never have 
 been ascribed unto him. 
 
 Touching anger in particular, the philosopher said 
 truly that anger is the whetstone unto fortitude, irn cos 
 fortUudiiiis ; and Basil called it a nerve or tendon of the 
 soul, giving it courage and constancj';* and that which 
 is remiss and tender otherwise, hardening it, as it were, 
 with iron and steel, to make it go through with her 
 business. To be angry (saith Jerome) is the part of 
 a man.f And if anger were not (by the sufl'rage of 
 Chrysostom), neither would teaching avail, nor judg- 
 ments stand, neither could sins be repressed. + Where- 
 fore the counsel of David in the 4th Psalm (and of the 
 apostle to the Ephesians) is, Be angry, but sin not 
 (T'auhts el 70 interpret). Whereupon the gloss noted, 
 be angry, as touching the first motions (which they 
 accounted not sins, because they were rather pro- 
 passions and entrances into passion than passions§, 
 rather infirmities than iniquities||), but bring them 
 not to action.^ As much as to say, I know that the 
 motion of anger is not in your power, but take heed 
 of consenting unto it. Cassiodore expoundeth it thus : 
 The blessed prophet permitted that which is useful 
 and accustomable unto man (which is to be angry), 
 but forbade that which in anger is sinful.** Others 
 are of opinion that he rather counselled that which is 
 
 * Nervus animie finidam, et earn veluti ferro duram effi- 
 ciens. — Basil Serm. de Ira. 
 
 t Irasci est liominis. — Epist. ad Snlin. 
 
 X Nee doctrinoe proficiunt, nee judicia stant, &c. — Homil. 
 11, in Math. O^yi^tnSai. 
 
 § Vi^o'Trakiai non "TraSri. — Ex. Hicron. 
 
 II Infirmitates non iniquitates. — Amhro. 
 
 % Irascimini primis motibus, et ne dncatis ad actum.' 
 
 ** Quod est consuetudinis permisit, quod culpa: prohibuit. 
 
 natural (allowing it to be good), than permitted that 
 which is usual. Surely to be angry is not sin, but in 
 the circumstance we may oflend ; either in regard of 
 the object, which is revenge ; as if we desire revenge 
 against him who hath not deserved it, or more than 
 he hath deserved, or not holding a lawful course 
 therein, or not observing the right end ; that is, if we 
 bend not ourselves to the preservation of justice, and 
 the correction of offences, but to execute our malice, 
 either in regard of the measure, when we are angry 
 overmuch.* For anger is a tyrannical afl'ection, f if it 
 be not stayed with laws ; and there is little odds be- 
 tween it and madness. And as hardly are they 
 ordered and pacified, that are thoroughly possessed 
 with a fit thereof, as men possessed with devils. | To 
 the measure of afl'ection wc may also add the length of 
 time. For anger and a sweet conceit of revenge may 
 so long be kept in the vessels of our heart till it wax 
 eager and sour, and be turned into malice. § For 
 anger and malice difl'er but in age, as new and old 
 wine. Chrysostom || concludeth upon the words of 
 our Saviour, Mat. v., 'Whosoever is angry with his 
 brother without a cause,' &c., qui cum causa nonirasci- 
 tur, peccat. Therefore he that is not angry when there 
 is just cause sinneth ; for unreasonable and supine 
 patience soweth vice, nourisheth negligence, and in- 
 viteth not only the bad and ill-disposed, but the good, 
 to naughtiness. The justest cause is the cause of 
 God rather than of man, public rather than private, 
 when the gospel of Christ is dishonoured, justice 
 trodden under foot, falsehood extolled, not when our 
 proper injuries are pursued. For as anger in the former 
 place conceived is not anger, but judgment, and a 
 simple or advised motion of the will, 11^ in the upper 
 part of the soul, arising by the prescript and rule of 
 reason, not a sudden and troublesome passion of the 
 sensitive and lower part, so, apprehended in the latter 
 place for private and personal grudges, whether un- 
 justly or upon desert, it never findetli toleration in the 
 sight of God. Cain was angry with Abel undeservedly, 
 and sinned ; Esau with Jacob upon the receipt of in- 
 jury, and yet sinned. Uterque punietur, et injuste ira- 
 sceus, quia iu juste; et juste, quia injuriarimi memor.** 
 Both shall be punished, the one for being angry without 
 cause, the other for cause given, because he remembereth 
 wrongs. Wherefore the schoolmen and divines, to keep 
 us within our marks, have distinguished anger into two 
 sorts : the one agreeing with the commandment of God, 
 and lawful, cum. mamiato Dei ; the other flatly against 
 his will, contra 7nandatuiii; ff the former zealous, ira 
 
 * Eespectu 1. appetibilis; 2. modi. — Aqiiin. 2, 2 quest. 158, 
 artic. 2. t Ira tyrannicus aiTectus. — Chrysost. 
 
 X Ira; et insanise nihil medium. Irati non magis compe- 
 scuntur quam diemoniaci. 
 
 § Servatur ira tam diu in vase et suavitas vindictce, 
 donee acesscat. || In Matli. bomil. 11, op. imperf., E;x?. 
 
 % Non iracundia sed judicium, simplex motus voluntatis ex 
 praiscripto rationis,&c. — Aquin. ii. 2, quo3 158, art. 8, conclus. 
 ** Chrysost. ft Wellerus. 
 
804 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 jier zehim, officious, grounded upon cause, having both 
 radicoa honatii et /mem honuiii, as Buoer requireth, a 
 good root and a good end, such as the anger of Moses 
 was. Exodus the two and thirtieth, for the golden calf 
 that was made ; when he avenged the quarrel of God 
 upon a few, and spared the multitude, to shew that 
 he hated the sin, loved their persons ; the other vicious, 
 ira per vitiam* affectionate, private, inrprivata, lightly 
 accepted, forgetting injuries done to God, ira officii,f 
 and proposing to please itself, as Lamech did : Gen. iv., 
 ' Trul3' Lamech shall bo avenged seventy times seven- 
 fold ; ' atid not regarding so much the offence, as desir- 
 ous that the offender himself may be rooted out. The 
 former of these two a little troublelh the eye of rea- 
 son, as eye-salve at the first causeth smarting, and 
 hindereth sight, tiirbat ocuhiiii, but afterwards the eye 
 is cleared and amended thereby ; the other putteth it 
 quite out, e.rcircal.\ 
 
 By this short discourse, you perceive what kind of 
 anger is not only allowable, but necessary and requisite, 
 in those that are zealously zealous for the Lord of 
 hosts, as Elias was, and cannot abide that his name 
 and honour should take harm ; what kind utterly con- 
 demned, the original whereof is in the sands, that is, 
 for trifles and gourds ; the proceeding restless, till a 
 moat becometh a beam, which difference Augustine 
 noteth between anger and hatred ; the mark, the per- 
 son, not the crime ; and the end, not to amend, but 
 to destroy him. 
 
 I conclude, therefoi-e, with Saint Basil, 5 if you will 
 be annry without sinning, and shew forth the right use 
 of this natural and lawful affection, know that one is 
 allured to sin, another allureth him. Alius qui in- 
 stiijat, alius qui iiistir/alur. Convei't your anger against 
 the latter of these two, a murderer of the brethren, and 
 the father of lies ; malign not the other. Irascimini uhi 
 est culpa cui irasci debeiili.<,\\ be angi-y where there is 
 
 * Greor fit Aquid. t Bn'-cv- J Huf,'o card, in Ps. iv. 
 
 g Serin, de ira. |1 Ambrose de ofBc. 
 
 a fault that may bear anger. Which cannot be pri- 
 vate displeasure, but a fault openly tending to the 
 profanation of God's fearful name, pollution of his 
 service and sacraments, a public, scandalous, enor- 
 mous, incorrigible, and uusufferable fault, whereby his 
 Christ is dishonoured, his good Spirit of grace is de- 
 spited, and the whole congregation or family that ia 
 named in heaven and earth wounded, blasphemed. 
 Be angry with those that are angry with God upon 
 every light occasion, for every cross wherewith they 
 are tried, ready to go back and to walk no longer 
 with him ; or if their mouths be not filled with 
 laughter and pleasure to theu- heart's desire, or their 
 bellies with garlic and onions, and flesh-pots, as in the 
 days of darkness, breaking forth into terms of highest 
 undutifulness. What profit have we by him ? Be 
 angry with those that are angry with the prophets for 
 prophesying right things unto them, and freeing their 
 souls. Be angrj' with Jonah and your prophets if 
 they go out of the city, to sit and shadow themselves 
 under bowers, and preach not ; and be angry with the 
 city if it repent not at the preaching of her pro- 
 phets, rather when they have pronounced the threaten- 
 ings and judgments of the Most High, take them to 
 bo but fables, and like the savings and doings of the 
 madman, Prov. xxvi., who ' oasteth firebrands, arrows, 
 and mortal things, and then saitb. Am I not in sport?' 
 Be angry with dogs, who return continually to their 
 vomit, though they have been purged 'ten times. And, 
 finally, to knit up all in one with the words of Ludol- 
 phus upon the fourth Psalm, irascimini riliis, diabolo, 
 vaiiilatibus, mendaciis, vohis ipsis, &c. Be ye angry 
 with sins, the devil, vanities, lies, yourselves ; with 
 hearty repentance for your former misdeeds, and 
 zealous indignation, that ever you have fallen into so 
 base and beastly corruption; et nolite peccare ultcnus, 
 and take heed that you fall not the second time, as 
 Jonah did, into the same faults. 
 
 LECTURE XLVIII. 
 
 Then said the Lord, Thou bast had jiitij on the i/ourd, rfc. — Jonah IV. 10, 11. 
 
 w 
 
 are at length come to the last part of the 
 chapter, which was the scope whereunto all 
 the sayings and doings of God were referred, compre- 
 hended in these two last verses, and contaiuing gene- 
 rally an earnest contention and plea for the justification 
 of his goodness in sparing Nineveh. For what other 
 purpose had God in the whole course of his speeches 
 and actions, by the words of his mouth once and again 
 iterated, and by the sensible image of the gourd 
 objected to the eyes of Jonah, than by irrefragable 
 demonstration, and by the concession of the adversary 
 himself, to clear and deliver his mercy from just re- 
 proof? God first drew him by demands, and as it 
 
 were by captious, Socratical interrogations, whither 
 ho would ; and when he had him in snares, then in- 
 ferreth upon him, which no man could deny that were 
 not too prefract and obstinate, ' Thou hast had pity 
 on the gourd,' &c., ' and shall not I spare Nineveh ? ' 
 Thou on a light, temporary plant, which was not thine, 
 whi.Tcin there wa; neither value, nor continuance, nor 
 any pi-opriety belonging unto thee, and shall not I 
 much more spare Nineveh ? Ac. The argument 
 standeth in comparison from the less to the greater, 
 and both the members thereof compared are so 
 strengthened and set fortli, that he must needs shew 
 himself forsaken of common sense that doth not assent 
 
7er. 10, 11.] 
 
 LECTURE XLVIII. 
 
 305 
 
 unto it. Jonah hath not now to deal with Chrysippus, 
 who was able to speak probably of anything brought 
 in question, but with the most expert schoolman that 
 ever spake with tongue, with the God of heaven, who 
 bindeth with arguments as with chains of iron, and 
 leaveth no evasion. For unless Jonah would except 
 against the reasoning of God, as those whom Tully 
 scoffeth at, who when they were brought to an incon- 
 venience in disputation, had no other refuge but to 
 crave that those inexplicable arguments might be left 
 out ; ■'■ and Tully answered them again that then they 
 must go to an officer, for they should never obtain 
 that exception at his hands. f What should he do to 
 rid himself of this strong opposition ? Before, you 
 have hoard, 1. Of the aliiictioa of Jonah; the sun, 
 and the east wind following the sun the same track, 
 pace by pace, confederate with him, working his woe ; 
 fervent east wind beating — upon his back and sides ? — 
 no, but upon his head, the most dainty and dangerous 
 place by reason of the senses ; his fainting and wish- 
 ing in his soul to die, and professing in open terms 
 that it was better for him so to than to live. 2. Of 
 the reproof of God in controlling that impatience. 
 3. Of his obfirmed and heretical maintaining of it, 
 which was his greater offence ; for there is no man 
 that falleth not, as there is no pomegranate wherein 
 there is not some kernel amiss ; j but when a fault is 
 espied and convicted, then to defend it with pertinacy 
 is another fault. § And the milder punishment is 
 evermore due to modesty, mttior pccmi dehetnr vcic- 
 cundid'. It is the fact of men to err, but of beasts to 
 persist and persevere in error, enrirc liwnannm , per- 
 severare in errore bclluhinm. Then said the Lord, by 
 way of conclusion, inferred upon the answer and grant 
 of Jonah, vouchsafing to reply upon him whose 
 answer before was more worthy of stripes than speech ; 
 and by continued remembrances, as by bands of love, 
 pulling his prophet out of the fire, who had burned to 
 ashes in the coals of his indignation if God had not 
 stayed him ; even that merciful and patient Lord, who 
 when he beginneth to love loveth to the end ; who 
 spake within himself, Though he have often refused 
 my word, and dealt unfaithfully with my command- 
 ment, yet once more will I shake the heavens and 
 speak unto him, I will not lose a soul for want of 
 admonition. It is true in men, that he twice sinneth 
 who is over-indulgent and favourable to a sinner, lis 
 pccciil qui peccanti oliseqiiium accommodat. God is a 
 debtor to no man, yet of his grace and benignity he 
 doth often admonish us. 
 
 Then the Lord said. The dignity of the person 
 addeth great authority to the speech. The apostle 
 urgeth the creditof the speaker strongly in his epistle to 
 
 * Hoc extremum eorum est : postulant ut exeipiantur 
 lisec inexplicabilia. 
 
 t Trihiinuni aliquem, oenseo, adeant, Ac— /n Academ. 
 
 I Nulhua malum punicum in quo non granum aliquoJ 
 putrcscit. 
 
 § Culpamdeprehensam pertinaciter tueri culpa altera est. 
 
 the Hebrews, chap, ii., 'If the word spoken by angels 
 was stedfast, and every transgression and disobedience 
 received a just recompeuce of reward, how shall we 
 escape if we neglect so gi-eat salvation ? Which at 
 the first began to be preached by the Lord, and after- 
 wards was confirmed unto us by them that heard him, 
 God bearing witness thereunto by signs,' &c. Again, 
 chap, xii., ' See that you despise not him that speak- 
 eth, for if they escaped not which refused him that 
 spake on earth, shall we escape if we turn away from 
 hiui that speaketh from heaven ? ' Therefore do the 
 prophets Habakkuk and Zechariah beckon with the 
 hand, as it were, to the whole earth and to all flesh 
 to give ear when the Lord speaketh, ' The Lord is in his 
 holy temple, let all the earth keep silence before him,' 
 Hab. ii. ; and 'Lot all flesh be still before the Lord, 
 for he is raised up out of his holy place,' Zech. ii. 
 
 ThoH hast had jntij, Tu parcis ; thou favourest, or 
 desirest that it may be preserved, c'onservari ciipis .- tu 
 doles, thou art grieved; all which constructions are 
 included in the demand that w^ent before, ' Dost thou 
 well to be angry ? ' For whereas other aflections are 
 simple, anger is compounded and mixed of divers : 
 partly of grief for the injury received, partly of com- 
 miseration of the thing injured, partly of desire and 
 pleasure to revenge the wrongs. But I stick not in 
 the words. I proceed rather to the argument, which 
 is so mightily and invincibly shaped that Jonah 
 frameth no answer unto it. It must needs be that, as 
 the plate sinketh down in the balance when weight is 
 put into it, so the mind must yield itself captive unto 
 the truth, when things are evidently and perspicuously 
 proved.* Geometricians profess that their art standeth 
 not upon persuasion, but upon co-action and enforce- 
 ment, their principles and theorems are so firmly 
 grounded. t But let all arts give place, all actions 
 bow, all logic submit itself unto him who is admirable 
 in counsel, excellent in his works, incomparable for 
 his wisdom. The manner of speech which God uscth, 
 being not plain and affirmative, ' I will spare Nineveh 
 as thou pitiest the gourd,' but by interrogation and 
 negation, ' Shall not I spare Nineveh? ' sheweth what 
 indignity is ofl'ered unto him, as if some right of his 
 were kept back. To set some order in my speech, 
 the comparison here formed consisteth of two parts : 
 the antecedent, or that which goeth before, the lesser, 
 inferior, and weaker part, in the lOlh verse ; and the 
 consequent, or stronger, in the 11th. The persons 
 balanced together, lltou and I, thou art moved, and 
 shall not / pity ? The things weighted one against 
 the other are, for their substance, a fjourd and Nine- 
 veh; for their accidents, 1, of the gourd, Jonah had 
 not laboured for it, Jonah had not brought it up, it 
 was neither of his making nor of his cherishing, Jonah 
 had not right in it, it was not his work ; besides, the 
 
 * Necesse est, ut lancem in libra pondcribus impositis de- 
 primi, sic animum perspicuis cedere. — Tull. in Academ. 
 t Geometrse se profiteutur non persuadere sed coyere. 
 
 u 
 
306 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 continuance was so small that ho had no reason to be 
 fond of it, for it came rip -in a night and in a niijlit 
 pcrisheJ. 2. For Nineveh, it was not a bush or a tree, 
 but (I citij : and not a little, but a i/rcat city ; and had 
 not only those of riper years, but infants ; and not a 
 few, hut six scoic thousand infants; and as they were in 
 age to be pitied, so for their innocency, because they knew 
 not their right hand from their left; and not only men, 
 but cattle; and not in a sparing quantity, but much 
 cattle ; all which, both in nature and use, are better 
 than the gourd for which thou contendest. These 
 things considered, be thou the judge whether it be not 
 lawful and reasonable for me, in a far greater matter, 
 to take upon me that right, and to put on me that 
 affection which thou challengest unto thyself in a much 
 less. The members of the comparison must be 
 matched together as I go, to give the more light one 
 to the other ; for, being severed, we shall not so well 
 perceive the force of them. 
 
 TIiou and I, as different as heaven and earth, light 
 and darkness ; thou a man, I a God ; thou tlesh, I 
 spirit ; thou dust and ashes, I the Lord of hosts ; 
 thou a creature, I thy maker ; thou the clay, I the 
 potter ; thou sitting at my footstool, I inhabiting 
 eternity ; thou creeping as a worm upon the circle of 
 the earth, I spanning heaven and earth in my fist, 
 weighing the mountains and hills in a balance ; finally 
 and especially, thou an unmerciful man, cruel, hard- 
 hearted, without natural affection, whose kindness to 
 mine 'is not so much as a gravel stone to the whole 
 sea sand, nor as a minute of time to the days ever- 
 lasting, yet thou takest pity, and shall not I much 
 more be moved, whom thou hast both preached and 
 known to be a ' merciful, gracious, long-suffering 
 God ' ? The inequality of the persons is very empha- 
 tical and forcible. Thou sparest, and shall not I 
 spare, who have more wisdom in my purposes, more 
 liberty in my actions, more goodness in my nature, 
 than all the sons of Adam ? So doth our Saviour 
 reason, Mat. vii., from this disparity of persons : ' If 
 you which are evil can give to your children good gifts, 
 how much more shall your Father which is in heaven 
 give good things to them that ask him ? ' So did the 
 famous orator reason against Catiline : Did Pub. Scipio, 
 a private man, kill Tib. Gracchus, but lightly weaken- 
 ing the state of the commonweal ; and shall we, that 
 are consuls, let Catiline alone, desirous to lay waste 
 the world with slaughterings and firings ? So did 
 Juno reason in the poet : Could Pallas burn the 
 navy of the Grecians, but I, that am the queen of the 
 gods, the sister and wife of Jupiter, shall I be able to 
 do nothing against mine enemies ? 
 I'allasnfi exurero classcm, 
 Ast fig() quae divum incodo rogina, &c. 
 
 So likewise it holdeth strongly on the other side, from 
 the greater to the less; as, Luke xi., ' If I through 
 Beelzebub cast out devils, by whom do your children 
 cast them out ? ' they are far inferior to me in righteous- 
 
 ness and innocency. But in the 18th of Matthew, beyond 
 all exception, ' Ihou evil servant, I forgave thee all that 
 debt because thou prayedst me ; ' a lord, my servant, 
 not mine equal, I did not respite and give time for, 
 but forgive a greater debt, yea, all that debt upon 
 thine own entreaty, ' Oughtest not thou, then, to have 
 had pity on thy fellow, even as I had on thee '? ' 
 
 Secondly, These persons are compared, as the 
 nature of comparisons requireth, in some third thing 
 common to them both. Thou sparest, shall 7iot I 
 spare .- I depart not from thine own affection, the 
 law is equal to us both ; if we take leave we must also 
 give leave, petimusque damusque vicissim, and it is 
 meet that he that craveth pardon for a fault should 
 also yield pardon for the same fault, aquum est peccatis 
 veniam posceulcm, &c. If thou hadst favoured, and I 
 maliccd, thou pitied and I hated, thy complaint per- 
 haps had carried some colour of justice ; but both our 
 dispositions are alike, and thou accusest me of that 
 whereof thyself art not free, thine own deeds and 
 thine own mouth witness against thee. Is it a fault 
 in me to pity ? Begin at thine own house, and there 
 correct it first ; go thou upright before thou accuse 
 me of going crooked, tu prius mater recta incedc. But 
 this is the fashion of us all, inforo vix decimus quisque est 
 qui seipsum nocerit, scarcely every tenth man amongst 
 us knoweth himself. And we have need of censurers 
 to make us more careful of our own doings, who are so 
 privy and severe to other men's ; as Diogenes some- 
 times was to the grammarians, whom he much laughed 
 at for taking diligent pains in searching after the faults 
 of Ulysses, and not seeing their own. 
 
 Thirdly, Sparing was more agreeable to the nature 
 of God than of Jonah, and therefore he might better 
 contend for it. Never was it more lively expressed 
 than when David made his choice of a third plague, 
 which came immediately from the hands of God, man 
 not working therein : 2 Sam. xxxiv., ' let me not 
 fall into the hands of man.' He prayeth to be deli- 
 vered from his own kind, more than from lionesses and 
 she bears. A man may play at the hole of an asp, and 
 handle a cockatrice with more safety, than fall into the 
 danger of his own brother. The finger of God hath 
 signed it, the apostle hath concluded it of us all, Jews 
 and Gentiles: Rom. iii., 'There is none righteous, no 
 not one ; their throat is an open sepulchre, they have 
 used their tongues to deceit, the poison of asps is 
 under their lips, their mouth is full of cursing and 
 bitterness, their feet are swift to shed blood, calamity 
 and destruction are in their ways, and the way of 
 peace they have not known.' This is the glass wherein 
 we may all behold our natures. If there were need of 
 proof, I would ask the generations, both past and pre- 
 sent, and they should make report unto you, that 
 neither the master hath been safe from the servant of 
 his own tabernacle, nor the king from the subject that 
 hath lived by the salt of the palace, nor tlio father 
 from the son of his own loins, nor the brother from 
 
Ver. 10, 11. J 
 
 LECTXTRE XLVIII. 
 
 307 
 
 his brother of the same womb, nor the husbanil from 
 the wife of his own bosom ; and that not only nature 
 hath been dissolved and uiiknit in private families by 
 treachci'ies, poisonings, slaughtering, and such like 
 Scythian kindnesses, but policy, and community of life 
 cut asunder, torn, and dismembered by sacking of towns 
 and cities, depopulations, and wastes of whole coun- 
 tries, through the untractable and unpeaceable nature 
 that man is fallen into. But, on the other side, the 
 mercy of God is so infinite, that no affection in nature, 
 no dimension or proportion in the whole creature, hath 
 heen fit to express it. The height of heaven above the 
 earth, the distance of the east from the west, the love 
 of fathers towards their sons, of mothers towards the 
 latest fruits of their wombs, of nurses towards their 
 sucking babes, eagles towards their young ones, hens 
 towards their chickens, have been shadows and ken- 
 nings in some sort, but not sufficient measures to scan 
 it by. It is well observed by Cassiodore upon the 51st 
 Psalm, that the beginning thereof, ' Have mercy upon 
 me, Lord,' is the only voice, qua: nunquam discutitur, 
 seil tninqnUlc semper auditnr, which is never examined, 
 suspended, delayed, deliberated upon, but evermore 
 heard with peace and tranquillity from God. And in 
 the 130th Psalm, you shall find his mercy, both the 
 mother that bred and tlie nurse that to this day 
 feedeth, and to the end of the world shall cherish and 
 maintain, all the works of God, ' for his mercy 
 endureth for ever.' It standeth there like a pillar or 
 bounder at the end of every verse ; an endless and 
 durable mercy, not only to beautify the psalm, but to 
 note that the whole frame of the world, and every 
 content thereof in particular, touching both creation 
 and government, oweth not onlj- their being, but their 
 preservation and sustenance to God's goodness. 
 
 To leave the persons, and to examine the things 
 themselves. What was a gourd? A matter of nothing, 
 and in nature but a vulgar and ordinary plant, for 
 there is a diiference in trees, as, Deut. xx., there is a 
 law made that, ' in besieging a city, they shall not de- 
 stroy tlie trees thereof by smiting an axe into them.' 
 The reason is, ' For thou mayest eat of them, there- 
 fore thou shalt not cut them down. For the tree of 
 the field is man's life. Only those trees which thou 
 knowest are not for meat ; those thou shalt destroy 
 and make forts against the city.' Now of this tree 
 there was none other use, either for meat or for aught 
 besides that he knew, save only for shadow. From 
 this difierence of things our Saviour argueth, Luke siv., 
 ■when he healed the man sick of the dropsy upon the 
 Sabbath-day, ' Which of you shall have an ass or an 
 ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him 
 out on the Sabbath-day?' For if they tendered the 
 welfare of their beasts, much more might he regard 
 the life of man, which was far more precious. And it 
 is there said, that ' they were not able to answer him 
 again in those things,' they were so plainly evicted. 
 Touching the accidents of this gourd, if Jonah had 
 
 planted and nursed it up, which he did not, he should 
 have regarded it none otherwise than as a gourd ; he 
 should not have doated upon it, as Xerxes is reported 
 to have loved a plane-tree in Lydia, and he could 
 hardly be drawn away from it ; and Passienus Crispus, 
 twice consul of Rome, a mulberry tree. They seem 
 to have been some notable bowers which they fell so in 
 love with. The nature of man is to love the works of 
 his own hands. The poet describeth it in the fable of 
 Pygmalion, arte siui miratur, he is surprised with the 
 liking of his own art. 'Who planteth a vineyard,' 
 saith the apostle, 1 Cor. ix., ' and eateth not of the 
 fruit thereof?' For this is the end why he planted it. 
 It is confessed, Eccles. ii., to be the hand of God that 
 wo ' eat and drink, and delight our souls with the 
 profit of our labour.' Nebuchadnezzar, Dan. iv., 
 boastoth of his great palace, not which his fathers and 
 progenitors had left unto him, but ' himself had built 
 for the honour of his kingdom.' The apostle telleth 
 the Corinthians, 1 Cor. iii., that he had ' laid the 
 foundation amongst them, and that others did but 
 build upon his beginnings ; and that, although they 
 had ten thousand masters in Christ, yet had tlrey not 
 many fathers, for in Christ Jesus he had begotten 
 them through the gospel.' Wherefore he requesteth 
 them in equity to be followers of him, because they 
 were his building and children, and he had a right in 
 their consciences which other men could not chal- 
 lenge. Now this was a tree wherein Jonah^bestowed 
 no labour, nee aram, nee serens, nee rigans, neither in 
 preparing the ground, nor in setting, nor in dressing : 
 it was not his work ; whereas the Ninevitos were God's 
 creatures. Neither belonged that to his tuition or 
 charge to see it preserved ; whereas that people had 
 evermore lived under God's providence. 
 
 If the continuance and diuturnity of time had bred 
 any liking in Jonah towards the gourd (because we 
 commonly love those things wherewith we are ac- 
 quainted), his passion might the better have been 
 tolerated. Nathan doth the rather amplify the fault 
 of David in taking away the poor man's sheep, 
 because he had ' bought it and nourished it up, 
 and it grew up with him and with his children,' 
 2 Sam. xii. Length of time commendeth many 
 things. It commendeth wine, we say ' the old is 
 better.' It commendeth wisdom : counsel must be 
 handled by the aged, spears by the young; Cousilia 
 seniiin, luista juvemun sunt. It commendeth truth ; 
 /(/ reriiis quod priu.<i, the first is truest. It com- 
 mendeth custom : ' Thou shalt not remove the ancient 
 bounds which thy fathers have set,' Prov. xxii. It 
 commendeth friendship : ' Thine own friend, and thy 
 father's friend, forsake thou not,' Prov. xxvii. ; ' Forsake 
 not an old friend, for a new will not be like unto him,' 
 Ecclus. ix. It commendeth service in the field. Dost 
 thou despise the soldiers of thy father Philip ? saith 
 Clytus to Alexander ; and hast thou forgotten that 
 unless this old Atharias, Nisi hie Atharias senex 
 
308 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 had called back the young men when they refused to 
 fight, we had yet stuck at Halicaruassus?* Lastly, it 
 commendeth our dwelling-places and possessions. Bar- 
 zillai tclleth David, who would fain have drawn him 
 along with him, 2 Sam. xix., 'lam four-score years old ; 
 let me,returu to mine own city, and bo buried in the 
 grave of my father and mother.' And Naboth telleth 
 Ahab, 1 Kings, xxi., ' The Lord keep me from giving 
 the inheritance of my father unto thee.' It would some- 
 what more have commended the gourd if Jonah had 
 long enjoyed the use thereof, which he did not; it was 
 but the child of a night, Jilius nocth, both in rising 
 and falling, suddenly sprung up and suddenly dead 
 again. So there is neither price in it, because it is 
 but a f/ourd, nor propriety, because he had not la- 
 loured for it, nor prescription of long acquaintance, 
 because it was soon dead. 
 
 Now, that which is set against the gourd on the 
 other side is by name Nineveh, by form a citij, by 
 quantity a ijreat city ; ' and shall not I spare Nineveh, 
 that great city ? ' Nineveh, at this time the head of 
 Assyria, the feme and bruit whereof fillelh the world, 
 and holdeth the people in awe by reason of her sove- 
 reign government ? Nineveh, no village or hamlet of 
 the east, but a city that had walls and gates, f — for so 
 is the nature of a city described : ' We have a strong 
 city : salvation shall God set for our walls and 
 bulwarks,' Isa. xxvi., — and the people whereof are en- 
 closed within orders and laws, as the buildings within 
 fences ? Nineveh, no small city in Assyria, as Beth- 
 lehem was in Judah, or as the little city of Zoar which 
 Lot fled unto, but a large and spacious city in circuit 
 of gi-ound, but for the number of inhabitants most 
 populous and abundant ? Now, the greater the place 
 is, the more matter is ministered for pity to work upon. 
 Jerusalem was more laboured and applied by Christ 
 in the days of his flesh than either Bethany, a country 
 town, or any other city of Judah or Samaria less than 
 Jerusalem. Agesilaus, a renowned Laccda;monian, 
 ■was grieved in his heart when be had slain ten thou- 
 sand of his enemies, and when many of the rest that 
 were left alive had withdrawn themselves \\ithin the 
 city of Corinth, his friends advising him to lay siege 
 unto it, lie answered that it was not fit for him so to do, 
 for he was a man which would compel olToiHlers to do 
 their duty, but not pull down cities. J The ruinating 
 and overthrowing of cities are miserable, either spec- 
 tacles or histories, to those that with any humanity 
 shall consider them. Nero may sing and triumph 
 when Home is on fire, a bloody horse-leech, feeding 
 upon the spoils of men and towns ; but Abraham will 
 pray for Sodom, though the sink of the earth, and not 
 only Jeremiah will lament and write Liinientations, but 
 Christ will mourn for the downfall of Jerusalem. 
 And Titus, whilst he lieth in siege, when he shall 
 
 * Curt. viii. t Vrhn iih arro; vol ab orhe. 
 
 I So eum case qui ad oflBciura peccatorea cogerot, non qui 
 urbes vaataret. 
 
 see such slaughter of the Jews, will throw up 
 his hands to heaven, and lay the massacre upon 
 God to clear himself. That Sodom whereof I 
 spake, consider but the rain that fell upon it, brim- 
 stone and fire from the Lord in heaven, Gen. xix., 
 itself ' overthrown with her sisters, and all the plain, 
 and all the inhabitants of the city, and all that grew 
 upon the earth tiu-ued into ashes,' and whatsoever 
 came up afterwards from that ground, unwholesome 
 and unprofitable fruit, pestilent vines and bitter clus- 
 ters,' Deut. xxxi., the whole land mingled with clouds 
 of pitch and heaps of ashes, Ezra i., the people 'suf- 
 fering the vengeance of eternal fire,' Jude ; and, not- 
 withstanding all this, itself made a byword to all ages 
 that came after it, as we read in Isaiah i. and Kom. 
 ix., ' Unless the Lord had left us a seed, we should 
 have been as Sodom ; ' I say, consider but these things, 
 and pity her ruin and desolation though she be Sodom, 
 because she was a city. Though Jericho were 
 Jericho, Joshua vi., a city of the uncircumcised, 
 idolatrous in the worship of God, and hostile towards 
 his people, can it sink into your ears without pitv'ing 
 and bemoaning the fate thereof, to hear that ' her 
 walls fell flat, and all that was therein was utterly 
 destroyed, both man and woman, young and old, ox 
 and sheep and ass, with the edge of the sword, and 
 the city burnt with fire, and all that was in the city,' 
 except some silver and gold that was reserved ? 
 Though Jericho be sunk so low that it shall never rise 
 again, to stand long (fen- it is sealed with a curse to 
 his person that should adventure to re-edify Jericho, 
 and with the blood of his eldest and youngest son), 
 yet say to yourselves when v'ou read that lamentable 
 narration. Alas for Jericho, because it was a city some- 
 times, girded with walls, fortified with bulwarks, 
 storiMl with treasure and wealth, peopled with men, 
 and furnished with other such habilities, as the very 
 name of a city presently implieth. But that Jerusa- 
 lem whereof I also spake, Jerusalem the Siinctificd 
 city, and the city of the everlasting God, Jerusalem 
 built in unity, Jerusalem the queen and empress of the 
 provinces, so dclaced and levelled with the ground 
 that not a stone was left standing upon a stone, neither 
 in their liouses, walls, bulwarks, turrets, no, nor in the 
 altars, sanctuary, temple of Jerusalem, the old and 
 young, matrons, virgins, mothers, infants, princes, 
 priests, prophets, Nazarites, all slain, fimiished, fet- 
 tered, scattered abroad, utterly consumed ; if it come 
 into the mind of any man, either by reading or hearing, 
 without commiseration, I say that his henrt is more 
 barbarous and rude than the veryfragments and ruble 
 wherein Jerusalem is lodged. Who can express those 
 havocs by speech, or find tears enough to equal their 
 miseries ? ' For this cause I weep,' snith the prophet, 
 Ijam. iv., ' mine eye, even mine eye, casteth out water,' 
 which itdraweth up from the fountain of my overflowing 
 heart ; and he callcth to the daughter of Zion to let 
 ' tears run downi like a river, day and night, to take no 
 
Ver. 10, 11.] 
 
 LECTURE XLVIII. 
 
 r,09 
 
 rest, neither to suffer the apple of her e3'e to ceaso, 
 to arise and cry in the night, in the beginning of the 
 walchos, to pour out her heart hlie water before the 
 Lord,' Lam. ii. ^neas Silvius, in his oration (of 
 the spoil of Constantinople) against the Turk, with 
 great compassion relateth the murdering of their chil- 
 dren before the faces of their parents, the noble men 
 slaughtered like beasts, the priests torn in pieces, the 
 religious flaj'ed, the holy virgins incestuously defiled, 
 the mothers and their daughters despitefully used, and 
 at length he crieth out, O )iiiferam iirbis facii'iii , the 
 miserable face of that city ! unhappy people ! 
 ■wicked Jlahomet ! AVho is able to report such things 
 without tears ? * There was nothing to be seen but full 
 of mourning, murder, bloodshed, dead carcases. At last, 
 converting himself to Greece (his mind even quaking 
 and starting back with sorrow), he thus bewaileth it : 
 famous and renowned Greece, behold now thy end, 
 now thou art dead ! Alas, how many mighty and 
 wealthy cities have heretofore been extinguished ! 
 What is become of Thebes, of Athens, of Mysene, of 
 Larissa, of Lacediemou, of Corinth, of other memor- 
 able towns, whose walls if thou seekest for thou canst 
 not find so much as then- ruins ? No man can shew 
 the ground wherein they are laid along ; our men do 
 oftentimes look for Greece in Greece itself ; only Con- 
 stantinople is now remaining of the carcases of so 
 many cities, s<jla e.v tot cailaveribus cirltatuin. Such 
 and so lamentable hath ever been the devastation of 
 cities to men of any atfection, and such it seemed to 
 God in this place : ' Shall not I spare Nineveh, that 
 great city ?' Jonah could have found in his heart to 
 have seen it in the dust, and corn fields ploughed up 
 where the walls and buildmgs stood, or rather an heap 
 of nettles and salt-pits in the place thereof ; the smoke 
 of the fii-e waving in the air and hiding awaj' the light 
 of the sun, and the flames spiring up into heaven ; the 
 king and his senators, merchants and people, those 
 that walked with staves for ago, and those that were 
 nourished at the breasts for weakness, (heir flocks of 
 sheep and herds of cattle, all wasted and consumed in 
 the same pile, if God would have yielded to the mad- 
 ness of his cruel appetite. But he answereth with 
 more clemency, ' Shall not I spare Nineveh, that great 
 city ?' Hitherto were but titles and names ; the 
 proof followeth. 
 
 Wherein are six tltouMitd persons that erinnot dis- 
 cern, &c. It may easily be guessed, qiiantus sit 
 numerus alterius dtatis, cum tantus sit parvuJorum,\ 
 how great the number of other ages, when there 
 were so many infants. The prophecy was here ful- 
 filled which was given to Israel and Judah, Jer. xxxi., 
 ' Behold the days come that I will sow the house of 
 Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man 
 and the seed of beasts.' So was the house of Nineveh 
 sown, ' for her inhabitants were multiplied as the grass- 
 
 * Quis talia fando temperet 4 lachrymis? Namque 
 animus meminisse hoiret, &c. t Hieron. 
 
 hoppers, her merchants as the stars of heaven, her 
 princes and captains as the locusts,' Nah. iii. Shall 
 not I spare Nineveh, wherein there is such a multitude ? 
 
 Or if thou art not moved with a multitude, doth not 
 the age of infants and sucklings touch thy heart ? that 
 cannot speak, cannot stand, cannot help themselves, 
 that stick to their mothers as apples to their trees, 
 and if thou pluck them away before their time, they 
 perish ? Is this thy welcome of babes into the world ? 
 Is this the milk thou wilt feed them with ? Is this 
 thy stUling and pacifying of them, to quiet them with 
 death ? Is this thy nursing of their tender and un- 
 grown limbs ? to wrap them up in flames of fire as in 
 swathe-bands, and to rock them asleep with pitiless de- 
 struction ? Cau thine ears endm-e that lamentable and 
 confused harmony of so many young musicians sing- 
 ing in their kind, and as nature hath taught them, 
 crying up together unto heaven, and wilt not thou 
 cry for company, and say, Lord, stay thine hand, 
 and forbear them ? Or can thine eyes behold the 
 shrinking of their soft members at every pull of grief, 
 their sprawling upon the gi-ound, their flesh scorched 
 with heat as a scroll of parchment, and not be moved ? 
 I stay not upon this point ; but the age of young in- 
 fixnts hath evermore been pitied. The midwives of 
 Egypt, Exod. i., though strangers, and charged with 
 the king's commandment, yet would not slay the chil- 
 dren of the Hebrews. Even the daughter of Pharaoh 
 himself, Exod. ii., finding Moses hid in the bulrushes, 
 had compassion on the babe, for ' it was a goodly 
 child, and wept.' One of the properties of an impu- 
 dent, barbarous, cruel nation, described Deut. xxviii., 
 is, ' it shall not regard the person of the old, nor have 
 compassion upon the young.' There is a notable 
 place to this purpose, 2 Kings viii., where it is said 
 that Elisha looked upon Hazael, a servant and mes- 
 senger unto him from Benhadad the king, till he was 
 ashamed, and the man of God wept ; and Hazael de- 
 manding, ' Why weepeth my lord ?' he answered, 
 ' Because I know the evil that thou shalt do unto the 
 children of Israel : for their strong cities shalt thou set 
 on fire, and their young men shalt thou slay with the 
 sword, and shalt dash their infants against the stones, 
 and rend in pieces the women with child.' Then Hazael 
 said, ' What ! Is thy servant a dog, that I should do 
 this great thing '?' So brutish a part he held it, to do 
 such villany upon the mothers and their infants. 
 
 Or if thou regardest not their age, doth not their 
 innocency afl'ect thee ? Say that the elder sort have 
 sinned, because they have judgment and election in 
 them ; but what have these infants done, who know 
 not their right hand from their left, nor have attained 
 to their years of discretion, nor able to distinguish be- 
 tween straight and crooked, good and evil, but are 
 altogether innocent ? It is a circumlocution of their 
 ignorance and simplicity ; the like whereof we have, 
 Isa. viii., ' Before the child shall have knowledge to 
 cry. My father or My mother ;' that is, before he can 
 
310 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 speak, or discern the oue from the other ; which was no 
 more than went before in the 7th of the same pro- 
 phecy, ' Before the child shall have knowledge to 
 eschew the evil and choose the good.' The son of 
 Su-ach, Ecclus. x., spcaketh of a fool in the same 
 manner, ' he knoweth not the wa}' into the city ;' that 
 is, ordinary and common things which every man 
 knoweth. We shall read that God hath evermore had 
 a special regard to the infant, because of his harmless- 
 ness and innoeency. He commanded, Deut. xsi., 
 ' that they should be spared in war ; and the women, 
 and the cattle ;' excepting those of the Ammonites in 
 the same place, and of those cities which were alto- 
 gether execrable in the sight of God, as of Jericho, 
 Joshua vi., and of Edom and Babj-lon, Ps. esssvii. 
 Their innoeency is everywhere proposed as a pattern 
 for the riper ages to imitate. Our Saviour told his 
 disciples. Mat. xviii., having first placed a little child 
 in the midst of them, ' Except .ye be converted, and be- 
 come as this little child, ye shall not enter into the 
 kingdom of heaven.' And in the 19th of the same 
 evangelist, ' Suffer little children to come imto me, 
 for to such as these are, Toioutwj, belongeth the king- 
 dom of God.' The apostles of Christ framed their 
 exhortations from the same precedents : ' Brethren, 
 be not children in your minds,' dXXa Tfj xaxic/. vrjzia- 
 ^ire, ' but in malice be you infants,' 1 Cor. xiv. ; and 
 ' as new-born babes, desire the sincere milk of the 
 word, that ye may grow thereby,' 1 Pet. ii. 
 
 But if thou hast the children, together with their 
 parents, as we destroy the whelps of wolves even for 
 their kind's sake, and because the fathers have eaten 
 the som- grape, the children's teeth must needs be 
 Bet on edge, and the infants smart for their oliences ; 
 shall I not spare Nineveh, wherein there in much callle- 
 What have the dumb beasts deserved, that they should 
 also perish ? Solomon, in the 12th of the Proverbs, 
 sheweth what the practice of the just is even in this 
 case: 'A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast, 
 but the mercies of the wicked are cruel.' And his 
 rule agreeth with that practice ; Prov. xxvii., ' Be 
 dihgent to know the state of thy flocks, and take heed 
 to thy herds.' Jacob, Gen. xxxiii., hath pity upon 
 the children, and ' upon the ewes, and the kiiio with 
 young which were under his hand," for he said to his 
 brother Esau, ' If I should over-drive them one day, all 
 the flock would die.' The errand that he sent Joseph 
 in, Gen. xxxvii., was, 'Go see whether it be well with 
 thy brethren, and how the flocks prosper.' David, 
 1 Sam. xvii., objccteth his life unto a lion, afterwards 
 to a bear, rather than one sheep should miscarry. 
 Howsoever PhiHp complained, ciijiisiiiodicst vita nostra, 
 cum ad atseUorum occasioiu-m ridcndum est! how basely 
 is our life conditioned, when we must live to make 
 provision for asses! (to one in his army, who told 
 him that they wanted food for th( ir beasts) yet it is 
 true, that some part of our care and forecast must this 
 way be employed. We also know that the law of God 
 
 favoureth them : Deut. xxv., ' Thou shalt not muzzle 
 up the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn.' 
 And the Sabbath, though made for man, yet it extend- 
 ed to the resting of the beast. And either nature or 
 profit, or something else, moved the hard-hearted Jews, 
 if their ox or ass were fallen into a pit, even upon the 
 Sabbath day, to pull him out. Moses kept Jethro's 
 sheep, Jacob Laban's ; the patriarch his sons were all 
 shepherds ; David followed the ewes; Saul sought 
 asses ; Amos was taken from the herds ; that you may 
 know the care of these unreasonable creatures not to 
 have been small in former time. 
 
 The last branch of amplification which God useth 
 against Jonah, was the store of the cattle, the re- 
 spect whereof did somewhat move him to withdraw 
 his judgment. And surely the abundance of cattle 
 is no mean blessing of God. He promiseth it unto 
 Israel : ' Behold I will multiply upon you man and 
 beast, and they shall increase and bring forth,' Ezek. 
 xxxvi. Abraham and Lot were very rich in cattle, 
 Gen. xiii. ; so were Jacob and Esau, Gen. xxxvi. ; the 
 land could not bear them both together because of 
 their flocks. So was Uzzah the king ; 2 Chron. xxvi., 
 ' He built towers in the wilderness, and digged many 
 cisterns, for lie had much cattle both in the valleys and 
 plains.' The substance of Job, in the fii'st of that 
 Ijook, was ' seven thousand sheep, and three thousand 
 camels, and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hun- 
 dred she-asses ;' and towards the end of his days, all 
 these were doubled unto him. 
 
 You see then what reasons the Lord hath used in 
 this second member of the comparison, for the spar- 
 ing Nineveh. 1, It was populous v\-ith all kind of 
 men ; 2, there were infants in it ; 3, six score thou- 
 sands ; 4, they were innocent ; 5, there was cattle ; 
 6, much cattle. I do not find that Jonah ever answered 
 this argument ; but yielding the victory to God and 
 his blessed truth, he leaveth a testimony of his silence 
 and submission to the whole world in this writing 
 which he afterward compiled. Such honour did Turnus 
 give to .^neas when he vanquished him, 
 
 Vicisti, et victum tcndere palmas, 
 Ausonii videre, 
 Thou hast overcome me, and the people can bear wit- 
 ness that I acknowledge thy victory. With this most 
 sweet and victorious sentence doth Jonah conclude, or 
 rather break off his prophecy ; as if he had said. Great 
 is thy truth, and prevaileth. Thy mercy triumpheth 
 against justice, much more shall it triumph against 
 dust and ashes. Let the corrupt afl'ectious of man 
 give place to thy righteous judgments ; let both great 
 and small, the infant and dumb beast, sing of thy lov- 
 ing-kindness, ' and let everything that hath breath, 
 say, The Lord be praised.' And let this be the end 
 of my labours for this time, the meditation of that 
 mercy of God, wherein this prophecy is ended, and hit 
 the labours of my whole life know none other end. 
 Thus let mc end the day and begin the night, end the 
 
Ver. 10,1].] 
 
 LECTURE XLVIir. 
 
 311 
 
 night and begin the day again. AVhethcr I read 'or 
 write, think or speals, or whatsoever else I do, let me 
 do it all with this conclusion ; and when I have run out 
 the race of my sinful days, let me rest at that happy 
 mark, wherein the Lord doth give over his argument, 
 I these pains. 
 
 I have at length finished, by the grace of God and 
 yom' patient audience, my simple expositions npon the 
 prophecy of Jonah, an argument and narration, you 
 see, of only mercy ; the four chapters whereof, as 
 those four beasts in the Eevelation, ' full of eyes both 
 before and behind,' Eev. iv ; I mean in every part 
 opening and discovering nnto us the invisible God in 
 the sweetest propriety of his nature, that is, in the 
 abundance of his love ; ' cease not day and night,' and 
 for all eternity, to smg, ' Gracious, gracious, gracious. 
 Lord God almightj', which was, which is, and which 
 is to come.' Thy mercy is over all thy works, and thj- 
 faithfulness endureth from generation to generation. 
 But the last of the four is the flying eagle to all the 
 rest, as the fourth beast there, having an higher reach 
 and loftier demonstration than the other had. For 
 where the mercy of God was then but exemphfied in 
 fact, 1, to the mariners ; 2, to Jonah ; 3, to Ni- 
 neveh in the three first chapters, here it is pleaded, 
 maintained, propugned, touching the right and reason- 
 ableness thereof, with arguments so strong, as that I 
 say not the tongue of man, but not the gates of the 
 nethermost hell, shall ever be able to prevail against it. 
 Whilst there is a difl'erence betwixt day and night, and 
 when the covenant of day and night shall be broken, this 
 indiflerency betwixt God and man shall stand in force, 
 Shalt thou spare, and shall not 1 spare I or rather this 
 difference, 7/' thou sparest not, yet irill I spare. Though 
 man can be content to see multitudes of his own kind 
 to be murdered like rats or mice, pitying neither in- 
 fant in age, neither innocent in conditions, nor the 
 harmless beast, yet God, the Creator of all, will cast 
 a merciful eye over all his creatures, and both man and 
 beast, aged and suckling, maugi-e the malice of Satan 
 and opposition of his own flesh, shall find grace in his 
 eyes. If I have profited any man by putting God's 
 talent to use in this exercise, and been, as my hearty 
 wish was, a sweet-smelling sacrifice and a savour of 
 life unto him, let God have the honour, the Father and 
 ' giver of all good and perfect gifts,' there shall none of 
 his glory cleave to my fingers. I take nothing to my- 
 self but weakness and shame, who, though I have 
 broken my Master's bread unto you with mine earthly 
 and unworthy hands, yet was I but the instrument, the 
 blessing and power his alone, who ' giveth both seed 
 to the sower, and bread to him that eateth.' That I 
 have been chargeable unto any man, it repenteth me. 
 ' It is more blessed to give than to take ;' and although 
 it s'andeth with the liberty and leave of the gospel so 
 to do (for ' who feedeth a flock, and eateth not of the 
 milk of the flock ? And if we have sown unto you 
 
 spiritual things, is it a great matter if we reap your 
 carnal '?'), yet I will modestly confess it hardly stood 
 with the liberty and freedom of mine own disposition ; 
 and I am able to aflirm it from a pure conscience, as 
 Paul did in the twentieth of the Acts, though I re- 
 ceived something, ovx i'jnDj/jbriaa, yet ' I have not 
 coveted the silver, or gold, or apparel of any man.' 
 I speak not in any sort (my witnesses are in heaven 
 and in mine own bosom) to diminish the credit of 
 your benevolence towards me. The Lord requite it 
 unto you seven fold ! I hate ingratitude as witclicraft ; 
 my mouth were worthy to be muzzled up, if I would 
 not freely and fully profess your kindness, for j'ou 
 were unto me as the house of Stephanas was unto 
 Paul and his company, ' the first-fruits of Achaia,' 
 1 Cor. xvi. (he meant the first of that region that 
 gave themselves to minister unto the saints), so you, 
 the first-fruits of England that have given me any 
 maintenance by voluntary contribution. I hope your 
 cruse shall the more abound, and your cup be the fuller 
 for it. Yet, let me say with patience, whatsoever hath 
 been done in this behalf, I was rather sought and motion- 
 ed thereunto, than myself ever sought it. And during 
 the greater time of my continuance therein, if I had not 
 rather desired to satisfy others than mine own heart, 
 feeling more burden in my pains, than sweetness in my 
 recompence, I had long since eased both myself of my 
 labour, and you of your charges. Though some are 
 ignorant, and others will not know, and some are 
 loath to feel it, I have both known and felt what to 
 read a lecture is. For if to read a lecture be not 
 only to read (as the name soundeth), or only to speak 
 by an hour-glass, declamare ad clepsydram, and to 
 spend the time ; if more than to talk and confer with 
 some single commentary, and not only to search 
 translations as the brooks, but to examine the original 
 as the well-spring ; and both to peruse and compare 
 the expositions of the learned (for the ' spirits of pro- 
 phets are subject to prophets ;' and we ' all prophesy 
 one by one ' in several ages, that we all may have 
 comfort one by another's labours), and not as drones, 
 to live by the honey which bees have gathered, but 
 ourselves to make honey, and to add to the travail of 
 others, for the building and perfecting of God's church 
 (for as they have found out many things, so they have 
 left many to be sought by us*) ; and to play the parts 
 of thrifty and good husbands in making our patrimony 
 larger, which we have received from our fathers,! to- 
 gether with studious meditation, discreet application 
 to the time, persons, and place, endless succession cf 
 pains after pains ; then, I am sure, that to read a 
 lecture is a greater labour than some in opinion will 
 conceive, others demonstrate and make proof of by 
 practice. There be that run away with a lecture, as 
 horses with an empty cart ; I cannot do it. It is but 
 a mote with them to read thrice in a week, and twice 
 
 * Nam illi quoque, non inventa, sed quserenda nobis re- 
 liquerunt. f Faciamus ampliora quje accepimua. 
 
312 
 
 KING ON JONAH. 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 in a day sometimes. I will not dis.semble my wants. 
 It was a beam to my back to make it my weekly exer- 
 cise. For if ever my hands were manacled, and my 
 feet bound up before, I say not from taking pleasure, 
 which I little regard, but from following the course of 
 my necessary and gravest studies, then did I purchase 
 that bondage unto myself, when I oflered my neck to 
 this yoke. How often have I said within myself, 
 
 Beatus ille qui procnl negotiis, 
 
 Paterna rura hol)Us exercet suis, 
 
 as Horace commended a country life. How happy is 
 that man in comparison (if to live in ease be any part 
 of happiness), who hath a rural charge ! That I leave 
 no man to succeed me, as Moses left Joshua, Elijah 
 Elisha, and such like, though it be my grief, yet I 
 cannot remedy it. It is threatened for a curse in 
 Jeremiah, chap, xlix., ' There shall be none to say. 
 Leave thy fatherless children unto me.' Mihi non 
 niinori euro: est qualis respuhlica post mortem meam 
 Jutura sit, quam qxuiUs hodie* My care is as great for 
 your church when I am departed, as whilst I am pre- 
 sent. For I hate the improvident and importunate 
 nature of Heliogabalus, who wished to be heir to him- 
 self, and to see an ending and dying of all things with 
 his own person. But your benevolence is your own, 
 and I cannot commend it as an inheritance to any 
 other man. Only my comfort is, that which Abraham 
 gave to Isaac when ho saw not the sacrifice. Gen. 
 xxii., Deus providebit, 'God will provide' for you, if 
 jou be not wanting to yourselves. For let me say 
 ■with your favourable construction, there are many 
 within these walls, that know not their right hands 
 from the left, chikben in understanding, and much 
 cattle, take them in the sense that Peter and Jude 
 mean them, 2 Pet. ii., beasts without reason, men 
 without humanity, as bad as the horse and the mule, 
 in whom is none understanding. For these, there 
 are not preachers enough, or rather to say the truth, 
 authority hath not edge and vigour enough to ' com- 
 pel them to come in, that the house of God may be 
 filled.' They walk in the fields, in the streets at their 
 pleasure ; they lie at their doors, upon their beds ; they 
 sit down to cat and drink and to be drunken, and rise up 
 to play. They may do worse than all this, in cham- 
 bering, in wantonness, in untolerable fillhiness, even 
 upon the best days, and in the best hours of the day, and 
 who saith unto them, What do yc? They have lived 
 apart by themselves a long time, and sung with their 
 own muses, whom I would have besought now, lastly, 
 even in the bowels of Christ, and for conscience to- 
 wards God, to have redressed this blot to their city. 
 But so they have lived and dwelt, as if Jordan had 
 lain between them and us, that they could not come 
 at us. I misliko not their absence, for they are 
 provided of their own ; and as the women said in 
 Isaiah, ' We will eat our own bread, and wear our own 
 garments,' so may they justly excuse themselves, We 
 * TuU. de amicitia. 
 
 have a peculiar vincj'ard, and a labourer of our own to 
 see it licpt and manured. I say so, but if there were 
 more than this (forgive my Christian jealousy), that 
 some of purpose would not, and others might not come 
 because of offence, God forgive it. I never offended 
 them, unless I committed that fault which the apostle 
 speaketh of, 2 Cor. xii., that ' I was not chargeable 
 or burdensome ' unto them. Xa^isaaHi /j.oi ttiv ubiy.lav 
 rdurriu, ho desired them to forgive him that wrong ; 
 and if mine bo the same trespass, I ask the same par- 
 don. I preached not Christ of envy, I preached not 
 Christ for glory, I preached not Christ for gain, and 
 neither to please nor justly to offend any man. I preached 
 Christ in uprightness and simplicity of heart, and 
 walked with the evenest foot that I could, by all means 
 labouring, if it were possible, to save some ; which if 
 I have obtained, though it be my great joy, and a 
 crown unto me, yet I glory in him that hath enabled 
 me thereunto, and cast my crown at his feet by whom 
 I had gi-ace to perform it. 
 
 Lasth% It is my comfort, and ever may it be, to see 
 such an happy and friendly aspect, of so many prin- 
 cipal planets together in one place.* I hope they 
 shall ever be found in that mutual correspondence 
 wherein I now leave them. For whilst I hve, I shall 
 pray for the peace of our Jerusalem ; which peace 
 of our Jerusalem, if either prayers to God or peti- 
 tions to men, if travail of body or contention of mind, 
 if shedding of tears or spending of blood, may pur- 
 chase to our church or commonwealth, it is not dearly 
 bought. Division had well-nigh broken of late the 
 heart-strings of religion amongst us. Oh, let the 
 head and the heart, with other the sovereign parts, 
 evermore accord, that the inferior members may be 
 the better governed. 
 
 Finally, ' my brethren, fare ye well ' (it is the 
 apostle's farewell to the Corinthians, 2 Cor. xvi.), ' be 
 ' perfect;' stick not always in the rudiments and first 
 ; beginnings. ' ]5e of good comfort;' you know who 
 hath overcome the world. ' Bo of one mind, and live 
 in peace, and the God of love and peace shall be with 
 you.' And so I leave you to the mercy of God, 
 neither greater nor less, than this prophecy doth re- 
 cord, beseeching the God both of Israel and Nineveh, 
 and all the ends of the earth, that his blessings may 
 be poured down in as abundant measure upon you all, 
 your city and people, aged, infants, and cattle, and 
 whatsoever is within your gates or possession, as my 
 faithful purpose hath been, truly and effectually to 
 preach his mercy, according to the matter of this pro- 
 sent history. ' To him that is able to keep yon that 
 you fall not, and to present you faultless before the 
 presence of his glory whh joy, that is, to God, only 
 wise and our Saviour, be glory, and majesty, and 
 dominion, and power, both now and for ever, Amen.' 
 
 • Tlie Lord Archbishop, and Lord Lieutenaiit, niul Lord 
 Warden. 
 
 END OF KING ON JONAH. 
 
A SERMON 
 
 PREACHED AT THE FUNEUAI, OF THE 5I0ST REVEREND FATOER, 
 
 JOHN, LATE APvCIIBISlIOP OF YORK, 
 
 NOVEMBER TIIK 17th, IN THE YEAR OF OUR LORD, 1591.* 
 
 Trust nut in jiriiices, nor in a)iy son of innn, for lloi-c is no Iwlp in liini. His lircnlli ili'imiiiih, nml In' rclurmih 
 to his riirlli ; tlicn liis llioni/lils jtrrisli. — Psalm CXIA'l. i), 1. 
 
 rpiIAT precept of the son of Siracb|- (tliou<,'li I never 
 X were willing to neglect) I would most gladly have 
 observed at this time : Tliou that art young, speak if 
 need be, and yet scarcely, when thou art twice asked. 
 For that which Euripides in Hecuba spake of a noble 
 and unuoble man, I hold to be true of an old and young 
 man delivering the same speech ; though it bo all one 
 in words, it is not so in force and authority. J The 
 rule, I am sure, is ever for the most part against the 
 younger. ' No man, when he hath tasted old wine, 
 desireth new, for he saith, the old is better.' Anti- 
 gonus gave his judgment of Pyrrhus, inniinnm fiiln- 
 rum si si'ncscfrct, that ho would prove to bo sonle groat 
 man if he lived to bo old. Tho weary ox treadcth 
 surer, bus tassns fortius Jif/il pedem, a proverb which 
 Jerome used against Augustine, being short of his 
 years. Umnidfcrtaias, animum quoijuc ; ago bringoth 
 all things, and with all things wisdom. Surely for 
 mine own part, I never thought it convenient that tho 
 gravity of this present business should not be answered 
 
 * Although this and the following sermon have no mate- 
 rial connection with tho lOxpogition of Jonah, and do not 
 jiroperly come within the range of the present series; yet 
 wo liave determined, after mature deliberation, not to sepa- 
 rate them from tlio connection in which tlieir riglit reverend 
 autlior originiiUy placed them. His reasons for appending 
 them to tho Lectures on Jonah are given in liis /•'pi.tlle /Jc- 
 dicntory. Had they been of great lengtli, wo should n(jt liavo 
 inserted them ; but we have thought tliat a few pages would 
 be well bestowed in giving the author's work as complete as 
 lie gave it originally, and in providing that any one who may 
 purchase this volume, and who may desire to possess these 
 two sermons, shall not bo under the necessity of searching 
 for a copy of tho old edition, in order to procure them. — Ed. 
 t Ecclus. x.txii. X Eadcm oratio aiija non a;que valet, Enon. 
 
 with gravity, both of person and spectdi ; and my wit- 
 nesses are both in heaven aii'l earth how justly I can 
 excuse myself, as Elibu did, Job xxxii, ' JJehold I did 
 wait upon the words of the ancient, and hearkened for 
 their knowledge.' I stayed tho timo till some older 
 and riper judgment might have acquitted mo from this 
 presumption. For as I wished all honour, bounded 
 within sobriety, to tho name of my living master, so 
 this to his memory, being dead, that those last ac- 
 complishments of our Christian humanity towards 
 him miglit have been honoured both with tho pro- 
 seuco and pains of some honourable person ; and that, 
 amongst other his felicities, it might have been ono 
 more which Alexander pronounced at tho tond) of 
 Achilles, when ho put a garland about his statuo 
 or pillar, (> tr fadicem, cui mortuo talis pri/ico con- 
 tiiji'rit: O happy Achilles, who, being dead, hast 
 gotten thoo such a trumpeter of thy praises as Homer 
 was. Howbeit, under that name and nature wherein 
 it comcth unto me, being imposed, not sought, and 
 rather a burden than either suit or desire of mine, 
 and as an end of my service, which for that virtuous 
 spirit's sake that sometimes dwelt in it, I owe to tlio 
 dead corpse, I have adventured the charge, that what- 
 soever my wants otherwise be, no man might say I 
 wanted duty. And as ono besides, not unwilling to 
 take tins advantage, though of a most unhappy and 
 unwelcome timo, to seal up my former affections, and 
 to publish to the world what my loss is. 
 
 It was said of old lime, and in some case it may bo 
 true, aninio dolcnti, nihil oportcl credere, that a man 
 should never boliovo a grieved or troubled mind. I 
 think the contrary : animo dolcnti viatjis oportcl 
 
81 1 
 
 A FUNERAL SERMON. 
 
 [Ps. CXLVI. 
 
 credere, a mau should rather believfi a mind in the 
 grief thereof. And it is the best excuse for my bold 
 endeavours at this time, that being no stranger either 
 to his death, the eyes of whose body (and under God, 
 of mine own hope) I holp to close up, either to that 
 sorrow which his death hath divided amongst us his 
 scattered flock, I am able to say that by my hearing 
 which others but by hearsay, and with a tongue fired 
 at the altar of my heart, quickened and enlived, I 
 mean from the sense of that inward sorrow which I 
 have conceived. 
 
 I have laid the foundation of mj' speech from the 
 words of the psalm, ' Put not your trust in princes, 
 nor in any son of man, for there is no help in 
 him,' &c. 
 
 1. Princes are an honourable calling, but they are 
 the sons of men. 
 
 2. The sons of men are creatures not far inferior to 
 angels, but there is no help in them. 
 
 3. There is no help in them ; because not only 
 their puissance and strength, but also the very 
 breath of their nostrils, diparleth. 
 
 4. When their breath is departed, they are not 
 placed amongst the stars, but return to their earth. 
 
 5. Their devices are not canonised and kept for 
 eternity, for their thoughts perish. You see the first 
 and the last, highest and lowest, of all the sons of 
 Adam, they may be made honourable, jniuces, but 
 they are born sinful, the sons of men ; born weak, there 
 is no help in tliein,- born mortal, their breath deparletli ; 
 born corruptible, they return to their earth; and lastly, 
 that mortality and corruption is not only in their 
 flesh, but in some part or remnant of their spirits, for 
 tlteir thoiif/hts perish. The prophet (if you mark it) 
 climbeth up by degrees to the disabling of the best 
 men amongst us, and in them of all the rest. For if 
 princes deserve not confidence, the argument must 
 needs hold by comparison, much less meaner men. 
 The order of the w'ords is so set, that the members 
 following are evermore either the reason or some con- 
 firmation to that that went before. Trust not in 
 princes. Why? ]3eeause they are the sons of men. 
 Why not in the sons of men ? Because there is no 
 help in them. Why is there no help in them ? Be- 
 cause when their breath i/oclJi forth, the;/ turn ujjain to 
 their earth. What if their flesh be corrupted ? Nay, 
 their thoiic/hts also come to nolhin;/. 
 
 For, first, this first order and rank which the pro- 
 phet hath here placed, the princes and gods of the 
 earth, are by birth men : secondly, nrak men, and 
 such in whom no hel/i is ; thirdly, not only weak, but 
 dijini/, their breath goeth out ; fourthly, not only 
 dying, but subject to dissolution, thei/ turn to the earth ; 
 fifthly, if only Ihoir bodies were dissolved, and their 
 intendments or acts might stand, there were less cause 
 to distrust them ; but their thoughts arc as transitory 
 as their bodies. 
 ^ Chrysostom deriveth it thus : Trust not in princes, 
 
 either because they are men, or because helpless, or 
 because mortal, or because corruptible, both in the 
 frames of their bodies and in the cogitations of their 
 hearts ; or lastly, si dicendum est aliquid mirabile, if a 
 man may speak that which the world may instantly 
 wonder at, trust not in princes even for this vei-y cause, 
 because they are princes, and in least safety them- 
 selves.* happy governors, saith one, if they Imew 
 theu' miseries, more unhappy if they know them not. 
 Tarn, illc tiinere cor/ilat qudm tiineri, it was Cyprian's 
 judgment of one in government, that he hath as great 
 cause to fear as to be feared. The authoritj' or pre- 
 eminence of princes amongst men is great. If the 
 king say Kill, they kill ; if Spare, they spare ; and, but 
 that it is the ordinance of God, a thing which his own 
 right hand hath planted, not possible to stand ; for 
 they may all say, ' It is thou that subduest my people 
 under me,' and their ' promotion cometh neither from 
 the east, nor from the west, Ps. cxliv., nor fi-om the 
 suffrages of the people, nor from the line of their 
 ancient progenitors, nor from the conquest of their 
 swords, but fi-om the Lord of hosts. 
 
 God telleth Cyrus, Isaiah the five and fortieth, 
 ' his servant, his anointed, to whom be had opened 
 the doors of the kingdom, and whose hand he held, 
 I have called thee by thy name, and suniamed thee, 
 though thou hast not known me.' I find it noted upon 
 that place, that bis name was Spaco before, which, by 
 the testimony of Herodotus and Justin, in the lan- 
 guage of the Modes, signifieth a dog ; but God changed 
 that name, and called him Coresch, or Cyrus, which 
 in the Persian language soundeth a lord. Job, in his 
 own person, chap, xxix., deseribeth the state of princes 
 and rulers ; that ' when he went out of the gate to 
 the seat of judgment, the young men saw him, and hid 
 themselves ; the aged arose, and stood up ; the princes 
 stayed theu' talli, and laid their hands upon their 
 mouths ; when the ear heard him, it blessed him, and 
 when the eye saw him, it gave witness unto him ; after 
 his words they replied not, and his talk drojiped upon 
 them, and they waited for him as for tlie rain ; neither 
 did they suffer the light of his countenance to fall to 
 the ground.' This is the reason that men are so 
 willing to seek the face of the ruler, for, being in the 
 highest places, they are able to gratify their followers 
 with highest pleasures. ' They that have power are 
 called benefactors,' Luke xxii. Elijah asked the wo- 
 man of Hhunam, 2 Kings iv., in whose house he had 
 lodged, what he might do for her : ' Is there anything 
 for thee to be spoken for to the king, or to the captain 
 of the host ?' as the greatest remuneratitm that his 
 heart could then think upon. Now, as their port and 
 presence is very glorious upon the earth, so neither is 
 it jK'^rmanent, and whilst it hath being, it is daily 
 assaulted, both with domestic and foreign dangers. 
 He that created great Ughts, a gi-cater to rule the day 
 and a less the night, he hath also created great rulers 
 * Milii croilitc, mori inallem quam iiiipcrarc. — Olho. 
 
Ver. 3, 4] 
 
 A FUNERAL SERMON. 
 
 815 
 
 ou the (.-arth, some to be emperors, some kings, some 
 subordiuate governors, some in continents, some in 
 islands, some in provinces, &c. And as he shall 
 change the glory of the former, that ' the sun shall 
 be darkened and lose his shining, and the moon shall 
 be tm'ned into blood,' so he shall stain the beautj' of 
 the latter, and lay their honom- in the dust, and those 
 that have been clothed in purple may hap to embrace 
 the dunghill. He saith in the psalm, ' I have said 
 that ye are gods, and the children of the Most High ; 
 but ye shall die like men, and fall like the rest of the 
 princes,' Ps. Ixxxii. It is a prerogative that God hath, 
 to ' call things that are not as if they were ;' but if 
 they theuiselves shall take upon them to be gods 
 when they arc but men, the Lord will quickly abase 
 them. Beuuacherib is in his rutf for a time, Isa. xxxvii., 
 'Where is the king of Hamah, and the king of Arphad? 
 (kings which he had destroyed) and have the gods of 
 the nations delivered their clients and orators out of 
 my hands ?' and ' Hezekiah, let not thy God deceive 
 thee.' Proud challenges ! But a man might soon 
 have asked him, Where is the king of Asshur '? and 
 hath Nisroch, the god of Ass^Tia, delivered Sennacherib 
 himself out of the hands of God ? and Sennacherib, let 
 not thy God deceive thee, nay, take heed that thine 
 o^\al• sous deceive thee not ; thy bowels, thy flesh and 
 bones shall murder thee whore thou art most devout. 
 Herod is content at the first to admit the persuasion 
 of the people, ' The voice of God, not of man,' Acts xii. ; 
 liut as he received his glory and pride in a theatre, so 
 his shame and downfall in a theatre ; the people 
 shouted not so fast in his ears, but another people sent 
 from God guaweth as fast within his bowels, and 
 maketh him alter the stylo of his oration : I that but 
 lately was called a god, and thought to be immortal 
 bj' you, am now going to my death.* But take them 
 in their happiest and fortuuatest courses, both kings 
 and kingdoms, as they have their beginnings and their 
 full strength, so they have their climactcrical and 
 dangerous years, as he spake of Frnnce,t so also their 
 periods and determinations. And these are the lots 
 they must all draw in their courses, as I have found 
 them recited, reijimho, nyno, nynavi, sum sine rerpio, 
 I shall reign, I do reign, I have reigned, I have now 
 done reigning. 
 
 Sui'ely those that are good princes indeed, whose 
 thrones are established with mercy and judgment, they 
 have need, daily and hourly, to be commended unto 
 God ; good luck have ye with your honour, we wish 
 you prosperity. ' Lord, give thy judgments unto the 
 king, and thy righteousness unto the king's son ; send 
 them help from thy sanctuary, and strengthen them 
 out of Zion;' for their honour is dearly bought, they 
 drink worm-wood in a cup of gold, they lie in a bed 
 of ivory, trimmed with carpets of Egypt, but over 
 their heads hangeth a naked sword, the point down- 
 ward, by a small horse -hair, threatening their continual 
 * Qui modo immortalis vocabar, &c. — Euscb. t La Novo. 
 
 slaughter.* They might all pronounce, but that they 
 are strengthened with the arm of God, of their honour- 
 ablest robe and ensign of theii- majesty, () iiohilein )n(uiiii 
 qudmfaiicein pdiaium,]- rather noble than happy 
 garment, if men did thoroughly know how many dis- 
 quietments, dangers, and miseries it is replenished 
 with, if it lay upon the ground before their face, they 
 would hardly take it up. Thiit which seemeth high 
 to others is steep and headlong to them. J Ishbosheth 
 never wanted a man in his own camp, nor Elah a ser- 
 vant in his own house, nor Dawd a son from his own 
 loins, besides Doegs, and Shimeis, and Ahithophels, 
 wicked counsellors, blasphemous railers, traitorous 
 spies, to do them mischief. 
 
 To conclude therefore ; our duty to princes is not 
 confidence and faith in them, but faithfulness and 
 obedience towards them. ' Give unto Cffisar that 
 which is Caesar's;' give him 'tribute, custom, honour, 
 fear;' serve him with yom- field and vineyards for his 
 maintenance, with your lives and the lives of yoiu" 
 sons for his defence ; and pray for the life of Nebu- 
 chadnezzar, or the king of Babylon, and of Belshazzar 
 his son, that their days may be as the days of heaven 
 upon the earth. § This the apostle requireth of us, 
 1 Tim. ii., ' that prayers and supplications be made 
 for all men, namely, and especially for kings, and all 
 that are in authority,' and that we be subject, one 
 saith, to the creature and constitution of man ; another 
 saith, to the ordinance of God, because God hath 
 ordained it by the hand of man, whether it be the 
 king or his oflicers, higher or lower. One saith for 
 conscience' sake, 1 Peter ii., another for the Lord's 
 sake, Eom. xiii., because conscience is then assured, 
 when it goeth after his direction. This is thou- right ; 
 but that confidence which my text speaketh of, be- 
 longeth only to the hope of Israel, and to him is fully 
 reserved. 
 
 Will you know a farther reason to exclude both 
 princes, and all others who have their dwellings with 
 mortal flesh, from this assurance of ours '? They are 
 the sons of incn. I except but one ; in iino jilio 
 lionrinis saliis,\\ in one, and that only Son of man there 
 was salvation, not because he was merely the Son of 
 man, but the Sou of God also. ' Amongst those that 
 were begotten of women, there never arose a greater 
 than John Baptist,' yet he told his disciples that 
 clave unto him, non sum, ' I am not he,' and sent them 
 away unto a greater, and pointed at him with his 
 finger, ' Behold the Lamb of God.' A\Tien Cornelius 
 fell down at the feet of Peter to worship him. Acts 
 the tenth, Peter took him up, and answered, Kayw 
 aurli, ' I myself am also a man.' When the priest of 
 Jupiter brought bulls and garlands to sacrifice to Paul 
 and Barnabas, it set them in a passion ; ' they rent then- 
 
 * Timeo incustoditos aditus, timeo ipsoa custodes. — Ti- 
 herius. t Stob. ser 47. 
 
 X Quic aliis excelsa viJcntur, ipsis pra3iupta sunt. — Senec. 
 i Baruch. || Au<;ustinB. 
 
S16 
 
 A FUNERAL SERMON. 
 
 [Ps. CXLVI. 
 
 clothes, and ran in amongst the people, crying and say- 
 ing, men, why do ye these things, for we are also 
 men subject to the like passions that ye be,' AiifcwTw 
 IjlMio^akT;, Acts siv. They might have added for 
 further explication's sake, that which is wi'itten, Isaiah 
 the second, ' Cease from the man whose breath is in 
 his nostrils, for wherein is he to be esteemed ?' and 
 in the 51st of the same prophecy, ' Who art thou that 
 thou shouldst fear a mortal man, and the son of man, 
 that shall be made like gi'ass ?' and a little before, 
 ' The moth shall devour him like a garment, and the 
 worm devour him hke wool, but my righteousness 
 shall be for ever, and ni}' salvation from generation to 
 generation.' A man, of what condition soever he be 
 (saith Lactantius),* Si slid credit, hoc esf, si homini 
 credit, if he trust himself, that is, if he trust man, 
 besides his folly in not seeing his error, he is very 
 arrogant and audacious to challenge that unto himself, 
 which the nature of man is not capal)le of. When the 
 Israelites, Isa. xxxi., waited upon the help of Egypt, 
 trusting in their chariots because they were many, 
 and their horses because they were strong, God gave 
 them none other answer than this : ' The Egj'ptians 
 are men, and not God ; their horses flesh, and. not 
 spirit ; and therefore when the Lord shall stretch out 
 his hand, the help shall fall, and he that is holpen, 
 and both shall fail together.' The nature of man at 
 the first creation, before that lump was soured with 
 the leaven of sin, was full of glory and grace, as God 
 expostulated with David : 2 Sam. xii., ' I made thee 
 king over Israel, and if that had been too little, I 
 would have done much more ;' so man was made Idng, 
 and put in lordlike dominion and possession, not 
 over cantons and comers of the world, but over the 
 air, the sea, the earth, and every beast and fish, and 
 feathered fowl therein created. All things were made 
 for us, for in a manner we are the end and perfection 
 of all things, 'Es/x.iv ya.g 'Trug xai [rj/j-u; riXo:. And if 
 this be too little, God hath yet done more for us. For 
 our sakes were the heavens created, and for our sakes 
 were the heavens bowed, and God was made man to 
 pleasure man ; f so that ' all is ours, and we are 
 Christ's, and Christ is God's.' The wise men cf the 
 world, who never looked so far into the honours of 
 man as we do, yet evermore advanced that creature 
 above all others : one called him a little world, the 
 world a great man ; anotlicr a mortal god, God an 
 immortal man; another all things, because hi; par- 
 taketh the nature of plants, of beasts, and of spiritual 
 creatures. Phavorinus marvelled at nothing in the 
 world besides man, at nothing in man besides his 
 mind. Abdala the Saracen, being asked what he most 
 wondered at upon the stage of this world, answered 
 man ; and Saint Augustine saith that man is a greater 
 miracle than all the miracles that ever have been 
 wrought amongst men. Whatsoever our prerogatives 
 
 * Lib. iii. cap. iii. 
 
 t 2. Physic. Propter lioniincm lionio Dens factus est. 
 
 are (as they have been greater in times past,/)(('Hi»,s 
 Troes, we have been Trojans, and it hath been an 
 happy thing to be bom man), we cannot now forego 
 our nature, our generation is known to the world, 
 ' oiu* foundation is in the dust ;' we were fashioned 
 beneath in the earth, wo were brought together to be 
 flesh in our mothers' wombs in ten months, and when 
 we were bom, we received no more than the common 
 air, and fell upon the earth, which is of like nature.* 
 Oar father is proved to be an Amorite, neither 
 angel nor God, and our mother an Hittite, and 
 we the unclean children of an unclean seed. Let 
 Alexander persuade himself that he was the son 
 of Jupiter Hammon, till he see his blood ; let 
 Sapor the king of Persia write himself king of 
 kings, brother to the sun and moon, partner with the 
 stars ; f let the canonists of Rome make a new canon 
 to transfigure their pope into a now nature, writing 
 him neither God nor man, ; but somewhat between 
 both ; let Autiochus think to sail upon the mountains ; 
 Sennacherib to dry up the rivers with the plant of his 
 foot ; let Edom exalt himself like an eagle, and ' build 
 his nest amongst the stars,' and say in the swelling of 
 his heart, ' Who shall bring me down to the gi'omid? ' 
 Obadiah ; yet, when they have all done, let them look 
 back to their tribe, and their father's poor house, and 
 the pit from whence they were hewn ; let them exa- 
 mine their pedigi-ee and descent, and they shall find 
 that they are but the sons of men, and that the Lord 
 hath laid this judgment upon them, ' Man that is 
 bora of a woman hath want of days, and store of 
 miseries.' I end with that excellent admonition of 
 Scaliger § to Cardan, I would ever have thee remember 
 that thou, and I, and others, are but men; for if thou 
 knowest what man is, thou wilt easily understand thy- 
 self to be nothing. For mine own jsart, I am not 
 wont to say that we are so much as men, but pieces 
 of man, partes hominin, of all which put together 
 something may be made, not great, but of each of 
 them sundered, almost less than nothing, pcne minus 
 qudm nihil. 
 
 If j'ou will now learn the reason why yon must not 
 trust in the sons of men, ' there is no help in them.' 
 That is not so, for Eve was made an helper to the 
 man, but there is no salvation in them; or salvation 
 there may be, such as it is, for a moment of time, not 
 final, as Joshua was a saviour'uuto Israel ; and salva- 
 tion of the body, but not of the soul, whereas the sal- 
 vation of the Lord is never but salvation ; for he is 
 ' the same God, and his years fail not ;' and it reacbcth 
 to all parts, for ' his arm is not shortened.' Pliny 
 observeth in his Natural History, || that nature hath 
 given armour and covering to all other living things, 
 shells, crusts, hides, prickles, hairs, feathers, fleeces, 
 
 • WiscL vii. 
 
 t Rex roKum, frater solis ct hin.T, particciis sy<Ieruin. 
 j N'cc Deus est nee homo. § Kxerc. cxlviii. 
 
 II Lib. vii. 
 
Vee. 3, 4.] 
 
 A FUNERAL SERMON. 
 
 317 
 
 scales; Cbryostom addeth, talons, tusks, horns; only 
 man upon bis birthday she doth cast forth naked, and 
 upon the naked ground, to weeping and howling."'' 
 Chrvsostom giveth the reason: God hath so disposed 
 of man, that himself might be his only protection.! 
 He confessed in the person of all mankind who saw 
 it experienced in his own, ' Naked I came from my 
 mother's womb, and naked I shall return thither 
 again.' We hear their beginning and their ending. 
 But say that in the course of bis life man shall have 
 girded himself with strength, and decked him with 
 majesty, what is he then more than a vain man ? 
 For what did it help the children of Canaan that the 
 sons of Anak, giants of the earth, dwelt amongst 
 them, of whom the children of Israel said, Deut. i., 
 ' We have seen the sons of Anak there.' They were 
 all destroyed by Joshua, ' they and their cities,' 
 Joshua xi., and not one Anakim left in the mountains 
 of Israel and Judah. We read of Og, the king of 
 Bashan, Deut. iii., the only remnant of those giants, 
 that ' his bed was a bed of iron, the length of it nine 
 cubits, the breadth four, after the cubit of a man ;' 
 yet how often doth the psalmist sing, ' He hath slain 
 mighty kings, Sihon king of the Amorites, and Og 
 king of Bashan.' What did it profit the Philistines, 
 1 Sam. xvii., that the monster Goliath was amongst 
 them ? or the monster himself, that his stature was 
 so huge, his helmet, his greaves, his corslet, his shield, 
 all of brass, the staff of his spear like a weaver's beam ? 
 He was smitten by a child in comparison, who came 
 with a shepherd's stafi', and sling in his hand, and a 
 few smooth stones in bis scrip ; but (that which was 
 the safest munition of all others) ' in the name of the 
 Lord of hosts,' the God of Israel, whom he bad railed 
 upon. 
 
 These and the like experiments made him so bold 
 afterwards, that he defied all men: Ps. Ivi., 'I will 
 not fear what man can do unto me ;' ' I will not fear 
 for ten thousands of people that shall beset me round 
 about,' Ps. iii. ; ' Though an host were pitched against 
 me, my heart should not be afraid,' Ps. xxvii.; 'All 
 nations compassed me about: but in the name of tho 
 Lord will I destroy them. They have compassed me 
 about; I say, they have compassed me about: but in 
 the name of the Lord shall I destroy them. They 
 came about me like bees, and are extinct even as a 
 fire of thorns : for in the name of the Lord shall I 
 destroy them,' Ps. cxviii. The reason is, ' For thou. 
 Lord, hast holpen me ; thou art my strength, and my 
 song ; thou hast been my deliverance.' ' The Lord 
 is a man of war; his name is Jehovah,' Esod. sv. ; 
 ' The eternal God is thy refuge, and under his arms 
 thou art for ever ; he shall cast out the enemy before 
 thee, and will say, Destroy them,' Deut. xxvi. The 
 
 * Hominem tautum nudum et nuda liumo natali die 
 abjicit ad vagitum. 
 
 t Horaiiiem soldm sic disposuit ut virtus ipsius sit Deus 
 ipse. 
 
 one was the song of Moses after tho drowning of 
 Pharaoh and his host, tho other a part of his blessing 
 given to the tribes of Israel not long before his death. 
 It was not the sword of Gideon that overthrew the 
 Midianites, Judges vii., but ' the sword of the Lord 
 (tml Gideon ;' and therefore he chose rather to give 
 that overthrow by few than by many, lest Israel 
 might make their vaunt against him, and say, ' My 
 hand hath saved me.' Afterwards, ' when they said 
 to Gideon, Pieign thou over us, both thou and thy 
 son, and thy son's son ; for thou hast delivered us out 
 the hand of Midian ;' he answered them, 'I will not 
 reign over you, neither shall my child reign over you ; 
 but the Lord shall reign over you.' You hear w^bat 
 our strength is ; and for other helps, seek them far 
 and near, they are so weak that they are not able 
 to change the colour of one hair to our bodies, nor 
 add one cubit to our stature, nor one minute of time 
 to those days which God hath assigned us. Why, 
 then, do we flatter ourselves that we shall ' multiply 
 our days as the sand ' '? or what treacle is there at 
 Gilead, what physician there, that can cure the gout 
 in Asa his legs, or lay a right plaster to the boil of 
 Hezekiah, or ease the aching of the head which the 
 Sbunamite's child complained of, or heal a fever, a 
 dropsy, an issue of blood, or any one of a thousand 
 diseases more wherewith the body of man is oppugned, 
 if the Lord instruct and assist him not ? I read that 
 Socrates never needed physician in his lifetime ; 
 that Pompey, a poet, and a nobleman born, was so 
 sound that he never belched ; Anthonia the wife of 
 Drusus never spit, ut pfihihciit qui Je mat/nis majora 
 loquiinltir, as they say who of great matters use greater 
 words. Their times, belike, were more temperate, 
 and therefore less rheumatic than ours. We desire 
 to have strong bodies, able to do us service in our old 
 age, scd pwhibeni ijraiules patiiur, but we eat and drink 
 so much that it cannot be. Asclepiades, a physician, 
 indented with fortune that if ever he should happen to 
 fall sick, he would no longer be a physician. Et quid 
 opus Cratcio, mafinos piioiiiitlcre inoiites .- What need 
 Asclepiades (who with a sudden fall of a ladder pre- 
 vented sickness, and ended his days), or Craterus, or 
 or any other physician, promise such mountains to 
 himself or others ? ' A physician is to be honoured 
 with that honour that is due unto him, but of the 
 Most High Cometh healing ; his knowledge lifteth up 
 the head, he receiveth gifts of the king, and in the 
 sight of gi-eat men he shall be had in admiration, but 
 the Lord hath created the medicines of the earth; the 
 apothecary maketh a confection, and yet be cannot 
 finish his own works.'* Let the physician do his part 
 with an upright and faithful mind in the sight of God 
 who hath created him ; let him not lie to his patient 
 and thrall, nor draw him into error, as Abraham did 
 Abimolech, in saying that Sarah was but his sister 
 when she was his wife ; he had well-nigh caused him 
 * Ecclus. x.vxTiii. 
 
318 
 
 A FUNERAL SERMON. 
 
 [Ps. CXLVI. 
 
 to sin bj' that false suggestion ; so these may deceive 
 their patients, and make thena the more careless, by 
 telling them that their disease is farther off iu degree, 
 when it is incorporate into them, and lieth so near to 
 their body (even like a wife) that it may not be 
 severed, when the sick man and his sickness are duo 
 in canie uud, as it were two in one flesh. Some are 
 unskilful in their profession, such as Pliny speaketh 
 of, c.vperimenta pennoiien (((/lint , they kill men to gain ex- 
 perience. And Seneca noteth the like, ojficio.iissiine mid- 
 tos occUunt, they are very busy to cast many men away. 
 Others are imfaithful, and these in my judgment are 
 more to be eschewed than the former ; evil counsel- 
 lors, healing the hurts of the people with sweet words, 
 crying. Peace, peace, all is well, when behold, Hannibal 
 is at the gates, death is entered in at the windows and 
 at the doors, and hath taken the fort of the body into 
 her hands. Such are very unlikely to make sound 
 bodies, because they come with unsound hearts ; and 
 of these is the proverb verified, tindi pharm/ica Iwbeni, 
 jryxules venena, all their titles, pretences, and promises 
 are health, health, but their drugs and i-ecipes are 
 poison. I mean not so much to the bodies as the 
 souls of men. Trust not in man, therefore, neither 
 in his strength nor in his skill and fidelity, for there 
 is no help in him. — Why no help ? 
 
 His spirit departetli ; not only his strength, his 
 health, his agility, his livelihood, but his breath. I 
 will join the residue of my text all in one ; not only 
 liis breath, but his flesh, blood, bones, marrow, sinews, 
 arteries, all must go. There is a resolution of his 
 whole substance ; his last garment, which is his skin, 
 shall be pulled off", (letr((helur novissimion rdainentuiii 
 cutis; he hath bore no abiding place, nor any state of 
 perpetuity, but returueth, not immediately to heaven, 
 but to the earth : nor to the earth as a stranger unto 
 him, or an unknown place, but to his earth, ad terram 
 siiam, as his familiar friend and of old acquaintance. 
 Neither is there only an end of these material parts ; 
 but part of his inward man also perisheth, so far as 
 his carnal and worldly dosignmcnts went, which he 
 fancied to himself in his lifetime. 
 
 Here is the end of all flesh : they sojourn upon the 
 face of the earth, and their spirit also sojourncth within 
 their bodies. It comoth and returueth as a traveller 
 by the way, and stayeth perhaps for an hour, a day, a 
 year, a decade of years, more or less, and then c.rit 
 spiriliis, our breath dopartcth from us. And as God 
 called Abraham, e.ri de terra tita, Go out of thy 
 country wherein thou wcrt born and bred ; so he 
 calleth to our spirits. Come out of your houses 
 wherein you have long dwelt. There is but one 
 manner of entering into the world, but many ways of 
 coin" out; uiiks introitus, iunumeri cxitKs ; we are full 
 of holes, we take water at a thousand breaches ; 
 ' one dieth young, anolhor in a good age, some in their 
 full strength, when their breasts are full of milk,' 
 some by the hand of God, some by sickness and in- 
 
 firmity, some by violence. The infants of Bethlehem 
 are slain in their cradles,' Eglon in his parlour, Saul 
 in the field, Ishbosheth upon his bed, Sennacherib in 
 the temple, Joab at the very altar; some die by famine, 
 as the children of Jerusalem ; some by fatuity and 
 surfeiting, as the children of Sodom ; some by bears, 
 as the boj's that mocked Elisha ; some by lions, as 
 the disobedient prophet ; some by worms, as Herod ; 
 some by dogs, as Euripides ; but Lucian better 
 deserved that death, and he also sustained it ; the 
 sons and daughters of Job, in the midst of their 
 feasting, with the fall of an house; Korah and his 
 complices, with the opening of the earth : the captains 
 and their fifties, with fire from heaven, the coals 
 wdiereof were never blown ; Zimri with fire from earth 
 which himself kindled; eosdein penates hahuit,et ref/iai/i, 
 et roijuni, et sepidchrum, as Val. Maximus writeth of 
 Tullus Hostilius, who was smitten with lightning, the 
 same house was both his palace, and pile, and grave 
 to be buried in. I add that which is more admirable : 
 Homer died of grief, because he could not answer a 
 riddle which fishermen proposed unto him ;* Sopho- 
 cles with joy, because in a prize of learning, after long 
 expectation, he got the victory of his adversary but 
 by one voice. Behold, 3-e despisers, and wonder at 
 the hand of God, you that ai'e 'in league with death, 
 and make a truce with the grave ;' you that say to your 
 souls, ' Take thine ease,' and be at rest for many 
 years, and ' to-morrow shall be as this day, and much 
 better ;' with whom there is nothing but as in the 
 days of Noah, eat, drink, marry, until the flood comoth. 
 Seeing that both sorrow and joj- are both able to kill 
 you, and your life hangeth upon so small a thread, 
 that the least gnat in the air can choke you, as it 
 choked a pope of Rome ; a little hair in your milk 
 strangle you, as it did a councillor in Rome ; a stone 
 of a raisin stop j-our breath, as it did the breath of 
 Anacreon : put not the evil day far from you, which 
 the ordinance of God hath put so near ; ' remember 
 your Creator in time, before the days come wherein you 
 shall say we have no pleasure in them ;' walk not always 
 with your faces to the east, sometimes have an eye to 
 the west, where the sun goeth down ; sit not ever in 
 the prow of the ship, sometimes go to the stern ; ' stand 
 in your watch-towers,' as the creature doth, Rom. viii., 
 and wait for the hour of your deliverance ; provide 
 your armies before that dreadful king cometh to fight 
 against you with his greater forces ; order your 
 houses before you die, that is, dispose of your 
 bodies and souls, and all the implements of them 
 both ; let not your eyes bo gadding after pleasure, 
 not your ear itching after rumours, nor your minds 
 wandering in the fields, when death is in your houses ; 
 your bodies are not brass, nor your strength the 
 strength of stones, your life none inheritance, your 
 breath no more than as the vapour and smoke of the 
 chimney within your nostrils, or as a stranger within 
 * Plufar. 
 
Ver. 3, 4.] 
 
 A FTTNERAL SERMOX. 
 
 819 
 
 your gates, coming and going again, not to return any 
 more till the day of final redemption. It is a wonder 
 that there should be need of any such exhortation 
 after so long experience. If we were as Adam was, 
 who never saw the example of any precedent death,* 
 we might the more justly be excused, for as Christ 
 spalie in the Gospel of the virtues done in Chorazin 
 and Bethsaida, ' if the virtues wrought amongst you 
 had been wrought elsewhere,' &c. So if those innume- 
 rable deaths which have been shewed amongst us had 
 been shewed in the days of Adam before his fall, he 
 would never have run into that contempt. We know 
 that we must die, and, as Calvus spake against 
 Vatiuius, you know that he hath practised ambition, 
 and there is no man but knoweth that you know so 
 much,f so we know the certainty of our deatli as we 
 know our names and the joints of our fingers, and yet 
 wo regard it not. What are all the cities and towns 
 of the earth, so far as the line thereof is stretched, 
 but luiinaiiaiinn cladium miscrauda consq}la,'l the 
 lamentable pinfolds of the deaths of men ? Oh pray 
 that the flight and departure of this spirit which 
 must depart be not upon the Sabbath-day, in the rest 
 and tranquillity of your sins, nor in the winter and 
 frost of your hard hearts, nor in the midnight of your 
 security, when you least look for it. ' Woe worth the 
 man whom the Lord when he cometh shall find sleep- 
 ing.' I say the untimely fruit is better than that man, 
 and it had been good for that man if he had never 
 been born ; the thieves shall break through his house, 
 the dangerous thieves of the soul. Satan and his 
 angels, spiritual wickedness, shall rob, not his coffers 
 but his conscience, of a treasure which he had, but lost 
 with carelessness. The bridegroom shall come by with 
 a noise, but behold, his light is out, his oil spent ; that 
 is, both his matter and opportunity of well-doing is 
 gone, and he cannot supply either by borrowing or by 
 buying, though he would give his heart's blood for it. 
 What shall become of him but that he shall knock at 
 the gates of heaven while those gates are standing, 
 and cry upon the Lord, while ho hath his being, to 
 no purpose. 
 
 The instruction serveth us all ; for the prophet was 
 willed to cry, Isa. xl., that those which were farthest 
 off from hearing the sound, and believing the report 
 of the voice, might be made partakers of it. ' All 
 flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof as the 
 flower of the field.' And to shew how strange it 
 seemed unto him, that any should be ignorant of their 
 mortal condition, and strangers in Jerusalem (as the 
 disciples spake to Christ, Luke xsiv.), or rather in the 
 world, not knowing the things which ordinarily come 
 to pass, from the first creation, till time shall be no 
 more, he continueth his cries : ' Know ye nothing ? 
 Have ye not heard it, hath it not been told you 
 
 * Cyprian, de sing. Cleric. 
 
 t Factum esse ambitum sciti?, et lice vos scire omncs 
 sciunt. J Valcr. Max. 
 
 from the beginning, have ye not learned it from the 
 foundations of the earth, that it is he that sitteth 
 upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants in 
 comparison of him are but grasshoppers ? that he 
 maketh the princes of the earth as nothing, and the 
 judges as vanities ? as though they were never planted, 
 never sown, and their stock had taken no root upon 
 the earth ? For he doth but blow upon them, and they 
 wither, and the whirlwind taketh them away like 
 straw.' Statiittim est omnihua semel Mori, Heb. ix., 
 ' It is appointed unto all men once to die,' nay, twice 
 to die {morieudo morieris, God threatened Adam, that 
 he should ' die the death') ; so the apostle here saith, 
 first death, and ' afterwards judgment,' if we look into 
 it. But the statute touching the former branch shall 
 never be repealed, till destruction bo thrown into the 
 lake of fire, and it be fulfilled which the apostle hath 
 revealed unto him, Eev. xxi., ' Dwrs non crit, nUra,' 
 death shall be no more. Let us take heed, therefore, 
 lest, whilst we are careful to do all other things in 
 time, to set our trees, sow our fields, gather our fruits, 
 we lose or lay up in the najjkin of security, and bury 
 in the earth of foi'getfulness, the most precious talent 
 of time committed unto us, in the ordering and framing 
 of our lives to salvation, as if nothing were viler unto 
 us than ourselves. Let us beware to ofl'er the dregs 
 of our life to him that inspired it, lest we drink the 
 dregs of his anger. If we wish with Balaam, ' that 
 our latter ends may be like the ends of the righteous,' 
 let us not be negligent to fashion our beginnings and 
 middles like theirs. Let us know that, vita brevis, ars 
 loni/a, life is short, and the art of salvation requireth 
 a long time of learning, and the way into heaven is 
 long, and cannot be trodden in a short time. Astro- 
 nomers say, that the space between heaven and earth, 
 if one should climb unto it by ladders, is nine hun- 
 dred thousand miles ; but the distance whereof I 
 speak, between corruption and incorruption, morta- 
 lity and immortality, wretchedness and glory, can by 
 no measure be comprehended. 
 
 Let the proud by name remember that they must 
 ' turn to the earth,' which now they set their feet 
 upon ; rather those tender and dainty women, that 
 never adventure to set the sole of their foot upon the 
 ground, but as if the face of the earth were not pro- 
 vided for the daughters of men, they must be alwaj-s 
 carried like the fowls of the air between heaven and 
 earth. Let them remember, that the earth shall set 
 her foot upon their heads, and their lips shall kiss the 
 dust of the ground, and the very gravel and slime of 
 the grave shall dwell between their haughty eyelids. 
 ' Why do they kill the prophets and build up tombs,' 
 kill their souls and garnish their bodies '? Do they 
 forethink what shall become of them, when after all 
 their labour and cost bestowed in whiting and painting 
 the outward walls, there remaineth nothing but piiti- 
 dioii et }nitridum cadaver, a stinking and rotten carcase, 
 when, though now they say to their sisters in the 
 
320 
 
 A FUNERAL SERMON. 
 
 [Ps. CXLVI. 
 
 flesh, ' Toucb me not, I am of purer mould than thou 
 art,' j'et the bones of Agamemnon and Thersites 
 shall be mingled together, of Vashti, the most beauti- 
 ful queen, and the blackest Egyptian bondwoman, 
 shall not be found asunder ! I have not leisure to 
 say much unto our proud dust and ashes. But if 
 purple and fine linen were an opprobrious note (for 
 lack of an inward clothing) to the rich man in the 
 Gospel, if that parable were to be written in these 
 days, purple and fine linen were nothing. And what 
 the burdens and carriages of pride in the age of 
 Clemens Alexandrinus were, I know not ; but if it 
 were a wonder to him that they kill not themselves 
 under those burdens,* I am sure, if the measure were 
 then full, it is now heaped upon the highest, and 
 shaken together and pressed down again. We are 
 mad to forget nature. Adam halh wisdom to call all 
 the beasts of the field by their proper names, but he 
 forgetteth his own name, that he was called Adam, 
 a,nd that there is an affinity between the earth and 
 him. For he shall return to the earth, his earth. 
 He was not made of that substance whereof the 
 angels and stars ; no, not of that matter whereof the 
 air and the water, inferior creatures. The earth was 
 the womb that bred him, and the earth the womb that 
 must receive him again. For let him play the 
 alchymist while he will, and strive to turn earth into 
 silver and gold and pearls, by making show to the world, 
 under his glorious adornatious, that he is of some 
 better substance, yet the time is not far ofi' that the 
 earth shall challenge him for her natural child, and 
 say, He is my bowels. Neither can his rich apparel 
 so disguise him in his lifetime, nor cere-cloths, spices, 
 and balms, so preserve him after his death, nor 
 immuring stone or lead hide him so close, but that 
 his original mother will both know him again, and 
 take him into her possession. 
 
 Let the covetous also remember this. Nature shall 
 as narrowly examine them at their going out as at 
 their first entering. f They brought nothing with them 
 into this world but skin over their teeth and over the 
 other parts of their body, and it is as certain they 
 shall cany away nothing. They join house to house, 
 field to field, by disjoining the companies and societies 
 of men ; they will dwell alone upon the earth, and 
 leave the inheritance of the world to theii- babes after 
 them. And as they were happy commonweals here- 
 tofore, wherein these speeches mine and Ihinc were 
 least heard, so are we fallen into these unhappy and 
 unrighteous days, wherein there is small care taken 
 what communities be overthrown and dispc!rsed, so all 
 may accrue to a few lords. Socrates carried Alcibiados, 
 bragging of his lands, to a map of the world, and bade 
 him demonstrate where his land lay. He could not 
 espy it, for Athens itself was but a small thing. I 
 
 * Mill! mirabile fit quoil non oiipcentur, cum tantum 
 onua bajnlfint. — 2 P<r(laff. 
 
 t Exciitit rccl( unteiii iia'.ura, sicul iiitraiitein. — Sctcc. 
 
 will not deal so sparingly with you, ye rich men of 
 this world (for the apostle distinguisheth you to shew 
 that there are both riches and a world to come), I will 
 tell you where your land lieth, and what is truly mine 
 and thine, and belonging to every man. So much 
 measure of ground to the length and breadth of your 
 bodies as may serve to bui-y them in,-'- or so many 
 haudfuls of dust as your bodies go into after their 
 consumption. This is terra mea, et terra sua, H terra 
 veslra, my earth, and his earth, and yom- earth, and 
 more than this we cannot claim. Therefore, as the 
 son of Sirach asked the proud, Quid superbis, terra et 
 cinis ? so I the covetous. Quid concupiscis, terra et 
 cinis ? Why dost thou covet, earth and ashes '? when, 
 if it were possible for thee to possess as much ground 
 as ever the devil shewed unto the Son of God fi-om 
 that high mountain, yet in the end thou shalt be 
 driven from all this, as the people of Canaan were 
 driven from that laud which they thought their ever- 
 lasting inheritance, and thou must betake thyself to 
 thine own earth, to that little quantity and rod of 
 ground which nature hath proportioned unto thee. 
 
 Kcce vix totara Hercules 
 
 Implevit urnam, 
 
 Behold, great and victorious Hercules, the siibduer of 
 the monsters of the world, when he was dead and his 
 body resolved into ashes, scarcely filled an earthen 
 pitcher. Amongst other thy purchases, forget not to 
 buy a field (as Abraham did) to bury thy dead in ; a 
 potter's field, such as they had at Jenisalem, bought 
 with the price of blood, wherein thy bones, and the 
 bones of thy sons and nephews, may be bestowed. 
 
 Now the thoughts of man are endless. ' Above all 
 things, man hath an unfaithful heart,' saith the pro- 
 phet, as deep as the sea ; ' who can find it out?' I 
 leave to the Searcher of all hearts to examine. The 
 ambitious hath his thoughts as large as hell, such as 
 PyTrhus had, from Macedon to Greece, from Greece 
 to Italy, &c. The voluptuous his thoughts, ' Let us 
 eat and drink.' ' Better is a living dog than a dead 
 lion.' The malicious his thoughts, ' Who will give me 
 of his flesh to eat ? ' The covetous his thoughts, 
 'Soul, take thy rest;' to-day or to-morrow we will go 
 into such a city, and there continue a year, and buy, 
 and sell, and gain,' James iv. Such arc the purposes 
 and supposals of men minding earthly things. But 
 ' the Lord knoweth the thoughts of men that they arc 
 but vanity,' Ps. xciv. I would they were not gi'oss 
 impiety. And ' they imagine such counsels as they 
 are not able to bring to pass,' Ps. xxi., for their 
 thoughts perish. Plus proficitur cum in rem prasentcm 
 renitur,] there is more good done by one example than 
 by many precepts. 
 
 Perhaps I have told you a tale as to men asleep; 
 and now I have done, yoii ask me what is the matter ? 
 This is the matter, if there were none other cxplica- 
 
 -!' Nomie (olliiris trcs tantum cubiti te cxpcctaut? — Basil. 
 t Cyprian. 
 
Ver. S, -t] 
 
 A FUNERAL KERMOX. 
 
 321 
 
 tion ; the prosent spectacle before your eyes is the 
 example of this precept, the life of this letter, and this 
 precept the sentence or moral of this spectacle ; for if 
 you will ask me of the person proposed to your view, 
 what he was, surely he was a prince and a great state of 
 the land ; and I may say of him as David said of 
 Abner, Hodic princeps cecidit in Israel, this day is there 
 a chief man fallen in England. If you demand further 
 what ho was by generation, I answer, one of the sons 
 of men ; if what by impotence and imperfection, un- 
 able to help either himself or others, there is no sal- 
 vation in him ; if whether he were mortal or no, yea, 
 for his spirit is departed from him ; if what bscometh 
 of his body, you see we have brought it to the earth, 
 and thither it must retm-u ; if what of hii mind, his 
 thoughts are also gone; lastly, if you will know the 
 use, and take an advice and counsel out of all these, 
 put not your trust in him, nor in any the like frail 
 and mutable creatures. ' Blessed is the man whose 
 help is in the Lord;' non ille homo, aut ille homo, nan 
 ilk anijelm, mil ille anyelw!,'" not this man or that 
 man, not this angel nor that angel, but the God of 
 Jacob, the Lord of hosts, 'which made heaven and 
 earth, the sea and all that therein is, and keepeth his 
 promise for ever.' He that not long since was a 
 glorious tree amongst us, like the cedar of Libanus, 
 and his boughs wore a shadow to these north parts, 
 hath had the message of the Lord by his angel accom- 
 plished upon him. ' Hew down the tree,' and there is 
 but a stump left, a remnant of that substance, now to 
 be hid and buried in the earth, till the Day-spring 
 from on high, the light of God's countenance, shall 
 again visit it. Do you doubt of the fall of princes ? 
 Handle, and see his body that here lieth ; examine his 
 nostrils, if there be any breath in them ; his eyes, if 
 they have any sight ; his cheeks, if any colour ; his 
 veins, if any warm blood ; and then believe, as the 
 Samaritans did, not because of my word, but because 
 yourselves are witnesses unto it. And as his body in 
 life hath given you many an instruction, so let his 
 dead and breathless corpse add one more unto you, of 
 common and inevitable mortality. 
 
 It hath been the manner of ancient times to commend 
 their dead, rather to testify their good aflection, and 
 bemoan their loss, and to hold out the lamp of their 
 virtuous lives to others left alive, than to gratify the 
 deceased. Thus David commended Saul, 2 Sam. i. ; 
 and Abner, 2 Sam. iii. ; Elisha, Elijah, 2 Kings ii. ; 
 the apostles, those saints ' whom the world was not 
 worthy of;' Nazianzen, Basil ;t making his followers, 
 in comparison with him for his excellent parts, no 
 more than an echo to the true voice. Thus Bernard 
 lamented LLdachi,; complaining that his very bowels 
 were pulled from him, and he could not but feel the 
 wound. Our Saviour praised the living, John Baj;- 
 list, the centurion, Nathanael. Though wisdom itself 
 
 * Augustine. t In Moiiod. J Ser. de transitu Malach. 
 
 could not err in judgment, yet it is safer for us to 
 praise the dead than the living, the complement and 
 period of whose days we have seen expired ; ijiiando 
 nee laudantcm adidatio tiiovet, nee laiidalitin tentat 
 elatio, '"■ when neither he that praissth is moved with 
 flattery, nor he that is praised can be tempted or swell 
 with vain gloiy. Lauda iiaviijantein cum perveneril 
 ad poiluin, praise a seaman when he is come to tho 
 haven, and praise a warrior when he is brought to his 
 triumph, not before. Such are the dead, whom we 
 should favour generally, if there were none other cause, 
 tanlilin quia prcecesseruid, only because they have led 
 the way unto us ; but those who have been honour- 
 able in their lifetime, we must follow with our 
 amplest testimonies, not of friendship and ati'jcUon, 
 but of truth, t and fulfil the blessing of God upon 
 them, what in us lieth, that ' the righteous may 
 be had in everlasting remembrance.' For mini own 
 part, I come not at this time to give titles to any ra an, 
 either living or dead, contrary to desert, nor t j pro- 
 nounce a sentence with my lips, which mine heart 
 gainsayeth. I know that the nature of praise U not 
 heniijna Jioininuni verba, sed judicia, the courteous 
 speech of men, but their sound judgments ; and the 
 seat or subject thereof is not the praiser (for then tha 
 credit of the just must stand to the mercy of flatterers), 
 but he that is praised ; as Pindarus answered one, 
 who told him that he deserved thanks for commend- 
 ing him, Ejficio ut vera dieas, the cause is in me, not 
 in thyself, that thou spcakest truth. According, 
 therefore, to these rules, I have thought it my duty to 
 break a bos of spikenard amongst you, and to fill tho 
 bouse with some part of that sweet perfume, which 
 his good name and memory hath left behind him. 
 
 In few words, this honourable shadow, presented 
 upon this stage of mortality, and now concluding his 
 last act upon the face of the earth, as he was not 
 great by parentage, so it was his greater commenda- 
 tion that he became great by virtues. Steiiiinata 
 quid faciunt ' Ancient and noble pedigrees are of 
 little worth, where the line of well-doing continueth 
 not. And it is much more glory to a man to begin 
 tho honour of his house, than either to end or not 
 to increase it. I What did it profit Ham, that he was 
 the son of Noah ? or hurt Abraham, that Teruh his 
 father worshipped gods of clay ? or disparage Timo- 
 thy, that he was born in gentility ?§ hiyeuuitas non 
 recepit contumeliam, honesty and virluousness, how 
 base soever the birth be, is free from disgrace. It 
 was no prejudice to Socrates, that his father wrought 
 in marble, and that his mother was a midwife ; to 
 Demosthenes, that his father was a cutler ; or Euri- 
 pides, that his mother sold garden herbs. Tullus 
 
 * August. 
 
 t Testimonium veritati non amicitia;. — Bern, 
 i Meum gi;nus a me incipit, tuum in te desiuit. — Jj'hi- 
 crates. 
 
 i Chrysost. in illud Math. — Patrem hahemvs Alraharnim. 
 
322 
 
 A FUNERAL SERMON. 
 
 [Ps. CXLVl. 
 
 Hostilius spent his iufancy iu a cottage,* his youth 
 in keeping sheep, his man's estate in govcrning^ the 
 kingdom of Eome; but his old age was so beautified 
 with most excellent gifts, that it reached to the top of 
 highest majesty. Moses, though he were hid in a 
 basket of flags, and cast aside amongst bulrushes, yet 
 became a terror to princes. Joseph, the son of Jacob, 
 who kept sheep for wives, was exalted to be the second 
 ruler of Egypt. Saul sought asses, and David fol- 
 lowed the ewes great with young, j'et the Lord hath 
 lifted them both out of the dust, and sot them amongst 
 the kings of the earth. It leaveth an encouragement 
 to those that are left behind. 
 
 Summos posse viroa et mngna exemjila daturos, &c.t 
 That most rare men, and able to bequeath to the 
 world great examples, both of virtue and learning, 
 may be born of mean parents. Potest rir inaijnus e 
 casa exire. 
 
 For the rest of his life, as Csesar in three words 
 abridged that service of his, rem, vidi, rici, I came, I 
 viewed, I vanquished, so three other words shall sum 
 and comprehend the whole com'se of it, academvi, 
 aula, ecclesia, the university, the court, and the 
 church of God. The university tried his learning, 
 the court his manners, the church his wisdom. 
 
 Touching the first, as Petrus Chrysologns said, that 
 if, in this present life, there be anywhere a paradise, it 
 is either in a cloister or in the school ; so if there be 
 anywhere a probation of learning, it is amongst 
 scholars. For popular judgment is very sufficient, 
 satis panel, satis unm, satis iuiIIh-'^, a few are enough, 
 one enough, none enough, to hear and determine of 
 such matters. Therein how well he proved, let the 
 transplanting of him from college to college, not by 
 chance or suit of friends, but advised choice, and not 
 only his sitting at the feet of Gamaliel to hear, but 
 his sittmg in a chair to teach, be arguments unto us. 
 The manner of a court is rather to take than to 
 make good men,; therefore Bernard admonished 
 Eugenius the pope to choose men unto him already 
 approved, not to bo approved after they were come.§ 
 I will not censure the court of England ; — the Lord 
 prosper both the root and branches of it, and cause the 
 light of his countenance to shine upon the sun and 
 stars of that firmament ! But, I am sure, in that 
 court, whilst he lived therein, non fult uniis e midtls, he 
 was not a common man for his deserts ; and yet for 
 his pains, fait iiiius e midtls, ho made himself a com- 
 mon man, in keeping as orderly and ordinary a course 
 of preaching, as whosoever was most bound to do that 
 service ; and, as he had an office therein, besides, to 
 wait upon, so he discharged it with fidelity, not bear- 
 ing the bag like a thief, but with such uprightness of 
 conscience, that, in the sight of God and men, he 
 
 * Incunabula Tulli Hostilii agreste tugurium ccjiit, &c. 
 
 t .Tuvenal. 
 
 i Bonos rccipere magia quam facere consuevit. 
 
 § Vires probato3 oportere deligi, non probandoa. — De Cumid. 
 
 might justly purge himself ; 'Witness against me if you 
 can ; whom have I ever defrauded ? ' 
 
 Lastly, The church had a long experience of his 
 government. He was thrice a dean, and, because he 
 was faithful in a little, he was made ruler over much, 
 for he was thrice also bishop : in the managing of 
 which weighty charges malice itself spared him; even 
 that malice which blotted and blemished the names of 
 most of the lights of this land, never accused him. 
 But I call this the least credit of a thousand. One 
 told Menedemus that Alexius praised him* (an evil 
 man) ; Menedemus answered, But I will never be 
 brought to praise Alexius. 
 
 Concerning his last service in these his ecclesiastical 
 prefectures, as Paul told the elders of Ephesus, Acts 
 XX., ' You all know from the first hour that I came 
 into Asia,' &c. ; so, from the first hour that he came 
 into this province, you know his behaviour amongst 
 you at all seasons, how he kept nothing back that was 
 profitable, but taught you openly and throughout 
 every church, witnessing both to Jews and Grecians, 
 protestants and papists, repentance towards God and 
 faith towards Jesus Christ. 
 
 Hball I yet draw my speech into a narrower com- 
 
 pass . 
 
 As Paul witnesseth of himself, 2 Cor. sii., 
 
 ' so ho both spent and was spent amongst you.' You 
 cannot truly say of him, Ditavlmus Abraham iim, we 
 have made Abraham rich, he hath not a shoe-thread 
 more than he brought at his first coming. 
 
 P. Scipio being called by the senate to give an 
 account of his administration in Africa, made answer 
 thus for himself: ' Whereas I have subdued all Africa 
 to your government, I have brought away nothing 
 therehence that may be called mine, but only a sir- 
 name.' f What hath this reverend prelate gained and 
 carried away with him by continuing amongst you 
 these many years, save only the name of an arch- 
 bishop ? In the consideration of whose estate, I can- 
 not but remember a speech that Cato used in A. 
 Gellius : ' I have neither house, nor plate, nor any 
 garment of price in mine hands. If I have anything, 
 I use it; if not, I know who I am. The world 
 blamoth me for wanting many things ; and I them, 
 that they know not how to want. 'J I need not apply 
 the speech : but will you have the reason of all this ? 
 Ncpotlaiiits iioster aurum calcans, sclicdiilns coiisfctatitr. 
 Our Nopotian contemned gold, and wholly gave him- 
 self to follow his study; § and 1 am sure the com- 
 mendation is that which Bernard gave to Martin in 
 his fourth of consideration, Nonne altoiim sccull res est 
 translre per terram awl sine auro? Is it not an 
 heavenly disposition, and fit for the other world, to 
 
 * I'Uilav de vitios. vorec. 
 
 t Niliil ex cii quod meum diceretur prictcr cognomen 
 rcluli. — Val. Max. 
 
 X Si quid est quo utar, utor: si non, ego sum, Vitio ver- 
 lunt quia multis cgeo; et ego illis quia nequeunt egere. — 
 Lib. xiii. cap. xxii. § Hieron. 
 
Yer. 3, 4.] 
 
 A FUNERAL SERMON. 
 
 323 
 
 live iu a country where a man may be rich, and not 
 gather riches ? 
 
 Now, touching the other member of my speech, his 
 travail and pains in his function ; he dealt both the 
 gospel of Christ and himself amongst you, whose say- 
 ing ever was that which he also took from a famous 
 light of this land, one that was Jidiiim siihis, a jewel 
 of his age, Where should a preacher die, but in the 
 pulpit '? Opiirtet impcriitorem in ricie stantcm mori, 
 a general must die in the field upon his feet; and 
 surely he thoroughly performed it. For when the 
 infirmity of his body was such, that the least moving 
 and stirring thereof by travail drew his blood from 
 him, even then he drew out his breasts, and fed you 
 with the milk of God's most holy word ; whereas the 
 dragons of the wilderness are cruel in their best health, 
 and regard not their young ones. 
 
 Lastly (which is the last of all, because the end is 
 both trial and perfection, and in this sense, unus 
 ilicit par omni, one day is as much as all the rest, for 
 it is eterni natalis, the birthday of eternity ; and as 
 the tree falleth, so it lieth ; and as we go out of this 
 life, so we shall be restored to that other*), that you 
 may not think he did, as the manner offcasts is, ' at 
 the beginning set forth good wine, and then that which 
 is worse,' or that he kept one hoof back from the 
 full sacrifice, I will shortly repeat unto you what his 
 end was ; wherein I must use that protestation before, 
 that Seneca somewhere used, Nunrjiiam par f nit imita- 
 tor authori, there is no equality betwixt one that imi- 
 tateth and the author himself; and, a thing done by 
 way of repetition and rememoration, must needs come 
 short of the truth, f Notwithstanding, this I can 
 constantly affirm in general, that all other cares and 
 consultations which the world might have drawn him 
 unto, laid aside, and not so much as named, he only 
 applied himself to make some profession and promul- 
 gat'on of his faith ; which he rathest chose to do, as 
 the apostle speaketh. Acts x., ' not to all the people, 
 but ri/j,i« /jM^Tvai, to us witnesses,' then chaplains in 
 his house, chosen of God, to the same dispensation of 
 the faith, wherein himself had been. His speech was 
 to this effect. 
 
 I have sent for you to this end, that before my de- 
 parture I might give some testimony of that faith 
 wherein I have hitherto lived, and am now to die. 
 ' "What I have received of the Lord, that I have ever 
 delivered.' I have read much, written much, often 
 disputed, preached often, yet never could I find in the 
 book of God any ground for popery ; neither have I 
 known any point of doctrine received in the church 
 of England, that is not consonant unto the word of 
 God. Wherefore he exhorted me (my colleague be- 
 ing then absent) to continue in that building, wherein 
 I had already laid my foundation ; and because I was 
 now his ghostly father (which was the unworthy name 
 
 * Qualis exieris ex hac vita, talis redderis illi vits3. 
 t Semper citra veritatem et minor est similitudo. 
 
 a father bestowed upon me, a child in comparison), 
 required that I would not neglect to repair unto him 
 twice or thrice before his ending. I told him that, 
 having often in his life ministered so good comforts to 
 others, he could not want comfort to himself. He 
 granted it ; but because onniis homo menda.r (wherein 
 we took his meaning to be, that a man might flatter 
 and beguile himself), therefore, he again required my 
 resort unto him. I replied that I thought it the 
 best, and I feared would be the last, service that ever 
 I should do unto him. Howbeit the comforts which 
 I had to give, I could but pour into the outward ears, 
 and that it must be the Spirit of God, which inwardly 
 comforteth the conscience. To this his answer was, 
 ' The Spirit of God doth assure my spirit that I am 
 the child of God.' I yet proceeded. You have seen 
 long peace, and many good days in Israel ; I hope 
 also, shall depart in peace, and leave peace behind 
 you ; neither know I anything in the world wherewith 
 your conscience should be troubled. He finally con- 
 cluded, I die in perfect peace of conscience, both with 
 God and man. So he licensed me to depart, not will- 
 ing (ho said) to trouble mo any more at that time. 
 Indeed, it was the last trouble that ever in breath he 
 put me unto ; for the next entrance I made, was justly 
 to receive his last and deepest gasp. Of whom, what 
 concerneth mine own private estate, I say no more, 
 but as Philip said of Hipparchus, being gone, Sihi 
 mature, at mild cito, he died in good time for himself, 
 but to me too soon. Thus he that was ever honour- 
 able iu the whole race of his life, was not without 
 honour at his death. For, as Sophoeles commended 
 Philoctetes, at what time he was killed himself, he 
 killed others gloriously, Eu/eviij za/ 3a»wv -/.al -liTaviav, 
 He fought a good fight, both in defence of the faith, 
 and in expugnation of heresies, schisms, seditions, 
 which infest the church. I calljhat labour of his, 
 because he made none other at that time, his last will 
 and testament. Wherein the particular legacies which 
 he bequeathed were these : 1. To myself (which I 
 hold more precious than the finest gold) fatherly ex- 
 hortation to go forward in planting the gospel of Christ 
 which I had begun. 2. To the papists, wholesome ad- 
 monition to relinquish their errors, having no ground 
 in the Scriptures. And let them well advise themselves, 
 that at such a time, when there is no cause to suspect 
 favour and parlialityto the religion established, no place 
 left to dissemble with God or man, Tanii merili, tanti 
 pectoris, tanti oris, tantte virtiitis episcopus (as Augustine 
 spake of Cyprian), so worthy, so wise, so well spoken, 
 so virtuous, so learned a bishop, gave such counsel 
 unto them. 3. To all the members of the church of 
 England, unity of soul and heart, to embrace the 
 doctrine authorised. And, lastly, to himself, peace 
 and rest in the assured mercies of God. This peace 
 he hath plentiful fruition of, with the God of peace. 
 For though he seemeth in the eyes of the foolish 
 to be dead, yet is he in peace. And like a true 
 
324 
 
 A SERMON PREACHED 
 
 [[2 KlXGS XXIII. 2'). 
 
 Hebrew, he hath eaten his last passover amongst us, 
 and is passed from death to life, where, with un- 
 speakable joy of heart, he recounteth between him- 
 self and his soul, Sic-Ill aidlii'liiiiis, sir ft viditinis, ' As I 
 have heard, so now have I seen and felt in the city of 
 our God ;' and with the blessed angels of heaven, 
 and all the congregation of the first-born, singeth ' the 
 
 song of Moses,' a song of victory and thanksgiving, 
 rendering ' all blessing, honour, glory, and power to 
 him that sitteth upon the throne, and the Lamb that 
 was killed,' and that undefiled Spirit which proceedcth 
 from them both, by whom he was sealed up at his 
 death to his everlasting redemption. 
 
 A SERMON 
 
 PEEACHED IN YORK, THE SEVENTEENTH DAY OF NOVEMBER, IN THE YEAR 
 OF OUR LORD 1595, BEING THE QUEEN'S DAY. 
 
 Lilie unto him was llwrc no kim/ lirfore him, that titnicil to Ihi' Lord with all his heart, and uilh all his soul, itx. 
 
 —2 Kings XXIII. 25. 
 
 11HE remembrance of Josiah is like the perfume that 
 is made by the art of the apothecary; it is sweet 
 as honey in all mouths, and as music at a banquet of 
 wine. He behaved himself uprightly in the reforma- 
 tion of the people, and took away all abominations of 
 iniquity ; he directed his heart unto the Lord, and in 
 the time of the ungodly he established religion,* which 
 to have done in a bettor season, the zeal of the people 
 and favour of the time advantaging him, had been less 
 praise. The land was sown with none other seed save 
 idolatry and iniquity, when he came unto it. For by 
 that which is written of him we may know what he 
 reformed. All idolatrous, both priests and monuments, 
 whether Chemarims or black friars, priests of Baal, of 
 the sun, moon, or planets, though founded and autho- 
 rised by both ancient and late kings before him, namely, 
 in these records, by Solomon, Ahaz, Manasses, Jero- 
 boam, together with their high places or valleys, their 
 gi'oves, altars, vessels, wheresoever he found them, either 
 in Jerusalem or Judah, in Samaria or Bethel, in the 
 temple or in the courts of the temple, upon the gates 
 or in the king's chambers, not sparing the bones of the 
 priests cither living or dead, but raking them out of 
 their graves, besides the impure Sodomites and their 
 houses, soothsayers, and men of familiar spirits, he 
 destroyed, deiiled, cut down, burnt to ashes, beat to 
 powder, threw into the brook, and left no sign of them. 
 He followed both a good rule and a good example. 
 His rule is specified, ' according to all the law of 
 Moses ;' his example in the chapter before, ' He did 
 uprightly in the sight of the Lord, and walked in all 
 the ways of David his father, and bowed neither to the 
 right hand nor to the left.' He was prophesied of 
 three hundred years and upward before his birth, 
 ♦ Ecclua. xlix. 
 
 1 Kings xiii., a rare and singular honour, that both 
 his name should be memorable after his death, as here 
 we find it, and written in the book of God before ever 
 his parts were fashioned. His acts are exactly set 
 down in this and the former chapters, and in the 
 second of Chronicles, and fourth and thirteenth, upon 
 the recital whereof is this speech brought in by way of 
 an epiphoueme or acclamation, advancing Josiah abovo 
 all other kings, and setting his head amongst the stars 
 of God. The testimony is very ample which is hero 
 given unto him, that for the space almost of five hun- 
 dred years, from the first erection of the kingdom to 
 the captivity of Babylon, under the government of 
 forty kings of Judah and Israel, there was not one 
 found who either gave or took the like example of 
 perfection. In the catalogue of which kings, though 
 there were some, not many, virtuous and religious 
 (David, Solomon, Asa, Jehoshaphat, Jehu, Joash, 
 Amaziah, Jothan, Hezekiah), yet they have all their 
 stains, and their names are not mentioned without 
 some touch. The wisdom, honour, riches, happiness 
 of Solomon every way were so great, that the queen 
 of Sh'-ba worthily pronounced of him, 'Blessed bo the 
 Lord thy God which loved thee,' 1 Kings x. Will 
 you know his blemish ? But ' Solomon loved many 
 ouiandish women,' and they brought him to the love 
 of many outlandish gods, so he is noted both for his 
 corporeal and spiritual whoredoms. Asa, the son of 
 Abijam, ' did right in the ej'es of the Lord as did 
 David his fatlior,' 1 Kings xv. His heart was upright 
 with the Lord all his days ; he put down Maach.ah 
 his mother for idolatrj'. The bitter herb that marreth 
 all this is, ' But ho put not down the high places.* 
 Jehoshaphat did well ; ' he walked in all the ways of 
 Asa his father, and declined not therefrom, but did 
 
Kings XXIII. 23.] 
 
 UrON THE QUEEN S DAY. 
 
 825 
 
 that v.hich was right in the ej'es of the Lord,' 
 1 Kings xxii., ' nevertheless the high places were not 
 taken away.' Jehn did well ; God gave him this tes- 
 timony : 2 Kings, x., ' Because thou hast diligently 
 executed that which was right in mine eyes, therefore 
 shall thy sons unto the fourth generation sit on the 
 seat of Israel;' but Jehu 'regarded not to walk in the 
 ways of the Lord God of Israel with all his heart.' 
 Aniaziah did well: he 'did uprightly in the sight of 
 the Lord,' 2 Kings xiv., ' yet not like David his father.' 
 David himself, so much renowned as the principal 
 pattern of that royal line to be imitated by them, yet 
 hath a sear upon his memory : ' He did that which 
 was right in the sight of the Lord, and turned from 
 nothing that he commanded him all the days of his 
 life,' 1 Kings, xv., thus far good, ' save only in the 
 matter of Uriah the Hittite.' Only Josiah is without 
 spot or wrinkle : ' like unto him was there no king.' 
 And as in the number of bad kings, Rehoboam did ill, 
 Jeroboam worse, for ' he sinned and made Israel to 
 sin ;' but Omri ' worse than all that wont before him,' 
 1 Kings XV., and yet 'Ahab worse than all before him' in 
 the same place ; so, in the number of the good, though 
 Solomon did well, and Jehoshaphat perhaps better, and 
 David best of all, yet Josiah is beyond the whole com- 
 pany which either went before or came after him. 
 
 Like unto him there rras no kinrf. It had been a 
 great praise to Josiah to have had none better than 
 himself, to have matched the virtues and godliness 
 of his progenitors ; but he is better than they all. 
 Though they all were equal in dignity and authority, 
 and had power in their hands and counsel by their 
 sides, yet were they inferior unto him in the care of 
 God's service. To have compared him with Manasses 
 his grandfather, or Amon his father, who went next 
 befoi'o him, and whose steps he declined, contrary to 
 the manner of children (for who would have thought 
 when Manasses 'did ill, and worse than the Amorites,' 
 and Anion no better, that Josiah would not have fol- 
 lowed them ?), or to have matched him with a few, 
 and given him pre-eminence within some limited time, 
 say for an age or two or three, had sufficiently magni- 
 fied him. But all times examined, chronicles and re- 
 cords sought out, the lives and doings of kings nar- 
 rowly repeated, Josiah hath the garland from them all, 
 the paragon to all that went before him, and a preju- 
 dice to as many as came after him. The reason is, 
 hecause he tunicd. His father and grandfather went 
 .awry ; they came like dromedaries in the ways of ido- 
 latry, but Josiah pulled back his foot. David turned 
 to his armed men and strength of soldiers, Solomon to 
 the daughters of Pharaoh and Moab, Rehoboam to his 
 young counsellors, Jeroboam to his golden calves, 
 Hezckiah to the treasures of his house (contrary to the 
 word of the Lord, Dent, xvii., ' he shall not provide him 
 many horses, neither shall he take him many wives, nei- 
 ther !-Lall he gather him much silver and gold'). Some 
 had even sold themselves to work wickedness, and had 
 
 so turned after the lusts of their own hearts, that they 
 asked, who is the Lord ? but Josiah turned to the Lord, 
 the only strength of Israel, as to the cynosure and load- 
 star of his life, as that which is defective and maimed to 
 his end and perfection, as to his chiefest good, as to the 
 soul of his soul, as to his centre and proper place to rest 
 in. They said like harlots, ' We will go after our lovers 
 that gave us bread, and water, and wool, and flax ; ' 
 Hosea ii. ; but Josiah, as a chaste and advised wife, 
 ' I will go and return to my first husband.' 
 
 The manner and measure of his turning to the Lord 
 was icith all his heart, and with all his soul, &c. You 
 seem to tell me of an angel of heaven, not of a man 
 that hath his dwelling with mortal flesh. And that 
 which God spake in derision of the king of Tyre, 
 Ezek. xsviii., is true in Josiah, ' thou art that anointed 
 cherub.' For what fault is there in Josiah ; or how 
 is he guilty in the breach of any the least': command- 
 ment of the law, which requireth no more than is hero 
 performed '? Lest you may think Josiah immaculate 
 and without spot, which is the only privilege of the 
 Son of God, know that he died for sin, because he 
 consulted not with the mouth of the Lord, he was 
 therefore slain at Megiddo by the king of Egypt. 
 But that which was possible for flesh and blood to do, 
 in an unperfect perfection, and rather in habit than 
 act, endeavour than accomplishment, or compared 
 with his forerunners and followers, and not in his pri- 
 vate carriage so much as in his public administration, 
 in governing his people, and reforming religion, all 
 terrors and difficulties in so weighty a cause as the 
 change of religion is (for change itself bringeth a mis- 
 chief), all reference to his forefathers, enmity of the 
 world, love to his qniet set apart, he ' turneth to the 
 Lord with all his heart,' &c. So doth the law of love re- 
 quire. God is a jealous God, and cannot endure rivals. 
 Headmitteth no division and parting between himself and 
 Baal, himself and Mammon, himself and Melchom, 
 his Christ and Belial, his table and the table of devils, 
 his righteousness and the world's unrighteousness, his 
 light and hellish darkness. I say more, he that for- 
 saketh not, I say not Baal, and Mammon, and Mel- 
 chom, and Belial, but father, mother, wife, brethren, 
 sisters, lands, life, for his sake, loveth not sufficiently. 
 For as God himself ought to be the cause why we 
 love God, so the measure of our love ought to be 
 without measure.* For he loveth him less than ho 
 should who loveth anything with him.f What ! not our 
 wives, children, friends, neighbours, yea, and enemies 
 too ? Yes, but in a kind of obliquity ; our friends, 
 and the necessaries of this life in God as his blessings, 
 our enemies for God as his creatures; so that what- 
 soever we love besides God may be carried in the 
 stream of his love, our love to him going in a right 
 line, and as a direct sunbeam bent to a certain scope, 
 
 * Causa diligendi Dernn, Dcus est, modus, sine modo 
 dih'gere. — £ern. tract, dc diltg. Deo. 
 
 t Minus tc amat qui tecum aliquid amat. — Avg. in soliloq. 
 
82G 
 
 A SERMON PREACHED 
 
 [2 Kings XXIII. 25. 
 
 our love to other, either persons or things, coming as 
 broken and reflesed beams from our love to God. 
 
 You see the integrity' of Josiah ia ever)' respect, a 
 perfect anatom}' of the whole mun, every part he had 
 consenting to honour God ; and that which the apostle 
 wished to the Thessalonians, 2 Thes. v., that they 
 might be ' sanctified throughout, and that their whole 
 spirit, soul, and body might be kept blameless unto 
 the coming of Jesus Christ ; ' their spirit as the reason- 
 able and abstract part, their soul as the sensual, their 
 body as the ministerial and organical, is no way want- 
 ing in Josiah. For whatsoever was ia the heart of 
 Josiah, — which Lyra upon the sixth of Deuteronomy, 
 and St Augustine in his first book of Christian Learn- 
 ing, expound the will ; because as the heart moveth 
 the members of the body, so the will iuclineth the 
 parts of the soul. Whatsoever in his soul, understand- 
 ing, and sense, which, Mat. xxii., is holpen with an- 
 other word, for there is soul and mind both, Yuy^n 
 xai hiania ; whatsoever in his strength for outward 
 attempt and performance, all the afi'ection of his 
 heart, all the election of his soul, all the administra- 
 tion of his body, the judgment and understanding of 
 the soul, as the lady to the rest, prosecution of his 
 ■will, execution of his strength, he wholly converteth it 
 to shew his service and obedience to almighty God. 
 Bernard, in a sermon of loving God, and in his 20th 
 upon the Canticles, expouudeth those words of the law 
 thus : ' Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy 
 heart,' that is, kindly and aflcctionately, diilcitcr, affi'c- 
 tuose ; with all thy soul, that is, wisely and discreetly, 
 jinuloitcr ; with all thy might, that is, stedfastly and 
 constantl)', foititer, cunstanter, &c. Let the love of 
 thy heart inflame thy zeal towards him, let the know- 
 ledge of thy soul guide it, let the constancy of thy 
 might confirm it. Let it be fervent, let it be cu'cum- 
 spect, let it be invincible. 
 
 Lastly, the rule which he fasteneth his eye upon 
 was ' the law of Moses, ' and the ' whole law of Moses ; ' 
 other rules are crooked and distorted, this only is 
 straight. And as many as mind to please God, must 
 Bufi'er themselves wholly to be directed thereby, not 
 turning either to the right hand or to the left. 
 
 This history considered, I pray you what hindcrct'i 
 the commandment and government of the king, both 
 in causes and over persons of the church? For, 1, in 
 the building of the temple, Josiah giveth direction 
 both to Shaphan and Hilkiah what should be done :* 
 2, the book of the law is presented unto him ; he 
 commandeth both the priests and princes to inquire 
 of Huldah the prophetess about it ; he weepeth and 
 rendeth his clothes, as the principal person whom that 
 danger and care doth principally concern : 3, he 
 assenibloth all tlic people both in Judah and Jerusalem, 
 the Chronicles add ' Jerusalem, and rienjamin, and 
 all the countries that pertained to the children of 
 Israel,' throughout his whole dominion, both small 
 * See 2 Kings xxii. and xxiii., and 2 Chron. xxxiv. and xxxv. 
 
 and great, elders, priests, prophets, Levites, both 
 laity and clergy : 4, he readeth the law in the house 
 of the Lord : 5, he maketh a covenant himself: 
 G, taketh a covenant of the people to keep it: 7, he 
 causeth all to stand unto it, 2 Chron. xxxiv., and 
 compelleth all in Israel to serve the Lord : 8, he 
 ordaineth and hokleth a passover, the like whereof 
 was never seen since the days of the Judges, nor in 
 all the days of the kings of Israel, and the kings of 
 Judah, and he appointeth the priests to their charges, 
 2 Chron. xxxv., and changeth the office of the Levites, 
 that they should not bear the ark any more ; so the 
 priests stood in their places, also the Levites in their 
 orders, jit.vta regis iiiipeiium, ' according to the com- 
 mandment of the king:' 9, in the purging of idolidry, 
 and removing those swarms of idolatrous priests, with 
 all their abominable service, he commanded Hilkiah 
 the high priest, and the priests of the second order to 
 do thus or thus. Meanwhile, the Levite, the priest, 
 the prophet, are not wronged by the king in their 
 callings. The king doth the office of a king in com- 
 manding, and they their offices in administering. He 
 readeth the book of the covenant (doubtless in person), 
 and in the house of the Lord, but he standeth not on 
 a pulpit of wood made for preaching, to give the sense 
 of the law, and to cause the people to understand it ; 
 for that belongeth to Ezra the priest, and to the 
 Levites, Neb. 8. Again, he causeth a passover to be 
 held, but he neither killeth the passover, nor preparcth 
 the people, nor sprinkleth the blood, nor flayeth the 
 beast, nor offereth burnt-oli'erings ; for all this he 
 leavcth to the sous of Aaron, yet is nothing done but 
 ju.vta praceptum lei/isJusia', according to the command- 
 ment of king Josiah. Moreover, the book of the 
 Lord was his counsellor and instructor in all this 
 reformation. For so is the will of God, Deuteronomy the 
 seventeenth, that a ' book of the law should be written 
 to lie by the king, to read therein all the days of his 
 life, that he might learn to fear the Lord his God, and 
 to keep all his laws.' And in a matter of scruple he 
 scndeth to Huldah the prophetess to be resolved by 
 her, and she doth the i)art of a prophetess, though to 
 her king and liege lord, ' Tell the man that sent you 
 unto me, Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I will bring 
 evil upon this place," 2 Kings xxii. 
 
 By this it is easy to define, if the spirit of peace bo 
 not quite gone from us, a question unnecessary to be 
 moved, dangerous and costly to Christendom (the 
 trial whereof hath not lain in the ends of men's 
 tongues, but in the points of swords, and happy were 
 these western parts of the world, if so much blood 
 already effused, so many emperors, kings, princes 
 defeated, deprived their lives by poison, by treason, 
 and other nndutiful means undermined, their state 
 disturbed and overthrown, might yet have purchased 
 an end thereof, but the question still standeth, and 
 thrcatcncth more tragedies to the earth), whether the 
 king may use his authority in ecclesiastical causes and 
 
2 Kings XXIII. 25.] 
 
 UPON THE QUEEN S DAY. 
 
 persons 
 
 ? Who doabted it, tli:it had an ear to hear 
 
 the doings of Josiah "? He is the first in all this 
 business ; his art, faculty, profession, authority, im- 
 mediate and next unto God, held from him in capite ; 
 not derived from beneath, is architectonical, supreme, 
 queen and commander of all other functions and voca- 
 tions, not reaching so far as to decree against the 
 decrees of God, to make laws contrary to his law, to 
 erect sacraments or service fighting with his orders, 
 nor to usurp priestly and prophetical ofiices, nor to 
 stop the mouths of prophets, and to say unto them, 
 ' Prophesy not right things ; ' but having the book of 
 the law to direct him, himself to direct others by 
 that rule ; and as the priests instruct, the prophets 
 admonish him in his place, so himself to appoint and 
 command them in their doings. What should I 
 trouble you ? Josiah as their lord, master, and king, 
 h'ai'Ayjji'i, ' assembletb, commandeth, causeth, com- 
 pelletii, buildeth, pulleth down, planteth, rooteth up, 
 killeth, burnetii, destroyeth.' What doth Hilkiah in 
 all this but obey ? though higher than all the priests, 
 because he was the high priest, yet lower than Josiah. 
 Or what doth Huldah the prophetess, but pronounce 
 the word of the Loi-d, her pei'son, possessions, family, 
 liberty, life, all that she had, being otherwise at the 
 king's commandment ? So let Samuel tell Saul of 
 bis faults, Nathan tell David of his, Abiah Jeroboam, 
 Elijah and Micaiah Aliab, Elisha Jchoram, Jeremiah 
 Zedekiah, John Baptist Herod, Ambrose Theodosius, 
 and all Christian bishops and priests their princes 
 offenders. The state of the question (me seemeth) 
 is very significantly laid down in that speech of Con- 
 stantine the emperor to his bishops. You are bishops 
 within the church, and I a bishop without the church.* 
 They in the proper and internal offices, of the word, 
 sacraments, ecclesiastical censures, and he for out- 
 ward authority and presidenco ; they as ' overseers of 
 the flock of Christ,' he an overseer of overseers ; 
 they as pastors and fathers, he as a master and lord 
 to command their service ; tliey rulers and superiors 
 in their kind, llyiiv/j,-voi, Heb. xiii., but it is rather in 
 the Lord, than that they are lords over God's inherit- 
 ance, Hooiaraij.evoi, 1 Thes. v. ; and their rule is limited 
 to the soul, not to the body, and consistoth in preach- 
 ing the word, not in bearing the sword ; but he the 
 most excellent, having more to do than any man. 
 Lastly, to them is due obedience and submission, 
 IlE/i)£ff^a/, rather oil'ered by their charges than enforced, 
 to the other a subjection, compelling and ordering the 
 people, T-siKiiv, whether they will or no. 
 
 I will draw the substance of mine intended speech to 
 these two beads : 1, that the greatest honour and happi- 
 ness to kings is to uphold religion ; 2, that the greatest 
 dishonour and harm to religion is to pull down kings. 
 
 The former I need not stand to prove ; they are 
 happy realms, in the midst whereof standeth not the 
 
 * Vos intra fcclesiam episcopi, ego extra ecolesiam. — 
 Euaeb. de vila Const, iv. 
 
 capitol, but the temple of the Lord. If this lie waste, 
 unfurnished, unregarded, and men be willing to cry, 
 ' The time is not yet come that the house of the Lord 
 should be built or beautified,' the plagues that ensue 
 are without number : ' heaven shall give no dew, 
 earth no fruit, drought shall be upon mountains and 
 valleys ; much shall be sown, little brought in, and 
 that little shall be blown upon and brouglit to nothing,' 
 Haggai i. But where the prophecy is fulfilled, 'kings 
 shall be thy nursing fathers, and queens thy nurses,' 
 in the nine and fortieth of Isaiah there, as the queen 
 of Sheba blessed both the people of Solomon and the 
 king himself, so happy is the church for drawing ber 
 milk and sustenance from such heroical breasts, and 
 happy are those breasts that foster and nurse up the 
 church of Christ. They give milk, and receive milk ; 
 they maintain the church, and the church maintaineth 
 them ; they bestow favour, honour, patronage, pro- 
 tection, they are favoured, honoured, patronaged, and 
 protected again. I will not stay to allege the fortu- 
 nate and happy governments of well-disposed kings. 
 The decrees of the king of Persia and Babylon for 
 repairing the temple, worshipping the God of the 
 three children, or the God of Daniel, brought more 
 honour unto them than all their other laws. The piety 
 of Antoninus Pius is very commendable for bis gra- 
 cious decree, that none should accuse a Christian 
 because he was a Christian.* Constantius, the father 
 of Constantino the Groat, made more reckoning (be 
 said) of those that professed Christianity than full 
 treasures. Jovianus, after Julian, refused to be em- 
 peror, albeit elected and sought to the empire, unless 
 he might govern Christians. Great Constantino and 
 Charles the Great had their names of greatness not 
 so much for authority as for godliness. But, on the 
 other side, the books are full of the miserable falls of 
 irreligious princes, their seed, posteritj-, whole race 
 and lineage, for their sakes overturned and wiped from 
 the earth, as one would wipe a dish and turn it upside 
 down. The name of Antiochus the tyrant stinketh 
 upon the earth as his bowels souiotiraes stunk ;f and 
 as then the worms devoured his loathsome carcase, so 
 his other worm yet liveth, and ceaseth not, crying to 
 all the persecutors under heaven. Take heed. He 
 thought to have made the holy city a buryiug-place. 
 but when he saw his misery, then bo would set it at 
 liberty. The Jews, whom be thought not worthy to 
 be buried, be would make like the citizens of Athens ; 
 and the temple which be spoiled before, he would 
 garnish with great gifts. Likewise Galerius, Ij'ing 
 sick of a wretched disease, crieth to have the Chris- 
 tians spared, and that temples and oratories should be 
 allowed them, that they might pray for the life of the 
 emperor. The unripe, unseasonable, unnatural deaths 
 of men more unnatural in their lives, the monsters 
 and curses of the earth they trod upon, the bane of 
 the air they drew, the rulers of the Jews and Komans, 
 * Si quia Clirisliano quia Cliriolianu.^, &c. f 2 Mach. 9 
 
32S 
 
 A SERMON PREACHED 
 
 [2 Kings XXIII. 25. 
 
 higli priests, princes, emperors, and their deputies, 
 that murdered the Lord of the vineyard, the son and 
 the servants, in the time of Christ and his apostles, and 
 by the space of three hundred years, the workers of 
 the ten persecutions, no meaner plagues to the Chris- 
 tian faith than those ten plagues were to Egypt, or 
 rather ten times ten persecutions, for they were multi- 
 plied like hydras' heads, proclaimed to the princes of 
 succeeding ages not to heave at Jerusalem ; it is too 
 heavy a stone, la/iis comminueiis, a stone that, where 
 it I'alleth, will bruise to pieces ; nor to war against the 
 saints, to band themselves against the Lord's anointed, 
 and against his anointed the church, unless they take 
 pleasure to buy it with the same price wherewith 
 others have done before them, to have their flesh 
 stink upon their backs, and rot from their bodies, to be 
 eaten up with lice and worms ; to be slain, strangled, 
 or burned, some by their own hands, some of their 
 servants, children, and wives, as is most easy to prove 
 in the race of forty emperors, the Lord getting honour 
 upon them, as he did upon Pharaoh, by some un- 
 wonted and infamous destruction. Heliogabalus 
 thought by the policy of his head to have prevented 
 the extraordinary hand of God, providing him ropes 
 of silk, swords of gold, poison in jacinths, a turret 
 plated with gold, and broidered with precious stones, 
 thinking by one of these to have ended his life; not- 
 withstanding, he died that death which the Lord had 
 appointed. 
 
 The second thing which I limited myself unto, that 
 it is the greatest dishonour to religion to pull down 
 princes, is as easy to be declared : a thing which 
 neither Moses in the Old, nor Christ in the New 
 Testament, and neither priest high nor low, nor 
 Levite, prophet, evangelist, apostle. Christian bishop, 
 ever hath taught, counselled, and much less practised, 
 I say not against lawful magistrates, but not against 
 heathenish, infidel, idolatrous, tyrannous rulers, 
 though by the manifest and express sentence of God 
 reprobated and cast off. Samuel offered it not to 
 Saul, a castaway; ho lived and died a king, after the 
 sentence pronounced against him of an higher excom- 
 munication than ever came from Rome. Samuel both 
 honoured and mourned for him, 1 Sam. xv. The 
 captive Jews in I'abylon wrote to their brethren at 
 Jerusalem to ' pray for the life of Nebuchadnezzar,'* 
 answerable to that advice which Jeremiah giveth the 
 captives in the twenty-ninth of his prophecy, though 
 in words somewhat difl'erent, ' Seek the prosperity of 
 the city whither I have caused you to be carried away 
 captives, and pray unto the Lord for it, for in the 
 peace thereof shall you have peace.' Daniel never 
 spake to the king of ]5abylon, but his speech savoured 
 of most perfect obedience : ' My lord, the dream bo 
 to them that hate thee, and the interpretation thereof 
 to thine enemies,' Dan. iv. His words had none other 
 season to Darius, though having cast him into the 
 * Baruch i. 
 
 lions' den, ' king, live for ever,' Dan. vi. I never 
 could suspect that, in the commission of Christ given 
 to his disciples, there is one word of encouragement 
 to these lawless attempts. ' Go into the world, 
 preach, baptize, loose, retain, remit, feed, take the 
 keys, receive the Holy Ghost.' What one syllable 
 soundoth that way ? unless lo ijo into the tvorhl be to 
 go and overrun the world, to shake the pillars and 
 foundations thereof with mutinies and seditions, to 
 replenish it with more than Catilinary conspiracies ; 
 to make one diocese, or rather one dominion and 
 monarchy, subject to the bishop of Rome, unless 
 preaching may be interpreted proclaiming of war and 
 hostility, sending out bulls, thundering and lightning 
 against Cassar and other states ; unless to baptize be to 
 wash the people of the world in their own blood ; 
 unless binding and loosing be meant of fetters and 
 shackles ; retaining and remitting, of prisons and 
 wards ; unless the feeding of lambs and sheep be 
 fleecing, flaying, murdering the king and the subject, 
 old and young ; taking the keys be taking of crowns and 
 sceptres ; and receiving the Holy Ghost be receiving 
 that fiery and turbulent spirit which our Saviour liked 
 not. Yea, let them answer that saying (these priests 
 and successors of Eomulus, giants of the earth, incen- 
 diaries of the Christian world), ' You shall be brought 
 before governors and kings, and scourged in their 
 councils.' If ever our Saviour had meaning, gover- 
 nors and kings shall be brought before you, emperors 
 shall kiss your feet, wait at your gates in frost and 
 cold, resign their crowns into your hands, and take 
 their crowns, I say not at your hands but at your 
 feet, and to your feet submit their necks, and hold 
 your stirrups, or that princes should eat bread under 
 your tables like dogs. I shame almost to report that 
 a scare-crow in an hedge should thus terrify eagles. 
 Where was then the eflect of that prayer which David 
 made in the psalm, ' Lord, give thy judgment unto 
 the king,' when the kings of the earth were so bewitched 
 and enchanted with that cup of fornication ? Christ, 
 though the judge of the quick and dead, refused to be 
 a judge in a private inheritance: Luke xii., 'Who 
 made me a judge or divider over you ? ' These will 
 be judges and disposers of kingdoms, empires, duke- 
 doms, and put lludolph for Henry, Pepin for Childcric, 
 one for another, at their pleasures. And when they 
 have so done, no man must judge of their actions. 
 Why ? Because ' the disciple is not above his master.' 
 Let not a priest give an accusation against a bishop, 
 not a deacon against a priest, not a sub-deacon against 
 a deacon, not an acolyte against a sub-deacon, not an 
 exorcist against an acolyte ; but as for the highest 
 prelate, he shall be judged by no man,* because it is 
 written, non est discipiiliix, &c. So did the devil apply 
 the Scriptures. Tiie apostles all concur in one manner 
 of teaching: llom. xiii., 'Let every soul be subject 
 to the higher powers.' He mcaneth of temporal 
 * M»ssonus in vita Sylvestri. I. 
 
2 Kings XXIII. 2".] 
 
 UPON THE QUEEN S DAY. 
 
 329 
 
 powers, because tliey bear the sword, and require 
 tribute ; and Cbrysostom expoumleth it of all sorts of 
 Bouls, both secular and religious, 1 Peter ii., ' Submit 
 yourselves to every ordinance of man ; fear God, honour 
 the king ;' 1 Tim. ii., ' Let prayer and supplication be 
 made for all men ; for kings, and those that are in 
 authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life 
 under them.' This is the sum of their doctrine. 
 Now either the bishop of Eome hath not a soul to be 
 subject, or he is a power above all powers, and must 
 command others; and so, indeed, he usurpeth, abusing 
 that place of the psalm. Omnia siihjecisti sub pcdibiis 
 ejus, ' Thou hast put all things in subjection under his 
 feet, all sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the 
 field.' Where by oxen are meant Jews and heretics; 
 by beasts of the field, pagans and infidels ; by sliccp. 
 Christians, both kings and subject; by hinis of the air, 
 angels in heaven ; hy fishes in the sea, souls in purga- 
 tory ! I do wrong to your sober ears to fill them with 
 such fables ; but subjection I am sure they deny, if 
 the whole world should be filled with books, legal and 
 evangelical, to admonish -them. Nay, they will take 
 both the law and. gospel, and make them speak vanity, 
 blasphemy, mere contradiction, rather than want 
 authorities to uphold their kingdom. Thus when 
 Adrian set his foot in the neck of the emperor, he 
 alleged the words of the psalm, ' Thou shalt tread 
 upon the adder and the basilisk,' &c. The emperor 
 highly sinned that he had not a sting to thrust forth 
 against him, and to tame his pride. John XXII. 
 perverted the words of Christ to this purpose : ' Behold, 
 I have set thee over kingdoms,' &c. Innocentius III. 
 fetcheth a prophecy of his usurped hierarchy from 
 the first creation : ' God created two lights in the 
 firmament of heaven,' so in the firmament of earth 
 two rulers ; ' a greater and a lesser light,' that 
 is, the pope and the emperor ; ' the one to govern 
 the day, the other the night,' that is, the pope to 
 govern the clergy, the emperor the laity, and for 
 this cause, they say, to shew the difference, the pope 
 hath his unction on the head, the emperor but on his 
 arms ! To leave their glosses and devices, let us 
 hearken to their practice. What a strange command- 
 ment was that which Gregory VII. sent forth ! We com- 
 mand that no man, of what condition soever he be,* 
 either king, or archbishop, bishop, duke, earl, marquis, 
 or knight, be so hardy to resist our legates ; if any 
 man do it, we bind him with the bond of a curse, not 
 only in his spirit, but in his body and all his goods. 
 In excommunicating the emperor then being he used 
 this form : Henry the king, son of Henry late em- 
 peror, I throw down from all both imperial and royal 
 administration, iwpcratorid adiniuislralione, rcfjidque 
 dejicio, &c. ; and I absolve from their oath of obedi- 
 ence all Christians subject to his authority. And 
 being requested to use more mildness in proceeding 
 to excommunicate him, answered for himself. When 
 * J.'andamus ne quisquam audeat. — Platina in his life. 
 
 Christ committed his church to Peter, and said. Feed 
 my sheep, did he exempt kings, e.rccjiilne rcijes ' 
 Afterward he calleth upon Peter and Paul, and saith 
 unto them. Go to now, and so use the matter that all 
 men may understand if yourselves have power to bind 
 and loose in heaven, that we may have also power on 
 earth, both to take away and to give empires, king- 
 doms, principalities, and whatsoever mortal men may 
 have, el quieqtiid habere mortales possunt. Boniface 
 VIII., whom Benevenutus called the tyrant over 
 priests, tijraiuuis sacerdotuiii, Petrarch the terror of 
 kings, refjum terror, named himself the lord not only 
 of France, but of the whole world. Philip, surnamed 
 the Fair, then king of France, advised him not to use 
 that kind of speech to the overthrow of his kingdom. 
 Hence gi-ew all those stirs and tumults between them. 
 It is a notable admonition which Massonus there giveth 
 in the knitting up of his life, I would wish the bishops 
 of the city not to make kings their enemies, who are 
 willing to be their friends ; for let them not think that 
 they are sent from God as bridles unto kings, to 
 master them at their pleasure as wild and unbroken 
 horses, vehd equos intractatos ; let them admonish and 
 pray them, and their hearty prayers shall be instead 
 of commanding ; but to threaten, terrify, raise up 
 arms, is not beseeming bishops, minari, terrefacere, 
 arma ciere, cpiscopos non dccet. Platina concludeth 
 him almost to the same effect : Thus dieth Boniface, 
 whoso endeavours evermore were rather to bring in 
 terror than religion upon emperors, kings, princes, 
 nations, and peoples. 
 
 This Platina was a professed catholic, living within 
 a college at Rome, that you may the less think the 
 author willing to slander them. On a time when Paul 
 the Second went about to pull down that college,* he 
 besought the pope that the matter might first be heard 
 before the masters of the rolls, or other like judges : 
 Itane, ait ? iins ad jiidices rerocat .' What ! Is it come 
 to this ? saith he. Dost thou call us back unto judges ? 
 Dost thou not know that all the laws are placed in the 
 shrine of my breast ? Innocentius the Sixth sendeth 
 Carilas, a Spanish cardinal, but withal a cardinal war- 
 rior, into Italy, to recover St Peter's patrimony, if 
 prayers were unavailable, by force of arms ; for arms 
 are the succours of popes, when prayers will not serve. f 
 Innocentius the Seventh had a meeker spirit, of whom 
 Baptista Fulgosus writeth, that such idle hours as he 
 had, he bestowed in pruning his orchard, and wished 
 that other popes had done the like, who were better 
 pleased with making war ; for it is fitter for the 
 bishops of Rome to prune orchards than men , hortos cnim 
 piitare, non hojnines, episcoposUoinanos decet. Julius the 
 Second, who from Juhanus turned his name to Julius, 
 that he might somewhat match himself with Juhus 
 Ca3sar, ut rcfcrret Juliiiin, was wont to say. It is a 
 
 * In vita Paul! II. 
 
 t Arma sunt pontific m perfiigia, cum prcccs non ser- 
 viunt. — Massonut. 
 
330 
 
 A SERMON PREACHED 
 
 [2 Kings XXIII. 25. 
 
 base thing that the Levites should servo and be in 
 subjection, indiijnitm Levitas servite, &c., who rather 
 arc meet to govern other men. Erasmus being at 
 Bonony in his time, thus -nTiteth to his friend : At 
 this present, stiadies are very cold in Italj', wai'S very 
 hot ; Julius, the highest bishop, fighteth, vanquish- 
 eth, triumpheth, and playeth the part of Julius 
 indeed, sutiimus pontife.v Julius bellic/eratur, vincit, 
 triumphal, et plane Julium ar/it. Worthy of immortal 
 fame (saith the author of the history), if he had been 
 the emperor, rather than the pope of Kome, si Ccesar 
 j)otiits quam puiitifc.r inaxiiiius fuisset.* 
 
 To conclude ; I will but add what Petrarch, an Ita- 
 lian, and countryman of their own, and one whom 
 Innoeentius would fain have had to have been his 
 secretary, writeth of the pope by way of dialogue. 
 
 Pope. Sujiniii pjonlificatus arccm. rcijo. I hold the 
 tower, or sway the honour of the highest prelacj'. 
 
 Petrarch. Solebant pirimi ex hoc statu ad marlyrium 
 peti. The first were wont to be taken from this 
 estate to martyrdom, now Ihey think they are called 
 to pleasure ; therefore they strive so much for the 
 place. 
 
 Pope. I am the pope of Rome. 
 
 Petrarch. Thou art called the servant of servants ; 
 take heed thou make not thyself the lord of lords ; 
 remember thy profession, remember thy debt, remem- 
 ber thy Lord, who justly is angry with none more 
 than with his vicar or deputy. 
 
 With many other free and friendly exhortations of 
 the like force. Kow, if their spirits be so mighty and 
 untamed, let them exercise them at home, with mu- 
 tual iusidiations, contentions, depositions, murderings, 
 poisonings, and other unpriostly and violent supplanta- 
 tions amongst themselves. And if ever that judgment 
 were tnie, which Petrarch gave, hrevis est homimim 
 vita, rei/iim lirerior, pontificum hrcvissima, that the life 
 of men is short, of kings shorter, of popes shortest of 
 all, let it be true still ; yea, let all Babylon fall, and 
 let the seat of antichrist be razed to the ground ; but 
 God, for bis own glory, and for his gospel and 
 church's sake, establish the thrones, strengthen the 
 bauds, lengthen the days, preserve the lives, honour 
 the faces, of all religious and virtuous princes ! 
 
 Because my text standeth wholly in comparison 
 betwixt Josiah and other kings, give mo leave, I be- 
 seech you, in few words, for the advancement of God's 
 blessed name, whoso goodness we are highly bound to 
 acknowledge, a testimony of mine own dutiful heart, 
 and a further animation, to you my brethren and the 
 children of this land, to continue your obedience and 
 faith, to make some little comparison betwixt good 
 King Josiah and gi-acious Queen Elizabeth. 1. They 
 both interpret their names in rendering and express- 
 ing by action the force thereof. Josiah, of the fire 
 of lite Lord, with whose zeal be was inllamed ; Kliza- 
 belh, of bis rest, both because she reposeth herself in 
 * Massonua. 
 
 his strength, and for that_the quiet and tranquillity of 
 this land was by her happj' government restored. 
 2. Josiah was prophesied of long before his birth : 
 1 Kings xiii., ' altar, altar, &c. Behold a child 
 shall be born to the bouse of David, Josiah by name; 
 and upon thee shall he oiler the priests of the high 
 places,' &c. ; and undoubtedly they presaged much of 
 the abolishing of altars and priests under the reign of 
 Queen Ehzabeth, who laboured to prevent her govern- 
 ment by such manifold practices. 3. Josiah, at the 
 age of sixteen years, sought the God of his father 
 David : I never read or heard to the contrary, but 
 that the childhood and prime of our sovereign lad}-, 
 and that glorious blossom, her brother, of blessed 
 memory, were dedicated to true religion. 4. Josiah 
 forsaketh the idolatry of Amou and Manasseh that 
 went next before him, and roturneth back to the faith 
 of David : Elizabeth declineth the path which her 
 sister Mary had trodden, the footsteps whereof were 
 yet very fresh, and reneweth the ways of her father 
 and brother almost worn out. 5. Josiah had a good 
 priest, a good prophet, and a good chancellor, a good 
 nobility, faithful workmen : ' The king commanded 
 that no account should be taken of them, for they did 
 their work faithfully.' It had not been possible to 
 have repaired the ruins of defaced religion within this 
 land without the advice and assistance of as faithful 
 a council and as zealous priests, of which, though 
 many were cast out for a time from their native 
 country into Germany and other foreign parts, as a 
 distempered stomach cannot endure to keep whole- 
 some meats in it, yet they were brought home again 
 with honour as banished Jephtha was, and deservedly 
 preferred to the highest dignities of our church. Such 
 nobles and priests as she then had, the Lord for ever 
 bless her with, lest it be said of this kingdom, as 
 sometimes of the court of Maximilian, An hundred 
 have to deal in the affairs of the commonwealth, but 
 scarcely five, or but eight at the most, help them 
 forwards, all the rest are hinderers.* 6. Josiah 
 pulled down altars, priests, groves, high places, bouses 
 of Sodomites ; Queen Elizabeth left neither college 
 nor cloister, nor any other cage of idolatrous birds, 
 and neither monk nor friar, to feed her people with 
 errors. 7. Josiah found and restored the book of the 
 law hidden in oLiscurity ; Queen Elizabeth delivered 
 fi-om darkness and banishment the testaments of her 
 God, not only hidden and buried in an unknown 
 tongue, but in corners and holes laid up, and forbidden 
 the light of heaven ; restoring both the letter of the 
 book to a vulgar language, and her people to freedom 
 of conscience, who might not read before, but privily 
 and by stealth, as men eat stolen bread. Finally, 
 Josiah was directed in all bis ways by the book of the 
 law ; and no other star guided the heart of our gra- 
 cious Esther. Josiah caused the book of the law to 
 * Centum admiiistrant negotia rciimblicne, sed vix quin- 
 que aut octo promovent, cajteri iinpediunt. 
 
2 Kings XXIII. 25.] 
 
 UPON THE QUEEN S DAT. 
 
 331 
 
 be openly read ; sbe, the everlasting gospel to be 
 preached throughout all her realms and dominions. 
 Josiah makelh a covenant himself, and taketh a cove- 
 nant of his people to observe it; she also bindeth her 
 people by statutes and laws to the true worship of 
 God, herself not second to any in rendering her vows. 
 Josiah holdeth a famous passover, the like whereof, 
 from the days of the judges and throughout all the 
 days of the kings, had never been seen ; and her Ma- 
 jesty hath purged the sacraments of Christ and reduced 
 them to their right form, which I say not from the 
 time of the ConQueror, but almost since the days of 
 the apostles, they were never happy enough to obtain. 
 And as Josiah turned to the Lord with all his heart, 
 &c. ; so whether her beautiful feet have not taken a 
 contrary course to that wherein others had walked 
 before her, and turned like the waters of Jordan when 
 Israel went over it, not only the people of this land, 
 but almost of whole Christendom, swimming away 
 apace in a full flood of popish superstition ; and 
 whether to the Lord alone, angels and saints omitted, 
 who in the consciences and opinions of men had set 
 their seats by the seat of almighty God, and said, We 
 will be like unto him in worship ; and whether, with 
 all her heart, and with all her soul, and with all her 
 might, &c., whom neither the curses of popes, nor 
 the banding of the princes of the earth, crying, ' A 
 confederacy, a confederacy ' against her, nor practices 
 without her realm, nor rebellions within, nor the 
 disloyalty of malcontented subjects, nor treachery 
 within her court and almost within her bosom, did 
 ever affright, at least not shake from her first love, as 
 they have done other princes, and cause to deal 
 unfaithfully with the covenants of God ; let all the 
 people of the earth, so far as the fame of her con- 
 stancy might be blown, bear witness with me. 
 
 Now there are also some differences, heaping more 
 honour and favour upon the head of our sovereign 
 lady, than befell Josiah. For albeit Josiah began to 
 reign sooner, yet she hath longer continued ; and 
 where Josiah reigned but thirty-one years, she hath 
 accomplished the full number of thirty-seven, within 
 few months of her father's time. And whereas Josiah 
 but in the eighth year of his reigm began to seek the 
 God of his father David, in the twelfth to purge Jeru- 
 salem, and in the eighteenth to repair the house of the 
 Lord ; this chosen handmaid of the Most High, with 
 the first beginning of her kingdom began to set up the 
 kingdom of God, and so incontinently proceeded to a 
 full refoi-mation. Lastly, 2 Chron. xsxv. 22, Josiah 
 was slaiu in battle for not hearkening to the words of 
 the Lord out of the mouth of Necho the king of 
 Egypt. But long and long may it be before her eyes 
 was dim in her head, or her natural force be abated. 
 And when she is gathered to her fathers (the burden 
 and woe thereof, if the will of God be, fall upon 
 another age !), let her go to rest with greater tokens 
 of his favour, than ever to have fallen into the hands 
 
 of the king of Spain, or any the like enemy, as Josiah 
 fell into the hands of the king of Egypt. But when 
 that day shall come, which God hath decreed, and 
 nature his faithful minister written down in her book 
 justly to observe ; then (to go back again to another 
 member of comparison) as Josiah, 2 Chron. sxxv., 
 ' was mourned for by all Judah and Jerusalem, and 
 Jeremiah mourned for Josiah : and all singing men 
 and singing women mourned for Josiah in their 
 lamentations to this day, and made the same lamenta- 
 tions an ordinance in Israel : and they were also 
 written in their lamentations, and became a common 
 word amongst them ;' for whensoever afterwards there 
 was taken up any gi'eat lamentation, it was sampled 
 and matched with that ' of Hadadrimmon in the field 
 of Megiddon,' Zech. sii., so look for mourning fi'om 
 all the ends of oiu- laud, complaining in the streets of 
 every city, and crying in the chambers of every house, 
 ' Alas for the day of the Lord, it is come, it is come ; 
 then shall the kindred of the house of David, and 
 their wives mom-n apart by themselves ; the kindred 
 of the houses of Nathan and Levi, and their wives 
 apart by themselves.' Then shall all the orders 
 and companies of this realm, from the honom-able 
 coimsellor to him that draweth water to the camp, 
 from the man of grey hairs to the j'onng child that 
 knoweth but the right hand from the left ; plentifully 
 water theii' cheeks, and give as just an occasion of 
 Chronicles and Proverbs to future times, as the 
 mom-ning for Josiah. For to fold up all other com- 
 parison in one, and to draw them home to my text, 
 not only betwnxt her and Josiah, but other her noble 
 progenitors and lords of this island, ' like unto her, 
 was there no king or queen before her.' And those 
 that shall WTitc hereafter in the generations to come, 
 shall be able as justly to supply the other part, 
 ' Neither arose there after her, any that was like unto 
 her.' And I verily persuade myself, that as the Lord 
 was angry with Judah and Jerusalem, and threatened 
 to bring e\il upon them, yet deferred to execute that 
 judgment in the days of Josiah, with promise of a 
 peaceable burial, and that his eyes should not see that 
 evil ; so he spareth om- country for his anointed's sake, 
 and reserveth his just and determinate plagues against 
 us to the days of some of her successors ; and when 
 he hath shut up her eyes in peace, then will begin to 
 open our judgments. 
 
 1 will not put .you in fear with the fatal period of 
 kingdoms, which many, both philosophers and divines, 
 more than imagine ; conceiving by reason that as in 
 the bodies of men and other living creatures, so in these 
 pohtic bodies of monarchies, empires, kingdoms and 
 other states, there is a beginning and a strong age, 
 a declination and full point ; and by many experiments 
 bearing themselves in hand, that then- alterations 
 have commonly fallen out not much over or under 
 five hundred years. From the erecting of the king- 
 dom of Israel under the hand of Saul, to then- going 
 
332 
 
 A SERMON PREACHED 
 
 [2 KlXGS XXIII. 25. 
 
 into Babylon, they say, were four hundred and nine- 
 teen j-ears. The consuls of Kome continued 4G2 ; 
 the monarchy flourished 454 ; Constantmople was the 
 seat of the Koman emperor 489. La Nove, when he 
 wi'ote his militar}' and politic discourses, observed the 
 like number of time in their kingdom of France, from 
 the diiys of Hugh Capetz. The stay of the Saxons in 
 England is esteemed thereabouts. And since the time 
 of the Norman Conquest, the seventy and seven weeks 
 of Daniel, that is, seventy times seven years, are ful- 
 filled, and God hath added thereunto, as the fifteen years 
 of Hczekiah, and as the surjjiusage of his love, only 
 the happy reign of our liege lady and mistress that 
 now ruleth. But as the apostle spake in his Revela- 
 tion, ' Here is wisdom ; if any man have wisdom 
 enough, let him account the number of kingdoms 
 in this sort ; ' for it may be the number of God him- 
 self, and he hath reserved it to his own knowledge. 
 But in open and simple terms, I will shew you what 
 the periods and stops of kingdoms are. Propter 
 jicccala 2>opuU crunt multi priiicipes, 'For the sins 
 of the people, the prince shall often be changed,' 
 Prov. xxviii., and in likelihood the people itselt' for 
 the same cause. The Lord hath tied himself no 
 farther to the king's sons and seed after him, than 
 with this reasonable and dutiful condition, ' If they 
 shall keep my testimonies.' And he often threatened 
 his people, if they provoked him with strange gods, to 
 provoke them again with a strange people, and to 
 di-ive them out of the good land, whither he sent 
 them to dwell, as he had driven out others. All those 
 removes and changes that we read of in the book of 
 God and in other histories, the emptying of the land 
 of Canaan from her natural inhabitants, disposing of 
 one state and setting up another, dividing the tribes, 
 raising kingdom against kingdom, the untimely deaths 
 and deprivations of princes, the disinheriting and 
 displacing of the right line, leading into captivity 
 from country to country, as it were pouring from 
 vessel to vessel, sometimes no kings at all, sometimes 
 many, sometimes \\ieked, sometimes a babe, some- 
 times a stranger of a iiercc countenance and unknown 
 language, all the commotions and perturbations of 
 kingdoms, invasions of kings one upon the other's 
 dominions, relicUions of subjects, and so much of 
 Christendom at this day buried in the veiy bowels of 
 Turkism and infidelity ; yea, the extirpation of the 
 Jews, and planting of the Gentiles upon their stock, 
 and hereafter the casting out of the Gentiles, and 
 filling of the Jews again, they are all rightly and 
 orderly derived from the former cause. For the sins 
 of the people, the princes, the people themselves, the 
 government, the policy, the religion, the peace, the 
 plenty of the land sliall often bo changed. 
 
 We have long and faithfully preached against your 
 sins, the dissolvers, you see, of kingdoms and com- 
 monweals, that if it were possible we might bring 
 them also to their period, and set some numbers and 
 
 end of them. Will you not be made clean ? when 
 shall it once be ? But if our preachings cannot move 
 you, ' he tiiat in times past, at sundry times and in 
 sundry manners, spake unto our fiithers,' hath also 
 sundry voices and sundry kinds of preachers to speak 
 unto 3'ou. You hear that the change of a prince is 
 one of bis preachers. It shall preach more sorrow unto 
 you, more wringing of your hands and rending of your 
 hearts, than ever erst you were acquainted with. Re- 
 member the vision that Micaiah saw, ' all Israel scat- 
 tered like sheep,' because their king was taken from 
 them; and think how woeful a day it will be when this 
 faithful shepherdof ours, which hath fed her Jacob with 
 a true heart, foriiwsi pcroris cnstos fonnosior ijisa, an 
 happy queen of an happy people (the Lord yet saving 
 both her and us with the healthful power of his right 
 baud), shall be pulled from us. We have hitherto lived 
 in peace equal to that in the days of Augustus, such as 
 our fathers never saw the like ; and when we shall tell 
 our children's children to come thereof, thej' will not 
 believe it. We have sittcn at ease under the shadow of 
 om- vines, nay, under the shadow of this vine we have 
 shaded and solaced ourselves, and lived by her sweet- 
 ness. But it may fall out that, as when the emperor 
 Pertinas was dead, they cried with redoubled shouts 
 unto the air till they were able to cry no longer, vsijue 
 ad (h'/cctioii, while Pertiuas lived and governed, we 
 lived in safety and feared no man, T'crtinan impcrante 
 seairi vi.r'unm, nemincm tiiiiuiiiuin ;* so we may send 
 our late and helpless complaints into heaven : Oh well 
 were we in the days of Queen Elizabeth, when perfect 
 peace was the walls of our country, and the mahce of 
 the enemy prevailed not against us. 
 
 The sword of a foreign foe, bands, and captivity is 
 another of his preachers. Will you not feel the warn- 
 ings of God's wrath till the iron have entered into your 
 souls and drawn blood after it ? You know who it is 
 that hangeth over your beads, of whom and other 
 princes I may say as thej' said in Athens of Dcmades 
 and Demosthenes their orators : Demosthenes is meet 
 for Athens, justly assized and fitted to the city, De- 
 mades over-great, Dcnioxthcncs par Allwiiif, Ihinades 
 major ; so when other kings hold themselves contented 
 with their kingdom, be is too great for Spain, and 
 many other kingdoms and dukedoms cannot suffice 
 him, but he yet devourctb in hope all the dominions 
 of Christendom, and drinketh down with unsatiable 
 thirst, the conceit of a monarch ; and for this cause 
 there is a busy spirit gone forth in the mouths of all 
 his prophets, Units Dens, umis papa, uiius rex Chris- 
 tiaiiisnii, 7nafiiius re.r catholicus, et nniversaUs: There is 
 but one G od, one pope, one king of Christendom, the great 
 and catholic and universal king. He hath once already 
 buckled his harness unto him with joy, and assured 
 presumption of victory. But they that pulled it off 
 (by outstretched arm of one more mighty than him- 
 self) more rejoiced. God grant that they bo not found 
 * Aurelius Victor. 
 
2 Kings XXIII. 25.] 
 
 UPON THE QUEENS DAY. 
 
 333 
 
 in England who h.ive said upon that happy and mira- 
 culous event in discomfiting his forces, ' We will trust 
 in our bows, and our swords and spears shall here- 
 after dehver us.' Their touching of late in Cornwall, 
 the utmost skirt of our land, no doubt, was some 
 little warning from God. But it was no more unto 
 us than if the skirt of our cloak had been cut away, 
 as it was to Saul ; we say our skin is not yet razed. 
 The commotion in Ireland, though a quicker and more 
 sensible admonition, is but a dagger held to our side, 
 and till the point thereof stick in our heart, till there 
 be firing of our towns, ransacking of our houses, dash- 
 ing of our infants against the stones in the streets, 
 we will not regard. Oh cease to incense the jealous 
 God of heaven. Turn not his grace and mercy into 
 wantonness ! Let not his strength be an occasion 
 unto you to make you vainly confident, nor his peace 
 licentiously secure, nor the abundance of his goodness 
 abundant and intolerable in transgressing his laws. 
 And if there were no other reason to make you 
 tremble before his face, j'et do it for your own politic 
 good (because you are threatened by a deadly enemy, 
 who accountcth himself the cedar, and us but the 
 thistle in Lebanon, 2 Chron. xxv., and whose power 
 is not contemptible, though God hath often cast him 
 down) AV veniant Uoinaiti ct (uiferant ri'i/nuin a nobis, 
 at least that the Romans and Spaniards, for they are 
 brethren in this case, come not upon us by the right- 
 eous sufferance of our God, and take away oui- king- 
 dom. Surely our sins call for a scourge, and they 
 shall receive one. For they even whip and torment 
 the patience of God. ' The arrows of death are pre- 
 pared against us,' and they shall shine with our gall 
 if with humble repentance we prevent them not. Our 
 pride calleth for humiliation ; she is ascended on 
 high, and asketh, ' Who shall fetch me down ? ' yet I 
 have read of those whose wimples, and cauls, and 
 periwigs have been turned into nakedness and bald- 
 ness, and they have run to and fro, smiting their 
 breasts, and tearing the hair of their heads, suffering 
 it to be blown about their ears with the wind, and not 
 regarding to bind it up so much as with an hair-lace. 
 Our clocks are not well kept, nor our chimneys good 
 (which I have heard to be two signs of a well-ordered 
 commonwealth, horoloijium bene ordinatum, cainini 
 honi) ; that is, our hours are misspent, our callings 
 not followed, and the breathing of the chimneys is 
 choked up, hospitality and relief to the poor almost 
 banished. The poorer have had their plagues already; 
 scarcity of bread within these few j'ears often renewed. 
 Their teeth have been clean and white through want 
 of food, when yours have been furred w'ith excess of 
 meats and drinks. But, rich men and gentlemen, 
 look also for your draught in the cup of the Lord : 
 either some mortal sickness to your bodies to eat up 
 your flesh, as you have eaten others', 'and then 
 ■whose shall these things be,' which, with so much 
 sweat of your brows, carefulness of heart, rack of 
 
 conscience, breach of charity, wrong to human socie- 
 ties, you have laid together ? or some barbarous and 
 unmerciful soldier to lay open your hedges, reap your 
 fields, barbarus has seijeles, rifle your coffers, level 3'our 
 houses with the ground, and empty you and yours out 
 of all your possessions, as you have emptied your poor 
 neighbours. 
 
 Your merciless money exactions, you, the infamous 
 usurers of the north of England ; you, the Jews and 
 Judases of our land, that woul.l sell Christ for money 
 if he were amongst you ; you, the engrossers of grain 
 in this time of dearth, and withal the engrossers of 
 your own woes, on whom the curse of the poor 
 lighteth, ratified in heaven, for not bringing forth 
 your corn ; you, that add atHiction to atflictiou, and 
 strengthen the hand of penury amongst us, use the 
 talents of the Lord, not your own pounds, to the 
 honourable advantage of your Master and the durable 
 gain of your souls, lest ye become the usurers of his 
 vengeance, and receive the wages of your unfaithful- 
 ness an hundredfold. 
 
 Tlic land mourneth because of oaths, and they shall 
 mourn that cause her heaviness. Contempt of God 
 will take away our gods of the earth ; atheism and 
 anarchy, confusion of all estates, mingling of head and 
 foot, will go together. 
 
 ('/( p nil/ for the peace of Jernsah-m. Pray for the 
 peace of England. Let prayers and supplications be 
 made for all people, especially for Christian kings, 
 most especially for our sovereign lady and mistressf 
 Let us fear God ; and all the enemies of the world, even 
 the kingdom of darkness, shall fear us. Let not our 
 sins reign, and our queen shall long reign over us. 
 Buy the length of her life with your silver and gold, 
 you that are rich in this world, rich in this land, dis- 
 tribute to the poor, scatter for God's sake, and God 
 that seeth from above will be mindful of your good 
 deeds, and prolong her Majesty's days. Humble 
 yourselves in time, you high-minded and high-looked, 
 that her horn may be exalted, and her root flourish 
 amongst us yet many years. Traitors, forbear at 
 length to plot your treasons, which have long bred, 
 never brought forth. The Lord is king, and his 
 handmaid is queen, be the earth never so impatient. 
 Time-serving hypocrites, lay down youi' dissimulations. 
 How long will you halt between Rome and England ? 
 Rebels, forsake and resign your unlawful arms. Say 
 not, as those seditious did, ' What part have we in 
 the son of David ? ' The son of David shall prevail, and 
 the daughter of King Henry prosper in all her ways, 
 when your heads shall lie low enough, and your 
 swords shall have drunk their fill of j'our own flesh. 
 Let it suffice you, the untamed brood of our land, to 
 have blotted j'our memories with none other censure 
 than that which is WTitton in the book of God, 1 Sam. 
 X., that a ' band of soldiers followed Saul, whose 
 hearts the Lord had touched, but they were wicked 
 that cried. How shall ho save us '?' 
 
334 
 
 A SERMON PREACHED UPON THE QUEEN S DAT. 
 
 [2 Kings XXIII. 25 
 
 Aud you, my beloved brethren, the true childi-cn of 
 England, knit your souls and tongues together, as if 
 you were one man, and s-aj, with a strong, united cry 
 and a perfect heart, that God may regard it from 
 above, ' Lord, preserve Queen Elizabeth!' And let 
 Amen, even the faithful witness of heaven, the word 
 and truth of his Father, say Amen unto it. Even so, 
 Lord Jesus, Amen, Amen ; hearken to the prayers of 
 
 thy servants that go not out from feigned lips ; let her 
 ever be as near unto thee as the signet upon thy 
 linger, as dear as the apple of thine eye, as tender as 
 thine own bowels ; water her with the dew of heaven 
 as the goodHest plant that ever om- country bare, hide 
 her like a chosen shaft in the quiver of thy carefuUest 
 providence, and give her a long life, even for ever and 
 ever. Amen. 
 
 FINIS. 
 
RAINOLDS ON OBADIAE 
 
THE 
 
 PROPHECY OF OBADIAH 
 
 OPENED AND APPLIED. 
 
 IN SUNDRY SERMONS. 
 
 BY THAT FAMOUS AND JUDICIOUS DIVINE, 
 
 Y 
 JOHN KAINOLDS, D.D. 
 
 EDINBURGH: JAMES NICHOL. 
 LONDON : JAMES NISBET AND CO. DUBLIN : G. HERBERT, 
 
 M.DCCC.LXIV. 
 
JOHN RAINOLDS, D.D 
 
 To have been the originator of that revised translation of the Holy Scriptures which, as our 
 ' Englisli Bible,' stands at the head of the Literature of England in potent and imperishable 
 influence for good — to have been regarded as a ' foemau worthy of his steel' by Bellarmine — to 
 have been missed and mourned by Scaliger, ' unused to weep' — to have united in his honour and 
 ever-recurring praise as scliolar, divine, controversialist, and man, the Precisian of ecclesiastical 
 order, and the Puritan in doctrine — to have won the lavish 'testimonies' of Crakanthorpe and 
 Joseph Hall, Harrington and Heylin, Fuller and Strype, Neal and Anthony a-Wood, and more 
 recently of Robinson of Cambridge, Price and Henry Hallam, Marsden and Perry, and the trans- 
 atlantic Hopkins — to have been the revered tutor of Richard Hooker — to have been selected 
 to write the epitaph of Sir Philip Sidney — and all this without sacrificing his own marked 
 individuality of character or intrepidity of adhesion to unpopular principles — argues a remark- 
 able combination of ' gifts and graces.' All this, and more, belongs to John Rainolds, a doer 
 of many noble and ' lovely' deeds (Philip, iv. 8), a scholar of the grand old stamp, a thinker as 
 well, a ' contender for the faith,' of extraordinary resources and self-possession, and author of 
 books which will never lose their value in the estimation of any who are capable of being 
 impressed with ' thoughts that breathe in words that burn.'* Except Thomas Cartwkight — 
 whose story we have already briefly toldj — there is scarcely a contemporary name more worthy 
 of a large and full biography. Our reprint of his little ' Openings,' or Commentaries on Haggai 
 and Obadiah, are only gleanings — for they were posthumous — of a rich harvest. Hence, more 
 than a slight sketch of the leading facts of his life were disproportionate here. This wo proceed 
 to give : and for further and minuter details, the reader is referred to the authorities below. + 
 
 John Rainolds, 7iot Reynolds — as many earlier and later have misspelled his name, thereby 
 leading to a confounding of him with Dr Edward Reynolds, the Puritan Bishop of Norwich § — was 
 
 * We have seen a letter from the late Professor Scholc- 
 field, in wliicli he stated very strongly his wi.sli that tlicro 
 might be a collective edition, worthily edited, of t lie Works 
 of Ur Rainolds ; and his deep regret that the failure of the 
 Parker Society series prevented its being undertaken under 
 their auspices. However historically interesting, one can- 
 not help deploring the vast amount of merely ecclesiastical 
 writings reproduced by the ' Parker,' while so much of 
 deeper and enduring Church literature was overpassed. 
 
 •|- Prefixed to his Exposition of Colossians in Vol. I. of 
 the present series of Commenlaries. 
 
 J Tho List under Cartwright above will servo equally for 
 33'J 
 
 Rainolds ; but besides, see the different accounts of the 
 ' Hampton Court Conference,' and tho memoirs of the 
 numerous Bi.shops and Divines engaged in it, also tho 
 hooks and documents quoted in our present Memoir. We 
 have to offer special thanks to Joshua Wilson, Esq., Nevih, 
 Park, Tunbridge AVells, for his interleaved copy of Brook's 
 ' Lives of the Puritan.-*,' with the author's MS. additions. 
 These are considerable uniler Rainolds, and we have made 
 use of them, after verification. 
 
 i Even Price, Marsden, Keble, and Perry, throughout 
 misspell ' Reynolds.' Reginaldus is tho Latinized form. 
 
VI JOBTM RAIXOLDS, P.P. 
 
 born in 1549, at Penhoe or Pinlioe, near Exetei-, in Devon — the county of Jewell and Hooker, of 
 Drake and Raleigh. This ' Penhoe,' or ' Pynhoe,' as Anthony a-Wood gives it, with still another, 
 ' alias PinhawGs,' was the seat of an old Family of tlie name.* His father was Richard Rainolds, 
 son of another Richard, and brother to Thomas Rainolds, D.D., celebrated in ' Merton' College, 
 Oxford,! and he farmed his own family lands. John was the fifth son. It is necessary to notice 
 one of his brothers, viz., William, the second son of his ftither. An epigram of Dr Alabaster gave 
 cuiTeney and substantiveness to an absurd rumour, that the two brothers — William being then 
 a zealous Protestant, and John a bigoted papist — having engaged in conference and disputation 
 on the matters in debate between the Reformers and anti-Reformers, each converted the other 
 to his respective opinions. Certainly William, once a Protestant, became a fierce and violent 
 adherent of the papacy; and certainly John, through life, shared witii Whittaker the name of 
 ' Hammer of the Papists ;' but Robert Parsons — himself a Jesuit as well as papist — furnishes a 
 less romantic, less fantastic, but, on the face of it, more probable account of William's apostiisy. 
 Says Anthony a-Wood, after mentioning the epigram, ' This is the reason commonly received 
 among Protestants for each other's conversion, but false ; for the dispute was, if you will believe 
 one that then lived, between John and Edmund Rainolds, of C.C. coll., as I have told you else- 
 where. So that now there being no pretence left for William's conversion by disputing with his 
 brother John, you may take this reason following, different from the other, if your charity will 
 permit you to believe a R. Catholic author, as he had received it from the mouth or jien of 
 Will. Rainolds, which is this, — "Mr William Rainolds being first an earnest professor and 
 preacher of the Protestant religion in England, and much engaged among the Puritans in North- 
 amptonshire (as he was wont to tell), he fell in the end to read over Mr Jewell's book, and did 
 translate some part thereof into Latin ; but before he had passed half over, he found such stuff 
 as made him greatly mistake of the whole religion, and so he, leaving his hopes and commodities 
 in England, went over the sea, and the last year of Jubilee, to wit, 1575, he came to Rome, and 
 brought that book with him, and presented the inquisition, of his own free motion and accord, 
 where I guess the book remaineth still, if it be not burned; and himself, after absolution received 
 for his former errors (which he with great humility and zeal required, and myself also, at that 
 time, spake with him in that place), he returned into France and Flanders, and there lived many 
 years, ^vith singular edification for his rare virtue and learning," ' &c.J 
 
 That Master John should have been deemed capable, so early as his seventeenth year, of 
 ' disputing' with, much more of ' converting,' a brother so much his senior, and possessed of no 
 little learning and acumen, if it betrays forgetfulncss of chronology, also indirectly shews how 
 soon he had won for himself eminence. 
 
 We have no information concerning the early years and early education of young Rainolds. His 
 brother William was .sent to Winchester ; but it does not appear that John was. He became ' a 
 student in Merton College, Oxford, in 1562, aged 13, or thereabouts. '§ His uncle was Vice-Clian- 
 cellor of Merton, and a consistent Roman Catholic, having gained the esteem of JIary. 
 He remained a very short time in Merton, being admitted scholar of 'Corpus Christi' 
 College — the college of Jewell and Jackson, in which Devonians had certain sciiolarships — on 
 29th April 1563, passed as fellow 11th October 1566, and proceeded M.A. in 1572-3, aljout which 
 
 * A. 0. i. 014, ii 12. 
 
 t For Thomas Eiiinolds or Raynolds, see Wood, as 
 before, Fasti, i. 03, 103, 133, 149; also A. 0. stib nomine, 
 Hist, and Ant. of Un. of Ox. under ' Merton' College. 
 
 X Wood, A 0. as before, i. pp, (113, 014, and his History 
 and Antiquities of tho Univ. of Oxon., for the epigram, lib 
 ii. J). 139 a, and for the alleged disputation, lib. i. p. 300 b 
 
 (tilled in by IJUss) ; see too Heylin's Laud, p. 4C ; Fuller's 
 Abel, p. 479 ; Beloc's ' Anecdotes,' i. p. 195 ; and Hobert 
 Parsons' ' A Helation of a tryal made before the King of 
 France, between the Bishop of Eureux and the Lord 
 Plessis Mornay,' 1004, jip. 67, 68. 
 § Wood, as' before, A. 0. ii. 13, 14. 
 
 340 
 
JOHN EAINOLDS, D.D. yii 
 
 date he was ' Greek reader' in his college. In 1579, he was admitted to ' the reading of the sen- 
 tences.' In 1585-6, he passed B.D., 'being then in great esteem for his profound learning.'* 
 
 We have a glimpse of him in his college-days, in a letter dated August 13. 1576, to the 
 inestimable Reformer Gualter, who, having finished his education at Oxford, had returned to 
 Zurich, and entered on his work as a Minister of the Go.spel. The letter is preserved among 
 the priceless treasures of the 'fair city' which has given its name to that 'Correspondence/ 
 by the printing of which, the 'Parker Society' has laid the Church of Christ under a deep 
 debt of gratitude. A few sentences may be acceptable. He says — ' I candidly acknowledge 
 myself the more obliged to you, and exceedingly rejoice that, although separated by so great a 
 distance, and wholly occujjied by matters both of a public and domestic nature, you nevertheless 
 both retain in your mind and cherish by your kindness, so grateful a remembrance of me. For 
 my part, though I will never allow you to excel me in love wherewith you love one who love s 
 you in return ; yet I must necessarily allow you the priority in this respect, that you have pre- 
 ceded me in the manifestation of your regard.' He then proceeds to notice a little poem which 
 Gualter had sent him, and after a tribute to its merits, specially approves his ' affection to the 
 Church of England,' whose ' pious defender,' he goes on, ' Elizabeth, you commend, while you 
 wound that cruel executioner Bonner ; scourge her bitter adversaries, the papists ; comfort her 
 afflicted members, the Christians ; deplore her wretched condition as she is now in languish- 
 ment ; and, lastly, implore Jesus Christ to favour her with divine compassion.' He then warmly 
 and pleasantly congratulates Gualter upon having the charge of a flock, and also upon being 
 united in marriage to a most excellent lady, ' who would be not only a helpmate, but also a guide 
 and mother in godliness,' urging him onwards in the best pursuits.! 
 
 But the glory of Rainolds in these earlier days, was that he had for a scholar perhaps the most 
 illustrious of the names of the Church of England — ElCHARD Hooker, who, as also a citizen of 
 Exeter, may have been thereby attracted to choose him. It is strange to find loveable Isaak 
 Walton leaving Rainolds unnamed, though withholding not the praise ' excellent tutor,' and 
 afterwards including him among the men to be boasted of by his College. J 
 
 In 1579 or 1580, tutor and scholar had incurred the displeasure of the vice-president of 
 the college, Dr John Barfoote, the ' perein'ptory' dealer with the Puritans — his OAvn word§ — as 
 appears by two letters from Rainolds to Sir Francis Knollys and Sir Francis Walsingham respec- 
 tively. The former, as shorter, may here be given : — 
 
 ' I am sony, right honourable, that I am enforced to make unto you such a suit, the which, I cannot 
 move it, but I must complain of the unrighteous doahng of one of om- college ; who hath taken ui3on him, 
 against all law and reason, to expel out of cm- house both mc and IL- Hooker, and three other of om' fellows, 
 for doing that which, by oath, we were bound to do. Om- matter must bo heard before the Bishop of Win- 
 chester [Home or Watson], with whom I do not doubt but we shall find equity. Howbeit, forasmuch as 
 some of om' adversaries have said, that the bishop) is already forestalled, and will not give us such audience 
 as we do look for ; therefore, I am humbly to beseech yom' honour, that you wiU desire the bishop, by your 
 letters, to let us have justice ; though it be with rigoui', so it be justice ; our cause is so good, that I am 
 sure we shall prevail by it. Thus much I am bold to request of j-our honour for Corpus Christi College 
 sake, or rather for Christ's sake ; whom I beseech to bless you with daily increase of His manifold gifts, and 
 the blessed gi'ace of His Holy Spirit. 
 
 ' Your honom-'s in Christ to command, John Rainoldes.[1 
 
 'London, October 9. 1579 [80?]." 
 
 * n,id. II. 13. 
 
 t Zurich ' Correspondence,' vol. ii. pp. 279, 280. 
 X Works of Hooker by Keble (ed. 3 vols. 8yo, 1841), 
 vol. i. pp. 14, If). 
 341 
 
 § Strype, Ann III. i. 849. 
 
 II Keble's Hooker, i. pp. 20, 21 ; cf. footnote 40 ; Wal- 
 singliam's, pp. 20, 21. 
 
Vlll JOHN RAINOLDS, D.D. 
 
 ' I cannot learn,' said Walton of this expulsion, ' the pretended cause ; but that they were 
 restored the same month is most certain.' * 
 
 Previous to this endurance of wi-ong, Rainolds, having applied himself with indefatigable 
 ardour to his studies, acquired that massive and compacted learning, that prodigious store- 
 house of effective reading, that familiarity with the progress of opinion and doctrine, and that 
 dialectic skill and judicial calmness for which his memory is renowned ' unto this day.' Speedily 
 restored to his college, he reapplied himself to his researches and thinking out of the many 
 debated questions of that age, and was thus unconsciously furnishing himself for a debate tliat 
 must always stand forth as an epoch in the ecclesiastical history of England. The papists had skir- 
 mished with him, and found themselves worsted. He was ever ready to ' answer,' and from day 
 to day prosecuted his readings of the Fathers, Greek and Latin, and the entire literature of the 
 Church. By these ' Herculean labours,' as Brook designates them, he ' attained so distinguished 
 a knowledge of the errors and superstitions of popery, that he was considered a complete master 
 of the controversy.-]- About this time, John Hart, a famous papist, challenged ' all learned men 
 to try the doctrine of the Church' in ' debate with him.' Rainolds accepted the challenge, having 
 been moved thereto by, in all probability. Sir Francis Knollys. The issue is historical. After 
 successive ' combats,' Hart was ' obliged to quit the field in frankly acknowledged defeat, as 
 appears from his own letter written from the Towcr.J This ' conference,' subscribed by both 
 parties, was published with this title, ' The Summe of the Conference betweene John Rainolds 
 and John Hart, touching the Head and Faith of the Church' (41 o, 1584). It were a pleasant 
 thing to us to cull from this wonderful book words of wisdom, of power, of depth, of beauty, to 
 evidence its erudition, its profound generalisation, its logic, its astonishing breadth as well as 
 subtlety of insight, its simple but also lofty eloquence, its burning fervour, its impetus and 
 verve, to illustrate its dramatic skilfuluess, its quaintnesses, its good sense, its clever repartee, 
 its under-current now of sarcasm and now of humour, its touches of pathos, its occasional felici- 
 ties of wording in the very sharpest places, like unto the coy pink or opal that linos the rough 
 spiracles of a sea-shell, and above all, and permeating all, its enduring TRUTH ; but our little 
 sketch admits not of this.§ In a sentence, it may be stated that Rainolds occupies the precise 
 ground of Thomas Cartwright and William Cliillingworth. He held to the supreme and absolute 
 authority of the Bible as ' the one only touchstone in religion.' Bowing to it, he insisted that 
 ' believers' were ' a free people, having neither visible altars nor visible sacrifices to laj' thereon.' 
 
 The original mANUSCKIPT of this great and noble bcxjk, subscribed on the last page by John 
 Hart, is preserved among the archiepiscopal MSS. at Lambeth. 1| It were right good service to 
 this age, were a competent editor to revise this manuscript and give it to the world. Those who 
 have the rare original quarto prize it highly ; but it is pity that such a book should be permitted 
 to abide among rarities. We are told that when Elizabeth visited Oxford, she ' scolded Dr 
 Rainolds for his preciseness, willing him to follow her laws, and not run before thcm.'f Never- 
 theless, the 'Conference' with John Hart, when jiublished, so raised his fame that he was imme- 
 diately taken notice of at Court. 
 
 At the time of this controversy. Sir Francis Walsingham, wlio, with Sir Francis Knollys, was a 
 generous friend of the Puritans, founded a Divinity Lecture at Oxford, avowedly intended lo ' over- 
 turn popery,' and her Majesty appointed Rainolds to the of^ce of ' Lecturer.' He delivered this 
 lecture thrice a week in full term, had constantly a crowded audience, and leavened the Univer- 
 
 * Kebles Hooker, i. p. 21. 
 
 t Interleaved ' Lives of tlio Puritans,' jt;4 nomine. 
 
 t Kullcr-u Abel, p. 482. 
 
 § Wo have seen these editions : C1-) 1584, 4to; (2.) ir)88, 
 4tn; (3 ) 1(598, 4to; (4.) IfiOS, 4to ; (5.) in Latin, 1019, 4to. 
 II Lnmlictli MSS. vol. 402 ; Urooic, <is hrfore. 
 \ Harrington's Tapers, vol. ii. p. 182. 
 
 3J2 
 
JOUN llAIXOLDo, B.D. 
 
 IX 
 
 sity v/itli sound and fearless Protestantism.* He was in high favour with Sir Francis Walsing- 
 ham, who consulted him on all important occasions, and also with the Earl of Leicester, chancellor 
 of the University, who was no less a friend of the Puritans. With such pillars behind him, as 
 well as from his own brave soul, he 'kept back' nothing. He mated himself against Bcllarmine, 
 then ' public reader in the Engli.sh seminary at Rome ;' and, as he there delivered his ' lectures,' 
 they were taken down and regularly transmitted to Dr Rainolds, who immediately commented 
 on, and refuted, them at Oxford. Thus, observes Brook, ' Bcllarmine's books of Controversy were 
 answered even before they were printed.' -f- In allusion to this the following couplet was placed 
 beneath Rainolds's portrait : — 
 
 ' With learned eloquence, Rainolds hurled thunderbolts, 
 The Roman Jupiter quaked, as Lis just reward. 'J 
 
 The unsparing fidelity of our Worthy, has earned that censure which is truest praise, the hate 
 and reviling down to modern times of those who regard the Reformation as an evil.§ 
 
 In 1598, he was made Dean of Lincoln ; but being unwilling ' to part with an academical life, 
 he changed that deanery, in the year following, with William Cole, for the presidentship of 
 Corpus Christi College, where, being settled, he had more leisure to follow his studies and have 
 communication with learned men, than at Lincoln.'! Preferred to the deanery by Elizabeth, ho 
 was also offered subsequently by her a bishoi^ric, which, on the same grounds, he declined. As 
 ' President' of his college, he shewed that he was no mere student. ' Through the covetousness or 
 inattention of its governors,' says Brook, ' the college had been greatly impoverished ; but by Dr 
 Rainolds's exertions, it was brought into a state of distinguished prosperity. Besides the improve- 
 ment of its statutes and pecuniary resources, he greatly beautified the buildings, improved the 
 scholars, reformed the whole college system, and directed all its operations to provide able and 
 learned pastors for the church of God.'^ 
 
 One beautiful trait is recorded of him at this period, viz., that, notwithstanding the offer of a 
 mitre, and his commanding reputation, he regularly attended Mr Field's catechetical lecture in 
 Magdalen Hall.** 
 
 On the death of the learned Dr Humphrey, the University petitioned the Queen that Dr 
 Rainolds might succeed him as public ' Professor of Divinity,' but it would appear that the 
 appointment had been forestalled. tt 
 
 As formerly Dr Rainolds had been a ' Defender of the Faith' against popery, he was now 
 called upon to defend himself against the extreme High Church opinions of the notorious Ban- 
 croft. We may not spare space for this memorable ' Controversy.' Suffice it to give below the 
 authorities on either side, and briefly to state the facts. + J Bancroft, who was chaplain to Arch- 
 bishop Whitgift, and in this instance, as in others, the interpreter of his opinions and sentiments, 
 preached a sermon, ou January 12. 15SS, in which he mentioned that bishops were a distinct order 
 fmni priests ; and that they possessed a superiority over them by divine right, and directly from 
 God. In those times this was ' strange doctrine,' since it had Vjeen hitherto maintained that the 
 superiority of bishojjs over pastors or presbyters was of human appointment, and traceable back 
 only to tiie 4th, or at most the 3d, century. 
 
 * This no doubt is tlie ' regius professorship of divinity' 
 to wliich Strype in his Life of Wliitgift refers, p. 382 ; and 
 tlius Dr Bliss in liis fdotnoto to Athena; Oxonieses, ii. 13, 
 tu!' nomine, errs in correcting Strype's imagined error. 
 
 t Brook, as before. X Granger, vol. i. p. 212. 
 
 § Cf. Lawson's Laud, vol. i. p. 21, and ' Itemains' of 
 Froudo frequently. || Wood, A. 0. as before, ii. l;i. 
 
 ^ Brook, as before ; and Wood, Hist, and Antiq. of Oxon., 
 at before. 
 
 343 
 
 ** Chalmers, vol. xiv. p. 280. 
 
 ft Wood, Hist, and Ant. as before, vol. ii. p. 844. 
 
 tt Besides the general authorities referred to in foot- 
 note X Pf^ge 1, wlio all necessarily with more or less ful- 
 ness di.scuss this question, we would specify Neal and 
 Strype, Marsden, Perry, and Hopkins: Cardwell's Doeu- 
 mentary Annals, Wordswoith's Ecelesiastical Biography, 
 Lathbury on Prayer Book, and every History of the CJhurch 
 of England. 
 
JOHN KAINOLDS, D.D. 
 
 Bancroft's 'notion' was peculiarly acceptable to the High Churchmen, and as offensive to the 
 more moderate clergy, and to the Puritans, cleric and laic. Sir Francis Knollys became the 
 mouthpiece of the last. He addressed a letter to the Lord Treasurer, in which he reasoned 
 powerfully in favour of the parity of Chri.stian ministers. He afterwards applied to Dr Rainolds, 
 requesting to be favoured with his opinion as to Dr Bancroft's assertion that the denial of the 
 doctrine of the superiority of bishops was heresy. Rainolds replied in a letter dated September 
 19. 1589. He commences by observing ' how much greater comfort he found in detecting and 
 refuting the errors of papists, than those of his brethren professing the same faith in Christ.' Yet 
 he continues, ' since it had pleased his honour to request him to state his opinion, he considered 
 it to be an incumbent duty to declare the truth without respect of persons.' Then having 
 distinguished the two points in Dr Bancroft's sermon, viz., the superiority of bishops over other 
 ministers by God's ordinance, and that those who opposed this superiority were guilty of heresy, 
 he sets himself to the confutation of both.* 
 
 Besides these two ' controversies ' with Hart and Bancroft, Dr Rainolds with like success 
 controverted Hugh Broughton's ' Concent of Scri23ture,' and in opposition to Gager, wrote his 
 ' Overthrow of Stage-Plays,' a mine of ingenious and clever argumentation, a piece of chain- 
 work alike in its principles and positions, and full of out-of-the-way reading and rich and racy 
 wording.! 
 
 The last important event in the life of Rainolds is his attendance at the ' mock conference' 
 — Neal's stinging designation — of ' Hampton Court.' He, with Sparke, Knewstubb, and Chad- 
 derton represented the Puritans by designation of James. We cannot enter upon the details 
 of this notable ' Council.' We prefer allowing representatives of all shades of opinion 
 to deliver their ' testimony.' Saj's Sir John Harrington, a bitter enemy of the Puritans, and 
 therefore not likely to over-state in their favour : ' I was by, and heard much discourse. 
 The king talked much Latin, and disputed with Dr Reynolds [Rainold.s] at Hampton : hut he 
 rather used uphra.idAngs than arguments, and told the petitioners that they wanted to strip 
 Christ again, and bid them away with their snivellings ; moreover, he wished those who would 
 take away the surplice might want linen for their own breech. The hisliops seemed much 
 pleased, and said his Majesty spoke by the power of inspiration. I wist not what they mean, 
 but the spirit was rather foul-mouthed.' I ' The Hampton Court conference,' observes Robert 
 Robinson of Cambridge, ' was a ridiculous farce, a compound of kingcraft and priestcraft. The 
 actors in it forgot nothing but their masks. The puritans would not bo gulled by it, but con- 
 tinued to dissent ; and they iverc right' § Says Hallam, ' Li the accounts that we read of this 
 meeting, we are alternately struck with wonder at the indecent and partial behaviour of the 
 king, and at the abject baseness of the bishops, mixed, according to the custom of servile natures, 
 with insolence towards their opponents. It was easy for a monarch and eighteen churchmen to 
 claim the victory, be the merits of the dispute what they might, over abashed and intimidated 
 adversaries.' || 
 
 'Thus decorously,' says J )r Thomas Price, 'could the Solomon of iiis age, as his clerical 
 sycophants styled him, talk in the presence of grave divines, whom he had convened to discuss 
 matters of the deepest importance to the religious interests of the community. Ho insulted the 
 puritan advocates by charging them with hypocrisy, and closed the conference by remarking to 
 
 * liuusjowiie MSS. vol. Ix. art. 27 ; Broolc, as hefore. 
 ■\ Tlie MSS. of thu ' Plav' ooiilrovcrsy aru still preserved ; 
 Oxford Univer. MSS. vol. 107, art. 18. 
 
 J Nug£e Antiquic, i. 181. 
 
 ? Lectures on the Principles of Nonconformity, Works 
 ii. -2.21. II Const. History, i. 2112. ' 
 
 344 
 
JOHN EAINOLDS, D.D. 
 
 his attendants, " If tliis be all that tliey have to say, I shall make them conform themselves, or 
 I will harry them out of this land, or else do worse." '* 
 
 With reference to the miserable king's saying, Marsden remarks, ' Several modern writers, 
 not acquainted with the force of this exiircssive Scotticism, have by no means done justice to 
 his Majesty's gracious intentions to his puritan subjects. They have made him say that he 
 would hurry them out of the kingdom. Those who have heard a pack of harriers in full 
 cry will better appreciate the meaning oi' the royal threat.' Then he adds, " A threat 
 addressed to the learned Reynolds [Rainolds], a divine of the highest rank ; and to the 
 wise and eloquent Chaddorton, the first master of Emmanuel College ; of whose eloquence it 
 is recorded that when, having preached at unusual length to an audience m Lancashire, he ex- 
 pressed an intention of concluding, the whole congregation arose and witli one voice importuned 
 him to proceed ; and of whose wisdom it may suffice to say, that Sir Walter Mildmay refused 
 to build his college (he was the noble founder of Emmanuel) unless Chadderton would promise 
 to accept the mastership. Sparkes and Knewstubb were also eminent divines. The infirmities 
 of such men must surely have been .shaded with some tints at least of piety and virtue. To 
 such men it was King James addressed his memorable bravado ; and this, too, at a conference 
 in which he had invited or rather commanded them to sustain a part.'t 
 
 Finally, let us hear the deliberate opinion of Dr Thomas M'Crie : ' On this occa.sion,' 
 he says with honest indignation, 'even the appearances of impartiality were not observed. 
 Everything was previously settled in private between the king and the bishops. The individuals 
 to plead the cause of reform were not chosen by those in whose name they appeared ; and the 
 moderation of their demands was converted into a proof of the unreasonableness of Nonconformity. 
 The modesty with which they spoke served only to draw down the most intemperate and in- 
 solent abu.se. They were brow-beaten, threatened, taunted, and insulted by persons who were 
 every way their inferiors, except in worldly rank. Though there was no cause to complain of 
 the unfairness of Barlow's account, yet nothing can be more pitiable than the disclosures which 
 it makes of the bigotry and servile adulation of the bishop.s, and of the intolerable conceit and 
 grotescjue ribaldry of the king. 'J 
 
 This is all we can adduce here, and we make no comment of our own. That were not easy 
 to do without entering into details, for which we have no space here. Let the authorities on 
 either side be dispassionately weighed, 7iot numbered ; and we aver the verdict will be in favour, 
 not against, the puritans. § From first to last he was a Puritan, though, in common with 
 
 * History of Protest. Noncon. i. 465, 4C6. 
 
 t Early Puritans, pp. 272, 273. 
 
 t M'Crie's Melville, ii. pp. 191, 192. 
 
 § Barlow's ' Account of tlie Hampton Court Conference, 
 which is reprinted in the r/mmx(\. 142) is the one Church 
 authority. Barlow was dean of Chester, and one of the 
 appointed disputants in the conference, and W'as imme- 
 diately charged hy the Nonconformists with having done 
 great injustice to their argument in his Accotint. ' When 
 the Israelites,' says Fuller, referring to this charge, ' go 
 down to the Philistines to whet all their iron tools, no won- 
 der if they set a sharp edge on their own, and a Hunt one on 
 their enemies" weapons' (Ch. Hist. x. 21). But Dr Price 
 ohserves, ' It is not necessary to impeach the correctness 
 of Barlow's account in onler to a vindication of the puri- 
 tans. His own report is sufficient evidence against his party. 
 'If,' says Dr Harris, 'he has not represented their (the 
 345 
 
 puritans') arguments in as just a light, nor related what was 
 done by tlie ministers as advantageously as truth required, 
 he has abundantly made it up to them by shewing that the 
 bishops, their adversaries, were gross flatterers, and had no 
 regard to their sacred cliaracters ; and that their mortal foe 
 James had but a low understanding, and was undeserving 
 of the rank he assumed in the republic of learning. This 
 he has done effectually ; and therefore, whatever was his 
 intention, the puritans should have applauded his perform- 
 ance, and appealed to it for the proof of the insufficiency 
 of him wlio set himself up as a decider of their contro- 
 versy (Life of James, i. 10a). For otiier accounts see Price, 
 as before, i. 463, footnote ; and for unpublished malttr the 
 Sloane MSS. vol. 4274, art. 91 ; and the Ashmolean 1\ISS. 
 vol. 8.546. Cf. Hopkins' ' The Puritans and Queen Eliza- 
 beth,' i. 28-30. 
 
Xll JOHN KAINOLDS, D.P. 
 
 all the puritans of his age ai)d of a later, he loved liis Chureh with that tender and holy love 
 that could not sunder him from her without actual ' liarrying.' 
 
 The one result of the ' Hampton Court Conference ' over which we can rejoice is Dr Rainolds's 
 suggestion and request that there should be a 'revised translation' of the Holy Scriptures. It 
 needeth not that we tell its lustrous story. 
 
 Appointed by the king one of the ' translators ' of the ' English Bible," Dr Rainolds cordially 
 undertook his part ; but he did not live to see the conijjletion of the immortal work. While it 
 was being carried on, he was seized with a ' mortal sickness.' Nevertheless, all through it, he 
 afforded his assistance, and the l)rethren met with him in his lodgings at Oxford once a week to 
 compare and perfect their notes. He was the ruling mind in the undertaking. Very touching 
 is the narrative of the closing days. He spent his time wholly ' in prayer to God, and in hearing 
 persons read, and in conferring witli the translators.' * He remained in a lingering state until 
 Ascension-day, when, addressing his friends, he said, ' I hoped to have ascended on the day of 
 our Lord's asccnsiim ; but I shall stay with you a little longer, in which time I entreat you to 
 read nothing to me, only such chapters of Scripture as I shall appoint.' + Thus quaintly says 
 Fuller, ' employed in translating the Word of life until his happy spirit was translated to life 
 everla.sting.' \ 
 
 He died May 21. 1607, being in the fifty-ninth year of his age. His remains were interred 
 with great solemnity, and ' before many witnesses,' in the chapel of his own College. Dr Henry 
 Airay, vice-chancellor, preached his funeral sermon, and the university orator, Wake, delivered a 
 funeral oration in which, with much emotion, he bewailed the condition of the University, then 
 bathed in ' pious tears ' for the loss of iiim ' who had far outshone others in abilities and attain- 
 ments.' § The ancient Biographer who tells ns this then adds : ' There were no commendable 
 qualities in Luther, Calvin, Beza, or Wliitakcr which Dr Rainolds did not possess. I will con- 
 gratulate our country that she brought him forth : our university that she bred him up ; and 
 that college, most fruitful in good wits, that nursed Rainolds; whom e.xcellent piety, virtue, and 
 erudition have advanced above Jewel, Wotton, Vives, Hooker, and others. All the university 
 dearly loved him, his manners, and his integrity ; and his equal could not be expected to succeed 
 him.' II He was styled, says Samuel Clarke, 'the light of the University; the glory of Europe ; 
 the trumpeter of God's glory ; an admirable example of holiness ; and so learned a writer against 
 the Romanists that his writings were unanswerable. He was, moreover, so humble that he 
 would never accept of any high preferment ; only being much imjiortuned, he took the deanery 
 of Lincoln, of which he soon grew weary and relinquished it to another.'IT Even Antliony 
 a-Wood, saturnine on the very suspicion of puritanism, waxes eumbrously eloquent and even 
 exaggerative in his praise.** Dr Rainolds, observes Hallam, ' is styled the phoenix of England, 
 and the most learned man of the time in which he lived, and classed among the most distin- 
 guislied Protestants of the age. The learned Scaliger lamented his death as a public loss to the 
 Protestant churches at home and abroad.' ft ' He was the first,' observes Davie.s, ' who proved 
 Cyrill of Alexandria's pretended book called "Thesaurus" to have been interpolated by some 
 popish friary. He also first discovered the spuriousness of the book Tk Vita Pvophctamw, 
 fathered upon Epij)hanius ; and also one of the first who proved that the papal Decretal was a 
 
 • Brook, as Ufort. f ^'"■'^- t Abel, pp. 487, 488. 
 \ Wake's 'Oriitioii' was printi'il witli Ituiiiolds's Ora- 
 tionet, Vlmo, ](il4, iiiirl at the end of Wake'H Hex I'luimdcui. 
 \ Clement liarksdale, pp. 6-9. 
 
 \ Clarke's ' Marrow,' p. 888. 
 
 •• Hist., n.s before, ii. 2»3, iii. 929; Outcb'a M'ood. 
 p. 400. 
 
 ft Hallam's Literature, ii. 119. 
 
 346 
 
JOHN RAINOLDS, D.D. xiil 
 
 forgery. * ' Since your departure from us,' wrote Bishop Hall to Bisliop Bedel at Venice, 
 
 Reynolds [Rainolds] is departed from the world He alone was a well furnished library, 
 
 full of ail faculties, of all studies, of all learning. The memory, the reading, of that man were 
 near a miracle.' t But as the crown of all, let it never cease to bo remembered that to Dr John 
 Rainolds and Puritanism we owe our invaluable English Bible. We trust that this our little 
 memoir will incite some loving son of the Church of England to make a 'labour of love' of 
 writing an adequate ' Life ' of this most venerable of the Fathers ; while it may be permitted 
 us to indulge the hope that the present reprint of this small expository portion of his numerous 
 \vTitings may form but the herald of a complete edition of them. I 
 
 The exposition of Obadiah is prefaced by William Hinde, respecting whom we learn from 
 Anthony a- Wood that he was born at Kendal, in Westmoreland, about 1568-9 ; that he became 
 *a poor serving child' (such is the phrase) of Airay's College, ' Queen's,' in- Michaelmas terra 
 lo8(), aged seventeen, afterwards tabarder, M.A., and perpetual fellow of the said House ; wherein, 
 'having been always a close and severe student, he was much respected and beloved by the 
 famous Jo. Rainolds, a commoner of the said college during his time ; whose doctrines making 
 impressions on the juniors there, our author Hinde became an admirer of him.' ' At length,' 
 continues Wood, ' being full ripe for a removal, he left the society about 1603, being then much 
 in esteem among them for his excellent theological disputations and preachments, and became 
 minister of God's word at Bunbury, in Cheshire, where he was much noted among the puritanical 
 party for his piety, and so much followed by them for his frequent preacliing, that he was 
 esteemed the ringleader of the nonconformists in that county dui-ing the time that Dr Tho. 
 Morton sat Bishop of Chester, with whom our author had several contests about conformity.' 
 (See Life of Morton by Barwick, 1669, 4to.) Hinde wrote and edited various books. His Life 
 of Bruen is worthy to be placed beside Edwards's David Brainerd. He died in June 1029. 
 Samuel Hinde was his son, and Thomas Hinde, D.D., Dean of Limerick, his grandson. (Athenai 
 O. ii. 4-02. Sd ed. by Blis.s.) 
 
 Edward Leigh, who furnishes the preface to the exposition of Haggai, is doubtless that 
 ' Edward Leigh, Esq., Master of Arts of both Universities,' whose Critica Sacra is sufficient to 
 refute the common notion that verbal criticism is a science of modern or German orioin 
 
 o 
 
 ALEXANDER B. GROSART. 
 
 Kinross. 
 
 \* Since our Memoir of Airay was printed ([prefixed to the reprint of his Exposition of 
 Phihppians), access has been obtained to his Will, which is preserved in the archives of Oxford. 
 By the kindness of the Rev. John Griffiths, MA., keeper, we are enabled to add these additional 
 details, which will be found to confirm our statements. They are fittingly given here, as 
 Rainolds's ' Obadiah ' is dedicated to him. Ho bequeaths £40 towards a yearly payment 
 for encouraging a schoolmaster at Kendal ; £40 towards providing a preacher of monthly, 
 or, if possible, weekly sermons, in Kentmcre Chapel ; 40s. to the poor in the town of Kendal ; 
 and 40s. to the poor out of the town, but in the parish of Kendal. These legacies go to shew 
 that, as we supposed, Kentmere, and not Barton, was the seat of our Airay's family. Further, 
 he leaves £5 to his cousin H. Airay (in whom, however, he says he ' never had comfort") ; £5 and 
 
 * Davies's AtlieniE, iii. p. 63. I J For a list of tliem cf. Watt. Bib. Brit., anJ Antliony- 
 
 t Epist. Dec. i., Ep. 7. a-Wood and Brook. 
 
 347 
 
XIV JOHN RAINOLDS, D.D. 
 
 some books to his cousin Tobie Potter ; some books to his cousin Mr Cristoplier Potter, whom 
 he made his sole executor. This corrects our apphcation of '^xtfrweKs,' in the inscription to 
 Kobinson instead of Potter. He appoints four supervisors of his Will, describing them as his 
 ' good friends ;' one of these is a ' Mr Airay.' 
 
 As the present volume is passing through the press, there has come into our possession a thick 
 quarto volume of ' Notes' or ' Heads' of ' Sermons' delivered in O.xford by nearly all the eminent 
 names of the University coutemjjorary with Airay. Among them there are ' Heads ' of three 
 sermons by Airay on (1.) Philippians iv. 8, 9 ; (2.) Phihppians i. 3, 4 ; (3.) Matthew iv. 1, &c. 
 As a singular illustration of the arbitrariness of the orthography of his name, it may be men- 
 tioned, that we have successively three spellings in addition to those specified in our Memoir, 
 ' Ayrei,' ' Ayre,' ' Dr Ayreie,' all of ' Queen's,' shewing our Airay was meant. A. B. G. 
 
 34S 
 
TO THE EIGHT WORSHIPFUL MY REVEREND AND RIGHT WORTHY FRIEND, 
 
 ME D. AIRAY,* 
 
 PROVOST OF THE QUEEN'S COLLEGE, OXFORD, 
 GRACE AND PEACE. 
 
 RIGHT Worsliipfu], whom I reverence and love in 
 the Lord Josus, the gifts and graces of this 
 humble and holy, rehgious and judicious, man of God, 
 were so glorious and resplendent in the eyes of all 
 that could discern the beauty, or prize the value of 
 such things, that he needs not my candle to light his 
 sun, nor any pen or style of mine to make new im- 
 pressions of honour and love in the hearts of them 
 that knew him. Only I say, the Lord had poured the 
 precious spikenard of his Spirit upon his head, filling 
 his mind with spiritual understanding in heavenly 
 things, and the virtue and vigour thereof had soaked 
 down into his heart, giving him both feeling and fruit 
 of that he understood. Jacob's body was never em- 
 balmed with so sweet spices, as this man's name and 
 memory is seasoned with the savour of his virtues, 
 and ever shall be honoured with variety of fresh praises. 
 His breast was as a treasure for the repair of the temple 
 and building up of Jerusalem. It was also as an 
 armoury for the ruin of the synagogue of Satan, and 
 razing of Babel even to the ground. And whereas 
 counsel and strength are for the war, even in fighting 
 the Lord's battle, the Lord by his wisdom taught his 
 hands to fight and his fingers to war ; and though his 
 flesh were not of brass, yet did the Lord so strengthen 
 his arm, that he was able to bend, to draw, to break, 
 even a bow of steel. He was a chosen shaft of the 
 Lord's quiver ; yea, his little quiver was full of chosen 
 shafts and keen arrows to wound the hearts of the 
 king's enemies. In brief, he was a John, and as 
 John was ; that is, ' a burning and a shining lamp,' 
 wasting his own oil, lamp, and life, that his light 
 might be continued for the comfort of others that 
 rejoiced in his light. To which purpose, he being 
 dead yet spoaketh ; his lantern being broke, his light 
 j'ct shiueth ; and though his vine be cut down, yet his 
 wine yet smelleth as the wine of Lebanon. I cannot 
 deny but, having some monuments of his learned and 
 painful preaching a long time lying by me, I have 
 
 * T}iat is, Mr Doctor Henry Airay, author of the Lectures 
 on the Philiiipians. See his Jlemoir by Mr Grosart. — Ed. 
 349 
 
 sometimes lighted my candle at his torch, stored my- 
 self of his treasure, refi"eshed my soul with his sweet 
 wine, rejoiced to hear his dead letter speak in the 
 power of his own spirit and voice unto me. But after 
 long waiting, if by any other moans rather than mine 
 own they might be published for a more common good, 
 and finding by diligent inquiry, no hope, no help 
 tending hereunto, I could no longer ofl'er such hard 
 measure to such as hunger and thirst after good things, 
 as to eat my morsels alone, but to bring forth my 
 provision, of another man's cost indeed, yet not with- 
 out some labour and care of mine own, to prepare the 
 table and set things in some order before them. 
 Hereunto I was the rather induced and (kawn by his 
 own both opinion and practice, and that concerning 
 one of these sermons upon this prophet Obadiah, 
 holding it a withholding of goods from the owner 
 thereof, if, having anything of special use, we keep it 
 back from them that need it ; such needers being 
 indeed, and in his account, the true owners of it. 
 When the four lepers had found in the camp of the 
 Aramites meat and drink to refresh them, gold and 
 silver to enrich them, and raiment to clothe them, 
 they took what sufficed for present necessity, and hid 
 the rest as provision against further extremity. Yet 
 remembering at length other men's penury in their 
 plenty, and other men's necessities in their super- 
 fluities, ' We do not well,' say they ; ' this is a day of 
 good tidings, and we hold our peace ; if we tarry till 
 daylight, some mischief will come upon us. Now, 
 therefore, come, let us go and tell the king's house- 
 hold ; ' so reckoning that needers were owners of that 
 which themselves did possess. Methought, when I 
 considered this storj', it was marvellous pregnant for 
 my purpose. I have been refreshed and well satisfied 
 myself with those lectures, as with spiritual provision 
 and repast, and a long time I have bid them and kept 
 them from public view. Certainly I do not well. 
 This is a day of good tidings, this a message of glad 
 tidings of the gospel, by a messenger whose very feet 
 were beautiful in the house of God, and yet I hold my 
 
EPISTLE DEDICATOllY. 
 
 peace ; if I stay any longer, I may rather fear some 
 cross than find any comfort in such stay. What 
 then ? I will forbear no longer, but now at length 
 resolve to make others partners in my gain, and par- 
 takers of my joy. And therefore, Eight Worshipful, 
 my worthy and much respected friend, I am bold even 
 iirst of all to present these glad tidings unto you, as a 
 bunch of grapes fallen from that vine whose very 
 shadow was a shelter and sweet refreshing unto many, 
 which grew sometimes in that soil, and brought forth 
 his sweet fruit in duo season, where now j'ou are the 
 chief husbandman. It will do you good, I know, to 
 commune once again with your nearest and dearest 
 friend. Read him, observe him, you shall acknow- 
 ledge his spirit and speech, his gi-acious wisdom, his 
 marvellous learning, his rare and exquisite gift of 
 interpretation, his entire and sound judgment for 
 observation, his faithfulness and conscionableness iu 
 serious, discreet, and sound explication. Now, for 
 myself, Eight AVorshipful, I ever acknowledge such a 
 
 debt of duty and love, into which your many and great 
 fovours have drawn me, as that, unless thankful 
 acknowledgment may be taken in part of payment, I 
 shall yet run upon the score still. My hope is, though 
 I run in debt of this nature, yet I shall not come in 
 any great danger, seeing your favourable acceptance 
 of this or any other the poorest pledge of my love, 
 may forthwith seal me an acquaintance, and prevent 
 all further grievance in this kind. And so, rejoicing 
 in your welfare, and praising God for your faithful, 
 wise, provident, and religious government in that 
 College, whereof, being once a member, I must ever 
 be mindful, as a child of his nurse, or son of his 
 mother, I commend you to the provident protection 
 and gracious direction of God almighty. 
 
 Your Worship's ever assured, in all Christian 
 affection, 
 
 W. HiNDE. 
 
 BuNBURY IN Cheshire, 
 Jnhj 19. 1G13. 
 
 350 
 
THE PEOPEECY OF OBADIAH OPENED AND 
 
 APPLIED. 
 
 SEEMON I. 
 
 The vision oj OhaJiah. Thus saith the Lord God aijaliist Edotn, We have heard a rumour from the Lord, mid an 
 avd/ct.ssador is se}it ainoriii the heathen. Arixe, ami let us arise up ar/ainst her in battle. Behold, I June 
 made thee small among the heathen : thou art utterlij despised. — Obadiah 1, 2. 
 
 BEFOKE I come to tbe exposition of the prophet's 
 words, I think it convenient to shew unto 3'on the 
 cause why, leaving the epistle of Peter, which I had in 
 hand, I have taken upon me to handle this prophecy. 
 Saint Peter having testified that the gospel of Christ 
 was the truth of God, preached to men for the salva- 
 tion of their souls, exhorteth them that, notwithstand- 
 ing the fury and malice of the wicked, which had set 
 themselves against the same, they would persist in the 
 doctrine and truth, which they had learned ; to emhrace 
 the same faithfully, and express the force and fruit 
 thereof eflectually in their life and conversation ; and 
 that in the general to fly from evil, and follow that 
 which was good, and in particular towards God and 
 man ; especially subjects to honour (heir kings ; ser- 
 vants to obey their masters ; wives, husbands ; chil- 
 dren, parents. In all which, that their endeavours 
 might not be hindered by enemies, he exhorieth them 
 to patience and constancy ; and, finally, beseecheth 
 the elders and pastors, to ' feed the ilock of Christ' 
 committed to thck charge, as the principal nu-aijs to 
 bring them to their duty, and to establish them in 
 grace unto the end. Now, in expounding these things, 
 I come to the duty of subjects, wherein I declared that 
 the princes received the sword and supremacy over all 
 persons, and it followed that afterward I should shew 
 that it was also in all causes. But because, since 
 that time it pleased God to call me to prove it else- 
 where, and to commit the same to wriling, it seemeth 
 not so necessary to handle that point in this place. 
 As for the other points, concerning the duties of ser- 
 vants, wives, parents, for that there arc very few such 
 come hither, lest I should preach to them that were 
 absent, I thought that part might conveniently' be 
 omitted. Wherefore the last point remained, which 
 351 
 
 was concerning the enemies of the church, whom for 
 that the Lord will most certainly destroj', we must 
 have the greater patience to endure and continue in 
 the stcdfastuess of our profession. For which cause 
 also he exhorteth pastors diligently to feed and tend 
 upon their flocks. Which matter, being right neces- 
 sary for us to know, and for that I hope this doctrine 
 would pierce the better into our hearts, if we had the 
 same handled out of some continued place, I choose 
 this prophecy of Obadiah, where this thing is handled 
 orderly and jointly, namely, in the sixteen first verses 
 the destruction of the enemies of the church, and in 
 the five last the salvation thereof by the ministry of 
 the pastors, whom in the last verse he calleth seiriours, 
 for that God by their ministry worketh the salvation 
 of his people. And this also have I the rather chosen, 
 because I may use Peter as an interpreter of the pro- 
 phet, whereby comparing them together, the one may 
 give light to the other, that so being built on (he 
 doctrine of the 'apostles and prophets' we may grow 
 up into that building, whereof Jesus Christ is the chief 
 corner-stone. 
 
 The title, the Vision of Obadiah. 
 
 Whence we gather the commodity and excellency 
 hereof by the matter and author. 
 
 1. The mailer is termed by the name of vision, 
 which is a doctrine revealed from God, so called 
 because God revealed them so evidently, and delivered 
 them for such certainty, as though they had presently 
 seen before their eyes the things which they foretold. 
 And the Lord, not only by visible sights, as he did to 
 Ezekicl, Daniel, &c., at sometimes, but also very often 
 by his word without visible signs, is said to have 
 delivered these visions, for so is he said to have spoken 
 to Abraham in vision : ' I am thy great reward ; ' ' The 
 
EAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver. 1, 2. 
 
 words which Isaiah saw,' &c., and of this sort is this 
 vision ; that is, a doctrine revealed from God, not by 
 sight, but by word only. 
 
 2. The author is supposed of some to be that 
 Obadiah who was governor of king Ahab's house, 
 who hid the prophets of the Lord, 1 Kings xviii. 3. 
 But by the circumstances, especially by that in the 
 eleventh verse, it seemeth not to be he, seeing men- 
 tion is made of the taking of Jerusalem, which was 
 eicht hundred j-ears after Ahab. But whether it 
 were the same or another of that name, whether he 
 before in the spirit saw, or afterwards spake by ex- 
 perience, it sufficeth us, that he was a minister of 
 the Lord, and servant, as his name importeth, and 
 that these ' prophecies came not by the will of man, 
 but holy men of God spake as they were moved by 
 the Holy Ghost,' 2 Peter ii. And for our parts, 
 though we know not the earthen vessel, wherein this 
 treasure was inclosed, yet let us bring faithful and 
 humble hearts to the receiving and embracing of the 
 same ; for he was but the messenger, the message was 
 the Lord's. 
 
 Edom, otherwise called Esau, conceived a deadly 
 hate against Jacob, because he had got from him, first 
 the prerogative of the birthright, and then the bless- 
 ino, which rancour and hatred descended unto the 
 children and seed also of Esau, so that when the 
 Israehtes their brethren would have only passed 
 throuoh their land, they would not shew them such 
 mercy, but gaiustood them ; and when the king of 
 Babylon had taken Jerusalem, and spoiled it, they set 
 the work forward by what means they could, calling 
 on them, as it is in the Psalm, ' Rase it, rase it, even 
 to the foundations,' Ps. cxxxvii. 7. Wherefore the 
 Lord, comforting his people with promise to execute 
 his judgment on such as had persecuted them, nameth 
 Edom as the chief amongst them. Now whore he 
 saith, ' I have made thcc small among the heathen,' 
 he speaketh of a thing to come, as though it were 
 already past, to signify the undoubted certainty thereof, 
 and so it is expounded in the 10th verse, ' Shame shall 
 cover thee.' Now, because the means he would use 
 is war, raised against them by nations confederating 
 together, the prophet opcneth it, as though it were in 
 doin" , God having revealed it to his servant ; for here is 
 an ambassador sent from one nation to another, to stir 
 them up against Edom, and mention is here made of 
 a full and perfect destruction. 
 
 Here note three things. 
 
 1. The ifitiicsses, Obadiah and the prophets ; ire 
 liarc heard, &c. 
 
 2. The means, heathen raising one another to xrar. 
 8. The event, an utter destrnctian of land and country. 
 One point which wo are to mark for our instruction 
 
 is the ground which the prophet layeth for our faith, 
 whereon the church of God must rest, which is this : 
 Thus saith the Lord. Which doctrine is first neces- 
 sary for such as arc teachers in the church, that the 
 
 words which they must teach must bo words of the 
 Lord, that as Peter commandeth, ' Whoso speaketh, 
 may speak as the words of God,' 1 Peter iv. 11. 
 And then is it needful for the hearers that they beware 
 how they receive anything for the ground of faith, hut 
 this word. Nothing for assurance of building but this 
 rock. ' He is like to a wise man that built his house 
 on a rock, who heareth the words of Christ, and 
 keepeth them,' Luke vi. 48, and ' one is our master, 
 even he.' And for the teachers, ' Go and teach those 
 things which I have spoken,' Mat. xxviii. 20. This 
 is Christ his lesson both to hearer and teacher, and 
 his promise we see is tied only to this word, Heb. 
 xii. 28. This is the gi-ound whereon we must build 
 the house that must not be shaken, and this is the 
 food of life, whereby the children of God must be fed. 
 Whatever ground of fathers, decrees, traditions, coun- 
 cils, or aught else, other lay, it is but sand which 
 will not hold our building ; only hereto we must stick, 
 this must be our only rock and stay. 
 
 In the first book of the Kings, chap, xiii., mention 
 is made of a man of God, who was sent to preach 
 against the idolatry at Bethel, ver. 2. He came 
 thither and did the message, crying out against the 
 altar, according unto the word of the Lord, ver. 2-4. 
 The king first threatened him, and after allured him 
 to come and dine with him, and receive a reward, 
 ver. 7. But the man of God answered the king that, 
 ' Though he would give him half his house he would 
 not.' ver. 8, for that he had received word of the Lord 
 against that. When he was departed from the king, 
 there mecteth him an old prophet ; he willeth him to 
 come homo and eat bread with him ; he denieth, tell- 
 ing him what word he had received of the Lord. The 
 old prophet replieth that he was a prophet also, and 
 that an angel had spoken to him by the word of the 
 Lord and bade him bring him again. The prophet 
 yieldelh, and leaveth the word which he heard the 
 Lord speak, to believe an old prophet. But for this 
 cause, because he obeyed not that commandment 
 which he heard of the Lord, he received this answer, 
 that ' his body should not come into the sepulchre of 
 his fathers.' And ' when ho was departed a lion met 
 him and slew him.' This is a good lesson for us, 
 that when we have once learned the will of God, we 
 go not out of our way, we leave not this word, though 
 proph.ts, ancient prophets, yea, such as tell you 
 angels from heaven have taught them. Gal. i. 8, yet 
 I say that we leave not the word of the Lord to go 
 with them. Now many tell you of these things, 
 fathers, ancient fathers, apparitions of saints, angels ; 
 would to God there were not many deceived by them. 
 Bnt we SCO that this was a prophet of the Lord, an- 
 cient in years, godly in religion, for ho came not up 
 to worship at Bethel; faithful, for he believed the pro- 
 phecy sent by God, and had a care to bo buried by 
 the prophet ; yet, when he said that an angel had 
 spoken to him, he lied, whereby we see that prophets 
 '■ 352 
 
Ver. T, 2. J 
 
 SERMON I. 
 
 old, &c., may deceive, for 'each man is a liar;' so 
 that we have none assurance but of them in whom the 
 Holy Ghost spake, and that were guided by him, and 
 they are alone to be our foundation, Eph. ii. 20. 
 Wherefore, whosoever the Lord sendeth to Bethel to 
 preach his truth- against sin and heresy, let him not 
 rely on any prophet, but on that word which he hath 
 received of the Lord ; lest, not that lion which stood 
 still by the carcase, but that ' lion which goeth roar- 
 ing about, seeking whom he may prey upon,' 1 Peter 
 V. 8, meet them and rend them in pieces, when there 
 will be none to deliver them, Hos. v. 14 ; Ps. 1. 22. 
 But you that are appointed messengers to foretell, 
 Mai. ii. 7, or rather to tell of reformation already 
 made, husbandmen to sow the seed in the Lord's 
 ground, 1 Cor. iii. 9 ; ambassadors to do the Lord's 
 messages, 2 Cor. v. 20 ; stewards to minister food to 
 his household, 1 Cor. iv. 1 ; captains to fight the 
 Lord's battles, 2 Tim. ii. S-t. Kemember that the 
 word of God is the only seed which you must sow. 
 Mat. xiii. 24 ; milk which yon must give, 1 Pet. ii. 2; 
 meat which you must divide, Luke xii. 42 ; and 
 sword wherewith you must fight, Heb. iv. 12. Which 
 I speak not as though it were not lawful to use the 
 benefit of that which is taught by fathers or philo- 
 sophers, for I know that the apostle is said to have 
 sanctified those sayings of the poets in the Acts, 
 chiip. xvii. 28, 29, Corinthians, 1 Cor. sv. 33, Titus, 
 Tit. i. 22, but for that, he only allegeth the prophets 
 to them that believed the prophets ; and these proofs 
 they used, not as necessary proofs, but probable 
 arguments against them that gave credence thereunto. 
 Even as though in this matter we should allege against 
 the papists, not one of their poets, but their chief pro- 
 phet and captain Aquinas, teaching that the canonical 
 Scriptures are only of necessity to prove,* &c. ; and 
 again, that he who goeth about with other arguments 
 to prove the truth of Christian religion, maketh it 
 ridiculous ; and yet is the ground of their divinity in 
 the points wherein they dissent from us ; this saith 
 Aiii/iistine, Clirysostotii, Damascene, this saith Aristotle, 
 &c. ; but seldom come they with, this saith the Lord. 
 Wherefore, by their own mouth, seeing they bring not 
 rationcs coiirjnientes, they make Christian faith ridicul- 
 ous. And for us, what have we to do to fill our 
 pulpits with man's words, as though they were the 
 ground of our faith? Gal. i. 10. Loathe we now the 
 heavenly manna, Ps. Ixxviii. 24, 25, and desire we to 
 return to the flesh pots of Egypt ? Remember we 
 not that the flesh which the Lord let fall among the 
 murmurers' tents came out at their nostrils ? Num. xi. 
 1-G. Remember, I pray you, that if we may allege 
 them, it is that the word of God by them may be en- 
 lightened, but in no ease shadowed, for we are mini- 
 sters appointed to publish his word, and not the 
 fancies of men. There is a promise to the preaching 
 of his word, and a blessing to the hearers thereof. 
 * 1 Part. QiiaDst 1, artic. viii. et o2, artic. 
 
 This have we a commandment to teach. Then this 
 ought to be as fire in our bowels to enflame us to 
 teach, and in others with reverence to be;ir and attend 
 to it, and unless we know this we have not learned 
 the very principles of religion. But let us, that are 
 brought up in his church, be content to be fed with 
 this food of angels. 
 
 The event is, that he should be made smaU, th 
 fulfilling whereof is mentioned by Malachi, chap. i. 
 3, 4, ' I have made his mountains waste, and his 
 heritage a wilderness for dragons.' For, though after 
 Malachi, Idumeans dwelt there, yet since is that of 
 the same prophet fulfilled : ' They shall build, hut I 
 will destroy.' Now when we see things so long before 
 told of, in their due time fulfilled, this must bo a 
 ground and stand for our weak faith concerning things 
 to come, as the last and eternal judgment; that as we 
 have seen the particular judgments fulfilled on Edom, 
 Jerusalem, &c., we assure ourselves, that what hath 
 passed from the mouth of the Lord, shall most cer- 
 tainly come to pass, Gen. xli. 32 ; Num. xxiii. 19. 
 
 Now, as the apostle writeth, ' The things which 
 were written before, were written for our learning,' 
 &c., Rom. XV. 4. For as ho saith in another place: 
 1 Cor. X. 11, the examples of the punishment of the 
 Israelites ' are for our use, on whom the ends of the 
 world are come, that we lust not as some of them 
 lusted, neither commit fornication, neither idolatry, as 
 some of them.' Even so these things will serve us for 
 example ; for those are Israelites that are of the faith 
 of Israel, Rom. ix. 6-10, and the Edomites are all the 
 enemies of the chm-ch ; wherefore, let us assure our- 
 selves, that as certainly as God threatened destruction 
 to Edom, so surely will he pour it on all our enemies. 
 The papists are the Idumeans, elder brethren, as they 
 say, though they disdain to be called our brethren, 
 yet are they our brethren, as Edom was the Israelites', 
 and they have dealt with us, even as the Idumeans 
 dealt with the Israelites, Obad. 10. When that we 
 would have entered into the land of promise, they 
 have withstood us with all their might, and ' having,' 
 as they say, ' the keys of knowledge, would neither 
 enter themselves, nor suffer others that would,' Luke 
 xi. 52. Again, when the church was afllicted by the 
 king of Babylon, they were at hand to set the work 
 forward, and to cry, ' raze it, raze it, even to the 
 foundations,' Ps. cxxxvii. 7. Now let us remember 
 the words of the apostle, 2 Thes. i. 6, that God can 
 recompense, to those that afilict us, suflicient recom- 
 pense, and ii we see it some way recompensed, and 
 somj measure of his judgments fulfilled upon them, let 
 us bless his name who revengeth the blood of his ser- 
 vants, Rev. xvi. G, and assure ourselves that he will 
 not cease from this work of his hands, but, as it is said 
 in Amos, chap. ix. 12, that 'his people should possess 
 the remnant of Edom,' as Peter also speaketh in the 
 Acts ; so no doubt are there many among these chil- 
 dren of Edom that shall inherit with the Lord's people. 
 
RAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver. 1, 2. 
 
 But they also must be destroyed, or ratlier the errors 
 must be destroyed, that they mny be raised ; their 
 heresies put to flight, that they may be recalled ; 
 and, as the Lord hath promised to consume anti- 
 christ, 2 Thes. ii. 8, so shall these heresies be de- 
 stroyed by ' the breath of his mouth.' But be not 
 afraid though heresies abound, 1 Cor. xi. 19, and 
 though Jordan overflow in the midst of harvest ; for 
 at his time Jordan shall retire and keep himself within 
 his bounds, and in good time the Lord will destroy 
 these Idumeans, Kev. vi. 10, 11. 
 
 Concerning the witnesses, they are the prophets, 
 who received it from the Lord ; wherefore he saith 
 -'we have heard,' not naming himself alone, hut others. 
 With this we are to compare a place of Jeremiah, 
 chap. xlix. 14, speaking of the same matter, saying, 
 ' I have heard.' This Jeremiah spake before the de- 
 Btruclion of Jernsale.n, Obadiah after; both agi'eeing, 
 not only in the same matter, but even in the very 
 words, which consent, confirming the message, is 
 well worthy the noting. I need not here to stand on 
 that point to shew unto you the consent of the pro- 
 phets and apostles together, using the very same 
 words, as of Amos and Joel, Amos i. 2, Joel iii. 16; 
 Mieah and Isaiah, Micah iv. 1, Isa. ii. 2; Jude and 
 Peter, Judo's Epistle, 2 Peter ii., &c. But I heartily 
 wish that we would ail learn to speak one thing, Philip, 
 li. 2, that there may be in us, as the prophet spenk- 
 eth, one heart and oneway; at least that the prophets 
 would remember that, by these examples of the pro- 
 phets and messengers of the Lord, they might say, 
 ' We have heard ' a message from the Lord ; for the 
 time is come that we had need to cast ourselves in a 
 ring and cleave together, that we may be the stronger 
 against our enemies. 
 
 As touching the means, it was battle raised of the 
 heathen by mutual consent, sending ambassadors from 
 one to another to stir them thereto. So you see that 
 to overthrow Edom a battle is necessary, and ambas- 
 sadors must be sent ; for wh(!n a strong man jiossessoth 
 the house, there is need of a stronger to cast him out. 
 Christ Jesus is our captain-general, and prince of the 
 army, and all faithful men are his soldiers, Ps. ex. 8. 
 The prophet, speaking of our battle which we are to 
 fight under our captain, saith, ' Thy people shall be 
 ready and willing in the day of battle;' all the ser- 
 vants of God shall be in a readiness, most willingly 
 to fight the Lord's battles. But, alas ! where is this 
 readiness ? where is this willingness which we arc to 
 shew, having to fight daily against, not outward, but 
 inward enemies ? Who hath put on that complete 
 harness which the apostle ministereth unto him, there- 
 with to strive against spiritual wickedness, even in high 
 places ? Eph. vi. 11, 12. 
 
 The ambassadors who are to raise the soldiers to 
 battle, are the servants and ministers of the Ijord, 
 2 Cor. V. 20. Now, ' how can they preach unless 
 they be sent?' Rom. x. 15. They therefore are all 
 
 sent that are his ambassadors. The apostle testifieth 
 that there are ' ambassadors for Christ, as though God 
 did beseech us through them, they pray us in Christ's 
 stead to be reconciled to God,' 2 Cor. v. 25. This 
 was indeed an embassage of peace with him, but con- 
 sequently of battle with his enemies. For the same 
 covenant hath he made with us that he made with 
 Abraham, Gen. xii. 3, namely, that all his friends 
 should be ours, and all his enemies ours ; wherefore 
 we must be at war with Satan and all his angels, 
 1 Peter v. 8, 9. Here let them who are called to 
 this function remember to do his message, and to 
 raise up his people against his and their enemies, 
 Rev. xii. Those ambassadors were sent to the hea- 
 then, some to this nation and congregation, some to 
 that, having particular people allotted on whom they 
 shou'-d call ; others there were sent in general to 
 every nation, as were the apostles. Mat. xxviii. 19 ; 
 and they, !is they most faithfully in their own persons 
 exercised this function, so have they exhorted us to 
 execute the same charge committed to us with the 
 same diligence ; and hereto belongeth that exhortation 
 of Peter unto the ciders, for the feeding and instruct- 
 ing of God's flock, 1 Peter v. 2. 
 
 But how far are we from this care ! and how many 
 either preach not, either feed not at all, or feed not 
 such to whom they are sent. Jonah was sent by the 
 Lord to preach at Nineveh, Jonah i. 2, 3, but he pre- 
 pared himself to go to Tarshish. The ship wherein 
 Jonah sailed was troubled, and he knew it was because 
 of him ; wherefore he bade them to cast him into the 
 sea. Tarshish was a famous university in Cilieia, as 
 Strabo * writeth, and for some respects preferred before 
 Athens. Jonah would not go to Nineveh, but would go 
 to Tarshish ; you see what I would say, or rather what 
 I would not say. Are there not many that have been 
 sent to Nineveh, but would go to Tarshish ? The ship 
 of our commonwealth hath been troubled and tossed 
 with rebellions and conspiracies. I may say truly, 
 that a great cause thereof hath been, for that Jonah 
 sent to Nineveh would needs go to Tarshish. But 
 would to God there had been in them that zeal of 
 Jonah, to have been touched in conscience with the 
 remorse of their sin, and confessed the same, and have 
 desired to have been cast into the sea ! Yea, happy 
 were they if they were cast into the bottom of the sen, 
 never to rise up again, rather than that one of those 
 little ones, of whom thousands are perished through 
 them, should have miscarried. Mat. xviii. G. Where- 
 fore, I beseech you in the name of Christ, and by 
 that duly and love which yon owe him, if there be 
 any care in you, any fear of his name, that you would 
 go to Nineveh whilher you are sent; and though 
 'i'arshish be a famous university, yet seeing God hath 
 sent you thither, that you would arise and go to 
 Nineveh. 
 
 As for us that remain in Jewry, let us arise against 
 * Stiub. Gcog. lib. xiv. 
 
 354 
 
Ver. S, 4.] 
 
 SERMON II. 
 
 her to battle, against Satan and his angels of dark- 
 ness, against the power of darkness, those principali- 
 ties, and powers, and spiritual wickedness, Eph. vi. 11, 
 against our own lusts and concupiscences, against the 
 old man and law of our members ; for all these are 
 enemies to God and enemies to us, and against all 
 these must we rise up to battle. As also against all 
 errors and heresies which fight against the truth, 
 2 Peter ii. 1 ; against these let us arise, and let us 
 rise up against them to battle. For it is not now a 
 time for us to say with Solomon's sluggard, Prov. vi. 
 9, 10, ' A little slumber, a little folding of the hands 
 together,' lest ' poverty come upon us as one that 
 travelleth by the way, and necessity as an armed 
 man,' Prov. xxiv. 33. There is a great necessity in 
 it, for the Idumeans are even withiu us ; we have no 
 need to fold our bands together, but rather to rise up 
 with that good housewife, Prov. xxxi. 1.5, who 'ariseth 
 whiles it is night, and giveth the portion to her house- 
 hold, and the ordinary to her maids.' 
 
 In the book of Genesis wo read that Abraham heard 
 that his brother was taken by his enemies, whereupon 
 he ' brought forth of them that were born and brought 
 up in his house three hundred and eighteen, and pur- 
 sued them ; and that he and bis servants divided them- 
 selves by night, and smote them, and brought again 
 
 his brother Lot,' Gen. xiv. 12-14. Our brother Lot, 
 nay, many of our brethi-en, are taken and carried away, 
 but they are not yet so far gone but that, if we make 
 haste, they may be recovered ; and if ever it behoved 
 Abraham to arm his household, it is now time. Ye 
 that are in the place of Abraham, arm them that are 
 brought up in your houses, to the bringing back of our 
 brethren. Arm them and yourselves with that spirit 
 of Abraham, with that brotherly love and care over 
 others. I cannot say to every one of you as is said to 
 him in the poet, 
 
 Niite DeA, potes hoc sub casu ducere somno3 ?^* 
 
 but I say to each of you, Nate Deo, potes hoc sub casu 
 ducere somnos ' And so much the rather for that the 
 danger was but near him, but it is within us ; where- 
 fore let us use the sword of God's word against these 
 enemies. And ' cursed be the man that witbdraweth 
 his sword from blood,' Jer. xlviii. 10. I mean not to 
 slay the person bodily, but I speak of the spiritual 
 sword, and of the spiritual slaughter, to kill their 
 errors, to slay our wicked and ungodly lusts, and 
 mortify the body of sin, Kom. vii. 24, Col. iii. 5, 
 which we bear about with us ; which the Lord grant 
 that each of us may do. 
 
 * Virfr. ^n. iv. v. IGO. 
 
 SEEMON II. 
 
 The priile of thine heart hath deceived thee, thou thai dtrellest in the clefts of the rocks, whose habitation is hitjh : 
 that saith in his heart. Who shall brinr/ me to the ground 1 Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle, and 
 viake thy nest among the stars, thence will I briny thee doun, saith the Lord. — Obadiah, Ver. 3, 4. 
 
 THE prophet having shewed in the former verses, 
 that God would bring to pass the doo*ruction of 
 Edom, by nations stirred up against them, sending 
 messengers from one to another, to rise up against 
 her in battle, doth in this place refute a reason, with 
 the which they were prepared to come against this 
 judgment of God. For whereas the land of Edom 
 was mount Seir, a country full of rocks, their cities 
 were strong, situated on hills, or amongst hills, seated 
 upon rocks, and by nature mightily fortified, for which 
 cause they imagined that it was impossible to con- 
 quer them, this conceit of theirs, the prophet doth 
 here open and reprove, saying, ' The pride of thy 
 heart,' &c. Wherefore in few words he saith thus 
 much, God will destroy thee, notwithstanding thy 
 great strength, which he hath confirmed by the in- 
 fallible word of God. Hereunto they opposed the 
 fond and vain imagination of man, for they said, 'Who 
 shall bring me down to the ground ?' because ' I 
 dwell in the clefts of the rocks,' and am strong on 
 ' the high mountains.' This conceit is said to pro- 
 ceed from pride of heart ; thereby being advertised, 
 that notwithstanding their vain conceit of defenced 
 places, as thoush by reason of them it were impossible 
 355 
 
 they should be subdued, yet they should find it false, 
 as issuing not from the truth, hut from the pride of 
 heart. The truth also hereof, that God would 
 assuredly bring them down, is amplified by compar- 
 ing their defences to the nest of an eagle, which is 
 wont to be builded aloft in the top of high and craggy 
 mountains, as Aristotle also writeth ;* and when he 
 saith, that though their nest were made among the 
 stars, by the hyperbole, he signifieth that nothing 
 should hinder, but he will subdue them, the Lord 
 telling Edom, that though he make his nest never so 
 high, yet he will fetch him down, and therefore will 
 also destroy him, though he dwell in the clefts of the 
 rocks. 
 
 And although these things were prophesied against 
 Edom, yet were they delivered for instruction to 
 Israel. Wherefore it seemeth that he turneth the 
 person, for having said before in the second person, 
 ' I have made thee small,' ' the pride of thy heart,' he 
 immediately turneth to the third person, saying, 
 ' Whoie habitation is high,' that ' saith in his heart,' 
 &c. This thing, then, as it is spoken to the terror of the 
 Idumeans, so it is for the consolation of Israel. Israel 
 *Aristot. hisfor. animal.- lib. ix. cap. xxxii. 
 
8 
 
 RAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver 3, 4. 
 
 is the church of God, that is, the house of God : ' Whose 
 house are we, if we hold fast unto the end the con- 
 fidence, and the rejoicin;^ of the hope,' Heb. iii. G. 
 These things then are written for our learning and 
 comfort, that wo should be neither puffed up with a 
 vain opinion of any gifts whatsoever, neither yet dis- 
 couraged wilh any fear, though the Idumeans ' dwell 
 in the clefts of the rocks, and say in the pride of their 
 heart, Who shall bring us down to the ground ? For 
 though they exalt themselves as the eagle, and make 
 their nest among the stars, yet thence will the Lord 
 bring them down.' ' Pride goeth before destruction, 
 and a high mind before a fall,' Prov. xvi. 18. Well 
 may the wicked for a while ' flourish as a gi-een bay- 
 tree,' and draw forth their sword against the godly, 
 but their sword shall enter into their own bowels, and 
 they shall be razed out, that men shall say, Where 
 is he ?' Ps. xxxvii. 35 ; or with the prophet, ' This is 
 Pharaoh,' Ezek. xxxi. 18. 
 
 The Jebusites that held the fort of Zion, 2 Sam. v. G., 
 so trusted in the strength thereof, that the blind and 
 the lame said, ' David shall not come hither ;' so sure 
 thought they themselves that, though there were none 
 to defend it but blind and lame, yet were they safe 
 enough ; yet behold God brought them down, and 
 that which before was the strongest against David, 
 became the strongest for him. 
 
 The king of Babylon, who said he would ' ascend up 
 and set his seat by the stars,' received this word from 
 the Lord, ' How art thou fallen, thou Lucifer, son of 
 the morning !' Isa. xiv. 12. Which place many un- 
 skilfully apply to the fall of the prince of darkness ; 
 but that name is in no place of Scripture given him, 
 but is here attributed to the king of Babylon, who 
 shone as the morning star in beauty and glory ; so 
 that those which before marvelled at his power, did 
 after wonder at his fall. 
 
 Tyrus shone as a cherub in the garden of Eden, 
 Ezek. xxviii. 14, 18 ; but when he had defiled his 
 sanctification by the multitude of his iniquities, it 
 was threatened him by Ezckiel that he should be 
 cast to the ground, that a fire from the midst of him 
 should devour him, and that he should be brought to 
 ashes in the sight of all that beheld him. 
 
 It seemed impossible to the Jews, when our Saviour 
 told them thereof, that the glory of Jerusalem should 
 be brought down, John ii. 10, Luke xix. 43, | for 
 which cause it was laid against Stephen as an especial 
 matter, that he should say that Christ would destroy 
 that place, Acts vi. 14 ; yet was not that generation 
 passed, before it was made an heap of stones, the 
 temple razed, and not one stone left standing on 
 another. 
 
 And what shall I speak of the latter Babylon, which 
 in like sort persecuted the faithful Christians, as the 
 other did the faithful Jews ? How did she lift up 
 herself, and say, ' Who shall bring me down ? Who 
 was worshipped as a goddess ; and the city called 
 
 inhs ftterna, as appeareth by writers, grounding them- 
 selves withal on that oracle of the poet : 
 
 Imperium sine fine dedi.* 
 Was it not taken, burnt, and laid waste by the Goths 
 and Vandals ? f by which examples of the Jebusites, 
 the kings of Babylon and Tyrus, the cities of Jeru- 
 salem and Rome, we see this, which is spoken by 
 the prophet of the Idumeans, to be verified in all 
 them that follow the pride of the Idumeans. 
 
 And to come nearer home, to the state of them 
 that represent the heart of the Idumeans, and desire 
 to raze Jerusalem even to the ground and foundation, 
 I mean to the state of the papacy, in which is revived 
 the image of the former beast, Rev. xiii. 15, but 
 much more lively resembling, not only the cruelty, 
 but the pride also of Edom ; for neither the Jebusites, 
 nor kings of Babylon, or Tyrus, nor Jews, come so 
 near as they, being partakers with us of the same 
 sacrament, baptized even as we, no otherwise than 
 as the Idumeans were circumcised as well as the 
 Israelites. But as they (notwithstanding the sign of 
 circumcision) were chief enemies unto Sion, even so 
 the state of the papacj' (notwithstanding the sacra- 
 ment of baptism) are chief enemies to the truth of the 
 gospel of Christ, which proceeded out of Sion. 
 
 For these also have their dwelling in the clefts of 
 the rocks, persuading themselves that that is the rock 
 on which the church of God is built ; making their 
 brags by reason of their power and league with so 
 mighty potentates, that they cannot be moved ; lifting 
 up their nests as an eagle, as the emperor, whose 
 ensign is the eagle, the spread eagle, for that he was 
 emperor of Constantinople and Rome, but spoiled of 
 both, for that the pope hath deprived him of one, 
 even as the Turk hath done of the other. He hath 
 lift up his nest to the stars, and not said in his 
 heart, but proclaimed by written books, and shame- 
 less libels cast abroad among us, that by reason of his 
 flourishing estate and great power he cannot be brought 
 low. Wherein they have shewed greater arrogance 
 than ever the Idumeans did in that prophecy : 
 
 Imperium sine fine dodi.. 
 Aquinas, J to prove the stability of the papacy, allegeth 
 the prophecy of Daniel, 2d chapter, whore, having 
 spoken of the four Idngdoms, and coming to the last, 
 which should destroy the other and endure for ever, ho 
 applieth it to CIn-ist's kingdom, but so, that it bclong- 
 eth to the papacy, adding, ' If they feed the flock.' 
 Now, for that they hold that it cannot fail in doctrine, 
 they conclude that the estate of the popedom must 
 oidure for ever, according to the words of that pro- 
 phecy. I stand not to shew how true the former part 
 is, that Rome should destroy the other kingdoms ; 
 but on that that he saith it shall be ctenial ; which 
 blasphemy is as great as that which he uttered in the 
 
 * Virg. Mn. i. v. 283. 
 t Sigon. de Occident, Ini]i. lib. x. et lib. xiv. 
 I Lib. iii. de regimine pi incipum, cap. x. 
 
 350 
 
Ver. 3, -l.] 
 
 SERMON II. 
 
 former cbiiptcr, applying to tbe pope that wliich is 
 spoken of our Saviour, ' of his fulness we have all re- 
 ceived.' But though hereby they may saj', as great 
 Bab>lon, 'I sit as a queen, and shall see no sorrows,' 
 yet the mighty angel ' took a stone like a millstone, and 
 cast it into the sea, and said, With such violence shall 
 the great city Babylon be cast, and shall be found no 
 more,' Rev. xviii. 7, 21. 
 
 But the maintainers of them say that this cannot 
 be by reason of tbe flourishing estate of the papacy in 
 Eome, which hath so mighty friends, and hatb been 
 of so long continuance ; but let them remember that 
 Nineveh had been a people of many generations, that 
 the Edomites were of greater standing. For it is 
 scarce five hundred years passed, since the usurped 
 authority over kings and princes and the whole 
 church began ; but not eight hundred since the 
 bishop of Rome set himself against the emperor ; not 
 one thousand years since he first claimed authority 
 over the bishops of Constantinople ; which is a less 
 time than Edom flom-ished ; for we read that there 
 reigned eight kings in Edom before there was a king 
 over the children of Israel, Gen. xxxvi. 31, 32, &c. ; 
 that is, before tbe government of Moses. So then 
 they flourished till the days of this prophet, even 
 no less than twelve hundred years, neither were they 
 then stiaight extinguished, for they lived to see the 
 ruin of the second temple, as we find in Josephus. * 
 Wherefore let us assure ourselves, that though they 
 say, Who shall bring us down ? yet in due time this 
 shall be verified to them also, for so shall it be to all, 
 that have said in the pride of their heart, &c. 
 
 And that which hath been said of the state of the 
 papacy, exiendeth also to the doctrine. For that, in 
 as great arrogancy of spirit, they magnify their works, 
 making their nests among the stars, and claiming ever- 
 lasting glory as a reward of their deeds ; for so the 
 Rhemish notes say,t that eternal joy is a merit, and lest 
 wo should not know by these general terms how basely 
 they think of God's mercy, how proudly of their own 
 works, they expound themselves, and say, that it is as 
 a stipend answering in weight and time to tbe work ; 
 than which, what could be said more grossly or pro- 
 fane, that the works of man should answer to eternal 
 joy, equal in time and weight ; as though you should 
 say, that ten thousand pounds wore equal in time and 
 weight to his works that had laboured one hour. But 
 I come far below in this comparison, for there is some 
 proportion between an hour's work and the greatest 
 sum of mone}-, for they be finite ; but between the 
 everlasting, endless, and infinite joy of heaven, and 
 man's works, that is, between finite and infinite, there 
 is no proportion. But how could it bo that any men 
 should thus speak, if the spirit of antichrist had not 
 thus pufi'ed them up to utter such blasphemy in the 
 pride of their hearts ? But what shall I say, when 
 
 * Do bello J ml. lib. vii. c. xxii. al. xxx. 
 t Upon tlio 1 Cor. iii. 
 357 
 
 the same men, in their notes on Romans viii.,. 
 grant, that if we look to the time, tbe joy of heaven is 
 a great deal more ? And here, forsooth, flee they to the 
 grace of God ; but they must consider that grace 
 serveth them not, that they may claim it by desert ; 
 for whatsoever good tbe servants of God do, it is by 
 grace ; yet is it said, Luke xvii. 10, ' When they have 
 done all that is commanded, they have done but their 
 duty,' and that which they owed to the Lord. So 
 that, seeing we do but our duty, there is not owing to 
 us so much as thanks ; and doth then God owe us the 
 reward of eternal joy ? The man that payeth no more 
 than that he owetb, doth his creditor owe liim any- 
 thing for the payment of it ? Unless he count him in- 
 debted to him, as he in the poet * said, for that the 
 world is so naught, that a man thinketh himself pleasured 
 that receiveth in debts ; but seeing we can never pay 
 all, for ' who can say. My heart is clean, I have not 
 sinned ?' Prov. xx. 9 ; and if we have not fulfilled 
 the whole law, done all that is commanded, we have 
 not paid our debt ; how then can we come hereby 
 to merit it, or buy it as it wore, which yet though we 
 had most absolutely kept, should be ours but by 
 promise '? 
 
 But how far from this presumption was Job when 
 he said, chap. ix. 8, that ' if God would enter into 
 judgment with him, he were not able to answer, no, 
 not one for a thousand ' ! How far was David when 
 he said, Ps. cxliii. 2, that ' in his sight no man living 
 was justified ' ! How far was Paul when he said, 
 Rom. iii. 9, 2-1, that 'none were righteous;' there- 
 fore concluding that ' all, both Jew and Gentile, are 
 justified freely by grace ;' for ' to him that worketh, 
 the wages is counted for debt, not of favour ; but to 
 Abraham was faith imputed for righteousness.' And 
 where the apostle saitb flatly, that there is no man 
 just, and that no flesh is justified, they say that the 
 Virgin Mary and apostles must needs be exempted 
 out of this number ; but if it be not so that it is 
 verified of all, then is the apostle's argument to no 
 purpose, neither can the conclusion which he labour- 
 eth to prove be so inferred, which is, that ' by the 
 works of the law ??o flesh can be justified.' But let 
 us be assured, that whatsoever they say, though they 
 speak never so proudly, yet the time shall come, when 
 this doctrine, by the breath of the Lord, shall be 
 brought to the ground. 
 
 Neither do I here enter into the depth of their pride 
 as concerning supererogation. For herein have they 
 set their nests, not (niion;/, but above, the stars, when 
 they say that men may not only merit for themselves, 
 but the abundance thereof is sufficient for other men 
 also. But is not this to build up to Babel, Gen. 
 xi. 4, and is not this pride like that of Pharaoh, who 
 hoped by his own strength to pass over there, where 
 others had passed over by grace and favour ? Exod. 
 xiv. 23. Is it not, with Jezebel, to set a colour and 
 * Plautus. 
 
JO 
 
 EAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver. 3, 4. 
 
 paint on onr foul faces? 2 Kings ix. 80. But the 
 builders of Babel were confounded, Pharaoh drowned, 
 and Jezebel, after she bad painted her face, was cast 
 down from the window, and had her brains dashed 
 out. These men that think it a beggarly thing to 
 receive the kingdom of heaven of alms, shall never 
 have it of debt, for those that say in the pride of 
 their heart, &c. 
 
 Lastly, Here wo have to mark that the Lord is said 
 to be the author of this vengeance, and yet it was 
 said before that this should be brought to pass by 
 nations stirred up against Edom, and sending messen- 
 gers from one to another, to provoke them to battle 
 against the Idumeans ; whereas in the 2d and 3d 
 verses he saith, I will : where we are taught that, 
 although it pleased God to use men as instruments 
 to bring his purposes to effect, yet would he have all 
 the glory to be proper and peculiar to himself; for 
 though the instrument work, yet sith the whole effi- 
 cacy cometh from him, theroforo the whole glory 
 ought to be given to him and not to the instrument. 
 
 In the C3d of Isaiah, the prophet demandeth 'who 
 it is that cometh from Edom, and why his garments 
 be red ?' Whereby, answering to the question, he 
 Bheweth that it is Christ, and that his garments are 
 red, because he ' alono had trodden the wine-press,' 
 and ' of all the nations there was not one with him ;' 
 which is meant of treading the Edomites and enemies 
 of his church, and bringing them to confusion. Yet 
 he saith, ver. 3, he trode the press alone ; not that he 
 useth not messengers, as is mentioned in this prophet, 
 or other means as scemeth best to him, but for that 
 the force and eflicacy alone proeeedcth from him ; so 
 that for this cause he is said alone to work, 1 (Jor. 
 iii. 6, 7. For ' Paul indeed planteth, and Apolios 
 watereth ; but neither he that planteth is anything, 
 neither he that watereth is anything, but God, that 
 giveth the increase,' is he that worketh all in all 
 things. 
 
 In the 5th of Luke, the apostles laboured all night, 
 and caught nothing; but when at Christ his command- 
 ment they had ' let fall their nets for a draught, the 
 net was filled with fish.' The king ' prepareth an 
 host against the day of battle, but the victory is 
 from the Lord,' Prov. xxi. 3L 'No king is saved by 
 the multitude of an host. A horse is counted a vain 
 thing to help a man,' &c. Wherefore that was a pro- 
 fane thing of Nebuchadnezzar, who, when he had taken 
 , the Jews as fishes in a not, lie sacrificed to his net, and 
 oflbrcd incense unto his yarn, llab. i. IC, IG. Profane 
 was that opinion of the Gentiles, attributing their pro- 
 sperity to fortune ; and that of Varro, who attributed 
 the success of luisbandry to water. Whereas they 
 might have learned by that ceremony which the 
 Romans used in their triumph, that the success of 
 things was to be attributed to God. For the laurel 
 crowns which they carried when they ascended into 
 the capitol and sacrificed to Jupiter, they laid down in 
 
 the lap of Jupiter, as Pliny* recorded. But let us 
 remember that the four and twenty elders ' cast down 
 their crowns at the feet of the Lamb,' Rev. iv. 10. 
 
 Now, as all glory is due unto God, so on the other 
 side we must remember that he calleth ministers to 
 do his work, who must not be slack in the thing 
 whereunto he appointeth them. He would lead the 
 Israelites through the sea, but he would have Moses 
 to lift up his rod, Exod. xiv. 16. Again, he would 
 divide Jordan, but he would have the priests' feet to 
 be dipped in Jordan, and to carrj- the ark. Josh. 
 ii. 13, 10. He meant to cast down the walls of 
 Jericho, yet would he have them to blow the trum- 
 pets and compass the city, Josh. vi. He would build 
 again the temple when the people returned with 
 Zerubbabel, but the angel shewed Zechariah a golden 
 candlestick, a bowl upon it, seven lamps in it, seven 
 pipes to the lamps, and two olive-trees over it ; and 
 that angel asked him what those were, who, answering 
 he knew not, the angel telleth him that he should say 
 to Zerubbabel, ' Neither by an army nor by strength, 
 but by my Spirit, saith the Lord,' Zech. iv. 1, 2, 6., &c. 
 Yet foUoweth it that Zerubbabel should lay the foun- 
 dation thereof, and the people should crj", ' Grace, 
 grace.' Wherefore the miuistrj- of Moses is necessary 
 that he strike the sea with his rod, necessary that the 
 priests' feet touch the water of Jordan, necessary that 
 they blow the trumpets. But if these things be con- 
 sidered in themselves, without the efficacy of God, they 
 are of no more power to bring this to pass, than the 
 rod was to make a sea stand like a wall, the feet of 
 men to make a river run back, the sound of a trumpet 
 to cast down a strong wall. 
 
 Wherefore, whomsoever they be whom God will 
 use, they must be obedient to his appointment, as 
 Moses, the priests, and Zerubbabel were. And I 
 would to God that they who have the place of Moses, 
 &o., would vouchsafe to humble themselves, and stir 
 up themselves to do their duty — to strike the waters 
 with their rod. This rod is the publishing of the 
 word, which the prophet saith he will ' send out the 
 rod of his power,' that he may ' rule even among his 
 enemies,' Ps. ex. 2. The priests must cai-ry the ark, 
 1 Kings viii. 9. In the ark were the tables of the 
 law, Hcb. ix. 4, and ' in the mouth of the ministers 
 ought the law of the Lord to be.' The priests" feet 
 were dipped iu the waters of Jordan ; the minis- 
 tors' feet must enter first the water ; and ' beautiful 
 are the foot of them that bring good tidings.' The 
 priests blew with the trumpets ; the minister must 
 ' set the trumpet to his mouth,' and sound out aloud 
 both the law and the gospel : the law to bring down 
 the high walls, and the gospel to raise and build up. 
 
 Is it any marvel if the Idumeans be so courageous, 
 
 and promise themselves a day wherein they may cry 
 
 out, ' Raze it, raze it even to the foundations,' if 
 
 means be not used to beat back their pride ? If Iho 
 
 * Lib xvi. 4, and lib. xv. 30. 
 
 358 
 
Ver. 5, 6.] 
 
 SERMON III. 
 
 11 
 
 messengers wliicli should stir up tho people to war 
 against them be silent ; if Moses will not strike with 
 his rod ; if the priests strain courtesy who shall first 
 step into the water ; if the trumpet be not in their 
 mouths : I am loath to name them in whom this fault 
 lieth, but sure too common it is amongst us, and that 
 partly through such as have spoiled the churches of 
 the livings, wherebj- faithful and painful messengers 
 should be maintained. As by impropriations, the 
 first- begotten child of the pope and Satan ; and by 
 the theft of such as somewhere have charge, and go 
 not to it ; by the negligence of others, who are some- 
 where, and will not instruct the people ; and by the 
 ignorance of many that are dumb dogs and cannot 
 
 bark,' so that by reason hereof the people sit in 
 darkness, and those merchants whose wares are the 
 souls of men, enter on the ilock to spoil them of that 
 comfort which they should have in Jerusalem. But 
 seeing our words cannot prevail in this matter, let us 
 beseech the Lord to be gracious and favourable to 
 Jerusalem, and that it would please him to move tho 
 heart of our sovereign, that she would provide that an 
 army of able men might be provided and maintained, 
 that by them the Idiimeans may be discomfited, a 
 way opened for the children of God to pass without 
 danger, the walls may be brought down, and the chil- 
 dren inherit the kingdom of promise. 
 
 SEKMON III. 
 
 If thieves had come unto thee, if robbers by night, (Jiow art tliou dcstroijed !) ivould theij not have stolen that which 
 uer( enotii/hfor tlicm? If grape-r/atlterers luul come unto thee, woiihl theij not have left some (/rajies ? How 
 are the tliinijs of Esau sought out ! Itis secret tilings are searched. — Obadiah, Ver. 5, G. 
 
 rr^HE ruin and destruction of the Idumeans is set 
 X forth by the Spirit of God in this prophecy for 
 the instruction and comfort of the Israelites, to assure 
 them that God will execute justice and judgment on 
 their enemies in the day of his visitation, when he 
 will save them. In the former verses, 1, 2 (as I 
 have shewed already), the prophet declared the sen- 
 tence of the Lord against the Idumeans, that they 
 should he destroyed ; the witnesses thereof, himself 
 and other prophets who heard it from the Lord ; the 
 means that he would work by (ver. 3, 4), tho 
 warriors ' rising up against them to battle ;' the weak- 
 ness of their helps and holds to the contrary, which, 
 ' though they exalted as the eagle doth his nest among 
 stars, yet thence should they be brought down, saith 
 the Lord.' Now, in these that follow to be handled 
 presently, the greatness and grievousness of their 
 destruction is opened ; to wit, that they shall be 
 spoiled and wasted, even unto tho uttermost, inso- 
 much that their things shall be sought out, yea, their 
 hidden things and secret places shall be searched. 
 And this is amplified by two dissimilitudes, the one of 
 thieves, the other of grape-gatherers. Thieves, who 
 i-ob by night, do steal for need commonly, and so they 
 take no more than may suffice their need, neither stay 
 they lightly to search all things and places, for fear 
 lest they be taken. Grape-gatherers among the Jews 
 were accustomed to leave some grapes behind them, 
 according to the law : Lev. xix. 10, ' Thou shalt not 
 gather the grapes of thy vineyard clean, nor the 
 grapes that fall down ; thou shalt leave them for the 
 poor and for the stranger.' But the warriors sent by 
 God against Edom shall not deal with him as thieves 
 or as grape-gatherers. They shall not be contented 
 with that which is enough, as robbers by night are. 
 They shall not leave somewhat of his things behind 
 359 
 
 them, as men do grapes in the vineyard. They shall 
 seize on all, on more than enough ; they shall ' seek 
 out the things of Esau,' that is, Edom, Gen. xxv. 30; 
 they shall seek them out, and by seeking find them : 
 yea, they shall search and rifle the corners, the dens, 
 the secret places wherein the Idumeans would hide 
 themselves and theirs. By which means there should 
 be snch havoc made of them that the prophet uttereth 
 it with admiration, and as if he saw it done, saying 
 first to Edom, ' How art thou destroyed !' and then 
 of him and his, ' How are the things of Esau sought 
 out ; his secret things are searched !' Thus it is fore- 
 shewed that the desolation of Edom or Esau, that is, 
 of Esau's ofl'spring, the people of the Idumeans, shall 
 be great and grievous, as being wrought by warriors 
 who shall spare nought, either of fear, as thieves do, 
 or of compassion, as grape-gatherers. ' If thieves had 
 come unto thee, if robbers by night, (how art thou 
 destroyed !) would they not have stolen that which 
 were enough for them ? If grape-gatherers had come 
 unto thee, would they not have left some grapes ? 
 How are the things of Esau sought out ! his secret 
 things are searched !' 
 
 St Peter advertising the Jews and the proselytes, 
 Acts ii. 38, that they should ' receive the gift of the 
 Holy Ghost,' if they repented and turned to Christ: 
 'for to you,' said he, 'is the promise made, and to 
 your children, and to all them that shall belong here- 
 after, even to as many as the Lord our God shall 
 call.' The same, in like sort, may 1 say unto you, 
 fathers and brethren, touching this promise of bring- 
 ing yom- enemies to utter ruin and destruction. For 
 God said to Abraham, Gen. xii. 3, ' I will bless them 
 that bless thee, and I will curse them that curse thee ; ' 
 meaning, that he would make a perfect league with 
 him, and be at peace with his friends, at war with his 
 
12 
 
 EAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Vek. 5, 6. 
 
 enemies. But the longue and covenant -wliich God 
 made with Abraham, he made with Abraham and his 
 seed, Gen. xvii. 7. And the seed of Abraham arc all 
 faithful Christians, Gal. iii. 9. To us all, therefore, is 
 the promise made, that God will bless our friends, 
 and will curse our enemies. Moreover, his particular 
 curse and plague ensuing it, upon the Idumeans, is a 
 pattern of that which shall fall on such as tread in 
 their steps. For the punishment of the Jews who 
 lusted after evil things, is threatened to the Gentiles, 
 if they lust as the Jews did, 1 Cor. x. G ; and if ye be 
 partakers of the sins of Babylon, ye shall receive of 
 her plagues, Kev. sviii. 4. Now, among the enemies of 
 the faithful Christians, othci's do more resemble the 
 Philistines, or Ammonites, or Moabities, or Amalek- 
 ites, or Canaanitcs, or Assp'ians ; there are none 
 liker to the Idumeans than arc the papists, as it hath 
 been shewed. The Idumeans, bom according to the 
 flesh of the seed of Abraham ; the papists by offspring 
 come of Christian parents. The Idumeans circum- 
 cised as children of the covenant ; the pa])ists baptized 
 in the same that we be. The Idumeans served not 
 the God of their fathers according to the law, neither 
 do the papists in spirit and truth after the gospel. 
 The Idumeans persecuted the Israelites to death, and 
 vexed them with all cruelty ; the papists have butchered 
 the godly with massacres, and made themselves 
 drunken with the blood of saints. Wherefore the 
 Spirit of the Lord assureth us, that the papists shall 
 be consumed in his wrath, when it shall burn sud- 
 denly; and, as they have followed the facts of the 
 Idumeans, so they shall feel their punishments. I 
 speak not herein of all that are pnpists, as neitlier did 
 the prophet of all Idumeans. For the remnant of 
 Edom shall inherit with Israel, Amos. ix. 12, and 
 papists with us ; as many as shall seek him, whose 
 name is called upon them. Acts xv. 17, 18; which 
 God grant they may do by faith in his mercy, that 
 papists may live, and papistry may die ! But I speak 
 of all who stubbornly persist in the popish heresies ; 
 in whom shall be fulfilled the apostle's prophecy 
 touching ' the mr.n of sin,' 2 Thes. ii. 8, ' The Lord 
 shall consume them with the breath of his mouth.' 
 And so, that which is written of Edom liy the pro- 
 phet may be said by us to the Romish antichrist: 
 ' If thieves had come unto thee, if robbers bj' night, 
 (how art thow destroyed!) would they not have stolen 
 that which were enough for them? If grape-gatherers 
 had come unto thee, would they not have left some 
 grapes? How are the things of Antichrist sought 
 out! his secret things are searched!' 
 
 Howbcit, as St Paul, though he were assured that 
 all who sailed with him should escape alive. Acts 
 xxvii. 24, yet said that they could not escape, ' ex- 
 cept the mariners abode in the ship,' ver. 31, so though 
 it be certain that antichrist and his members shall bo 
 consumed, yet cannot that be, except they be set upon 
 by warriors ; for God doth work by means ordinarily. 
 
 And this is the means that he hath ordained for the 
 achieving of that conquest, as we saw before in the 
 ambassador's message, Obad. 1, ' Arise, and let us 
 rise up against her to battle.' The warriors whose 
 service the Lord doth use thereto, are all his servants 
 in a sort, ' his people most willing in the day of his 
 army,' Psalm ex. 3, but specially preachers and 
 ministers of his word. For his word is the rod of his 
 mouth, Isa. xi. 4, the breath, 2 Thes. ii. 8, the 
 sword, Rev. six. 1.5, whereby he doth destroy his 
 enemies; and ministers are soldiers, 'by whose hand' 
 he wieldeth it. Hag. i. 1. For which cause their 
 function is compared to warfare, in that it is written 
 by St Paul, 1 Cor. ix. 7, ' Who goeth to warfare any 
 time at his own cost?' and, 2 'Tim. ii. 4, 'No man 
 that warreth entangleth himself with the aifairs of this 
 life, that he may please him, w^ho hath chosen him to 
 be a soldier.' And God saith of them, by the prophet 
 Isaiah, chap. hii. G, ' I have set watchmen upon thy 
 walls, Jerusalem, which all the day and all the 
 night continuallj- shall not cease.' The watchmen 
 and warriors, therefore, of the Lord, the keepers of 
 his church, the conquerors of his enemies, the spoilers 
 of the Idumeans, the consumers of antichrist, and 
 antichristian imps, are ministers of his word, pastors 
 and teachers, who, to please him by whom they are 
 chosen soldiers, should not be entangled with the 
 aflairs of this life ; to discharge their duty, should be 
 sent forth and kept on public cost ; to preserve their 
 flock, should watch day and uight continually over it. 
 The less marvel is it if, in our English chiu-ches, anti- 
 christ and Edom be not consumed yet ; nay, if they 
 attempt to consume us, if by popish policies, by 
 superstitious tokens, by blasphemous writings, by 
 traitorous libels and conspiracies, they undermine our 
 state; if they ' take crafty counsel against the people 
 of God,' Psalm Ixxxiii. 3, and say, ' Let us possess 
 his habitations by inheritance,' ver. 12; if they look 
 for a day when they may cry, once again, ' Raze it, 
 raze it to the foundation thereof,' Psahn cxxxvii. 7; 
 in a word, if they range through the land like wolves, 
 and suck the blood of sheep and lambs, sith the 
 shepherds fail, the watchmen are asleep, the warriors 
 do not fight through want somewhere of will, some- 
 where of ability. Of will, where they entangle them- 
 selves with such afl'airs as draw them from their war- 
 fare, and are not content to be ' watchmen in Jeru- 
 salem,' but they must have a watohmanship in Cassarea 
 too ; or, if they have one flock alone, yet do not feed 
 it, but take their ease in Zion. Of ability, where 
 there is not suflicicnt provision for training of men to 
 make them good soldiers, nor maintenance to find 
 them being trained ; that, setting all other cares of 
 life apart, they may attend their charge wholly. To 
 them here amongst us, who, through want of will, are 
 backward in this service of the Lord (iod of hosts, 
 so much hath been spoken, so often, so earnestly, both 
 out of this and other places, that I am half ashamed 
 
 300 
 
Veil 5, 6.] 
 
 SERMON III. 
 
 13 
 
 again to solicit them with ' precept upon precept, 
 precept upon precept.' Notwithstanding, as I have 
 read, that when we had gotten Calais from the French- 
 men, there was one appointed to put them in remem- 
 liraiice, from time to time, of Calais, in all their 
 solemn meetings for state consultations, till they had 
 regained it, so I am' persuaded that, till the amend- 
 ment of this fault ho won, it is most convenient for the 
 Lord's remembrancers iu all our church assemblies to 
 wish it to be thought of. 
 
 Wherefore, to put you in mind even now also of 
 our spiritual Calais, I beseech j'ou, fathers and 
 brethren (whom it toucheth), now at length to regai'd 
 the state of the souls, the precious souls of men com- 
 mitted to your charge ; whose blood, if they perish for 
 lack of that attendance which you ought to give them, 
 will cry for sharper vengeance, than did the blood of 
 Abel, Gen. iv. 10. Or, if my persuasion cainiot pre- 
 vail with you, yet let his prevail, whose prayer hath pre- 
 vailed for you ; who died himself, that you might live; 
 who said, and aU things were created ; whose word 
 the winds and seas obey. Consider the function that 
 he hath called yoa to, the duty laid upon ynu, the re- 
 ward if you do it, the punishment if you do it not. 
 ' Who is,' Siiith ;_he, Luke sii. 42, ' a faithful and 
 wise steward, whom his master maketh ruler over his 
 household, to give them their portion of meat iu due 
 season ? Blessed is that servant, whom his master, 
 when he cometh, shall find so doing ; verily, I say 
 unto you, he shall make him ruler over all his goods. 
 But if that servant saj' in his heart. My master doth 
 defer his coming ; and begin to smite the servants and 
 maidens, and to eat and drink, and to be drunken ; 
 that servant's master will come in a day when he 
 looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not 
 aware of, and will cut him in pieces, and give him his 
 portion with the unbelievers.' Our Saviour, the Son 
 of God, the King of kings, the Lord of lords, having 
 entertained men and women of all degrees to be his 
 household servants, is careful to feed them with con- 
 venient food, that they may servo him in their voca- 
 tion fruitfully. This food is the doctrine of his holy 
 word, which must be divided in diverse sorts unto his 
 servants, according to their diverse states ; some to 
 be fed with milk, some with strong meat ; some 
 humbled with the law, some raised with the gospel ; 
 each to have his ' portion of meat ' most wholesome 
 for him. Nor only must they have it, but have it too 
 ' in due season,' as often as they need it, which is so 
 often, that the Holy Ghost (to shew the continual 
 necessity thereof) doth will it to be given them ' in 
 season and out of season,' 2 Tim. iv. 2. For, as 
 men's bodies should lose their temporal life, unless, 
 as they decay still, so they were repaired with suste- 
 nance of meat and drink ; in like sort men's souls are 
 fainting still also, to their hazard of life eternal, unless 
 they be refreshed with the food of God's word, Amos 
 viii. 11. Wherefore, that his servants and maidens 
 3G1 
 
 be not famished, the master of the household hath 
 made j'OU his stewards to minister meat unto them. 
 If you behave j'ourselves as wise stewards and faith- 
 ful, — wise, in discerning what portion of meat thej' 
 need each, and when ; faithful, in giving it to them 
 in due season, — your master shall come, who now is 
 absent, as it were, and gone into a far country, Luke 
 xix. 12 ; but he shall come again and till you with 
 blessedness ; he shall make you rulers over all his 
 goods, and honour you as highly as Pharaoh did 
 Joseph, Gen. xli. 40 ; yea, he shall reward you with 
 a ' cro.vn of glory, an incorruptible crown,' 1 Pet. v. 
 ■1, and ye shall,' shine as stars forever and ever,' Dan. 
 xii. b. But if ye think his coming to be far otl, and 
 so begin to ' smite the servants and the maidens ;' 
 nay, I would to God 3'e did smite them only, so that 
 ye taught them too, for that were a benefit ; but if ye 
 famish them, and play the good felknvs yoursrdves 
 with the world, and ' eat and drink, and be drunken,' 
 your ' Master will come iu a day when ye look not for 
 him, and in an hour that ye are not ware of, and will 
 cut you in pieces, br/oro/Mnan, and give you your por- 
 tion with the unbelievers.' By the Koman laws of the 
 twelve Tables, * if a man owed money unto sundry 
 creditors, and after judgment given did not agree 
 with them himself, or others for him, his creditors 
 might (after certain days' respite) cut his body in 
 pieces, and take them each a part thereof. Phavori- 
 nus the philosopher reproved this law as cruel and 
 barbarous, f But Ca^cilius the lawyer replied well 
 upon him, that so great a punishment was appointed 
 of purpose, that they might never come unto it. For 
 now we see many (said he) laid up fast, and cast into 
 fetters, because the pain of fetters is contemned by 
 lewd persons. But I never read nor heard, that of old 
 time any were cut to pieces, because they could not set 
 light by thatpunishment. Mettius Fufetius the prince 
 of the Albans, having promised the lioman king Tul- 
 lus Hostilius to succour him against his enemies, did 
 treacherously deceive him , by wdiom he was therefore lied 
 to two carts, his hands to the one, his feet to the other, 
 and so (the horses being driven contrary ways) he was 
 torn iu pieces. Livy misliketh this punishment as 
 over sharp, \ and saith that there was small regard of 
 human laws had in it. But Virgil, § weighing better 
 the greatness of the fault, alloweth it with grave cen- 
 sure. 
 
 At tu dictis Albane mancre, 
 But thou, Albau prince, thy promise shouldst liave kept. 
 
 Traitors iu our days, though they be not torn with 
 horses as Mettius, yet are they rent in pieces as Mettius 
 was, and quartered. The papists complain thereof to 
 foreign nations, [| as of outrageous tyranny, when 
 they are put unto it for traitorous facts against our 
 
 * Tit. Jc re judicata. 
 
 t A. Gel. Noct. Attic, lib. xx. cap. i. 
 
 * Hist, ab Urb. Coiul lib. i. § yliDeitl, lib. viii 
 II Epist. de persecut. Angl. 
 
14 
 
 EAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Yer. 5, 6. 
 
 prince. But it is usual and lawful for the pope (as 
 Leo the Tenth's practice in Guiceiardini'' doth witness) 
 to quarter men for treason wrought against him. Now, 
 this severe punishment, which hath been thought fit 
 by mortal judges to be laid upon unfaithful debtors, 
 upon treacherous persons, upon rebellious traitors, is 
 the same that Christ, the immortal Judge, denounceth 
 unto 3-ou, if 3-0 be disloyal to God, your sovereign 
 Lord, if ye break promise with him and his servants, 
 if ye pay them not the debt which ye owe them, and 
 'give them their portion of meat in due season.' A 
 very grievous punishment, yet nothing to that which 
 Christ importeth by it. For he doth import (as the 
 words following shew) that ye ' shall have your portion 
 ■with the unbelievers ;' and ' the unbelievers shall 
 have their portion in the lake that burneth with fire 
 and brimstone, which is the second death,' Rev. xxi. 8. 
 Of Damocles, a heathen man, iV is recorded, that 
 when Dionysius the tyrant entertained him magnifi- 
 cently and princely, although at the first he thought 
 himself happy, respecting the train of men attendant 
 on him, the plate of gold and silver, the gorgeous 
 cloths, the sweet perfumes, the viands most delicate, 
 all furniture rich and royal ; yet after, seeing a sword 
 hanging by a thread let down over his head, he could 
 take no joy of his entertainment, nay, he took grief, 
 and desired earnestly to bo dismissed from it. How 
 much less joy should you take in your eating, your 
 drmkiug, your pleasures, with which, as worldly baits, 
 the prince of this world doth pamper your flesh 
 against the day of slaughter, sith there hangeth over 
 your necks an axe of vengeance, not that may perhaps, 
 but that will assuredly, not kill your bodies only, but 
 both bodies and souls, not with temporal death, but 
 with everlasting into hell-fire. ' There shall be weep- 
 ing and gnashing of teeth,' Mat. xxiv. 51. Oh consider 
 this, ye that forget God, lest he tear you in pieces, 
 and there be none that can deliver you. The warrior 
 that spoileth the Idumeans shall honour him, and he 
 that watcheth over the Israelites, to save them, shall 
 see the salvation of God. And thus much to them 
 who, through want of will, search not the secret things 
 of Esau. 
 
 As for the defect which this exploit suffereth 
 through want of ability, because such as should do 
 it are either not trained or not maintained to it in 
 sufficient sort, that is so much hurtfuller to us than 
 the former, by how much the contagion of it spreadeth 
 farther. For soldiers ought to learn and practise 
 feats of war (as expert nionf have noted) before they 
 deal in martial aflairs with their enemies; and as they 
 should employ themselves to no liusiness but to their 
 service only, J so should they be allowed victuals, and 
 other necessaries, that they need not to do it. § 
 'vVhereupou the Lord appointing priests and Levites 
 
 • Hist. Ital. lib. xiii. 
 
 t Veget. de re milit. lib. i. cap. i. 
 
 X Lib. ii. caj). xix. 
 
 i Lib. iii. cap iii. 
 
 to serve him in this warfare (as Moses termeth it, 
 Num. iv. 23) and ministry, allotted them ofi'erings, 
 first-fruits and tithes of all the land to live by, Num. 
 xviii. 9, with cities to dwell in, and grounds annexed 
 thereunto. Num. xxsv. 2; and beside the convenience 
 of their abode together in Jerusalem and other cities, 
 that they might the better be trained from their infancy 
 to skill of the priestly and Levitical duties, to teach 
 the law of God, and ofler incense and sacrifice, Deut. 
 xxxiii. 10, tbere were also colleges and companies of 
 prophets, 1 Sam. x. 5, and xix. 10, wherein the 
 younger learned under the elder (as children under 
 fathers, 2 Kings ii. 3, and vi. 1) to be men of God, to 
 praise his name, and teach his will. These orders 
 received by the church of Israel should be followed by 
 ours, though not in all particulars, yet in the general 
 equity. For, 1 Cor. viii. 13, as ' they who served 
 about the holy things did eat of the temple, they who 
 waited at the altar were partakers with the altar. So 
 the Lord ordained, too, that they who preach the 
 gospel should live of the gospel.' And Timothy, 
 1 Tim. i. 18, who was chosen to serve in this warfare, 
 cr^arilav, as a soldier of Christ, 2 Tim. ii. 3, did not 
 only know the Scriptures from his infancy, 2 Tim. 
 iii. 15, but also was brought up to the ministry by St 
 Paul, whose doctrine and behaviour framed him unto 
 it. Acts xvi. 3, 2 Tim. iii. 10. In which considera- 
 tion our ancestors provided houses, glebe-laud, tithes, 
 and other profits for the commodious dwelling and 
 maintenance of pastors, and endowed bishoprics, 
 cathedral and collegiate churches (as we call them), 
 with lands and revenues, that learned godl}' teachers 
 being placed there, might instruct others by their 
 doctrine and behaviour, as St Paul did Timothy ; for 
 the fuller perfecting and finishing of whom to all the 
 Lord's work, they founded universities and colleges 
 therein also.* But I would to God these nurseries of 
 pastors and teachers of the church were husbanded in 
 such sort to the Lord's advantage, that we need not 
 fear his sentence of the vineyard, that ' he will let it 
 out to other husbandmen,' Mat. xxi. 41. Then should 
 not so many raw, untrained soldiers receive the Lord's 
 pay, who do him small service in the day of battle. 
 And yet there were less cause to complain hereof, if 
 they who be trained were procured to serve him. But 
 the impressed money and wages due to them, the 
 livings (I mean) appointed for their maintenance, are 
 so impaired and minished, that being not able there- 
 with to find themselves in soldierlike state, they refuse 
 the calling; or if they undertake it, they are distracted 
 from it with cares how to supply their need. "Whereby 
 it cometh to pass that ' the Levites Hying each into 
 his land' for lack of their portions, ' the house of God 
 is forsaken,' Neh. xiii. 10. And to fill their rooms 
 
 * As appcarcth by tlio grounds tlieieof in St Cyprian, 
 Eusobin.^, Gregory, tlie Councils of Toledo, with other coun- 
 cils, fathers, and stories ecclesiastical ; and M. Rucersheweth 
 in his book, entitled, Ve reformationc Collegii Caitoiiici. 
 
 302 
 
Ver. 5, 6.] 
 
 SERMON III. 
 
 15 
 
 others are taken, who will be hired for least ; not 
 aeeorJiiig to the proverb, Best is best cheap, but to 
 the common practice, Best cheap is best ; who, 
 though not to serve the calves of Dan and Bethel, j-et 
 are made priests, as those by Jeroboam, 1 Ivings 
 xii. 31, ' of pieces of the people, not of the sons of 
 Levi ;' who, if they had the grace, should say, ' I 
 am no prophet, I am a husbandman,' Zech. xiii. 5, 
 and return to the trade which their friends have taught 
 them. 
 
 AVlio are not endued with necessary gifts for the 
 prophet's duty, and therefore, howsoever men have 
 called them to it, God hath not called them. For 
 whom God calleth unto an}- fimction, them endueth 
 he with gifts to perform it: as Bezaleel, to make his 
 tabernacle, Esod. xxxi. 2 ; Jeremiah, to do his mes- 
 sage, Jer. i. 9 ; the apostles to preach the gospel. 
 Acts ii. 4. So the tlock of Christ is desolate of shep- 
 herds, and his camp of soldiers, while such have the 
 places as cannot 'strengthen the weak, help the sick, 
 bind up the broken,' Ezek. xxxiv. 4, nor destroy 
 his enemies with the two-edged sword, Heb. iv. 12, 
 and defend his subjects. A great cause hereof are 
 patrons of benetices. For, whereas the interest of 
 choosing the pastor, belonging of old time to the con- 
 gregation, is now conveyed to them, because their 
 predecessors did benefit the church some way, and 
 therefore were put in trust as patrons of it, they, a 
 number of them, do deal with the matter as Polymes- 
 tor did with Polydore, that is, as evil guardians do 
 with their wards, and turn their patronage into pillage. 
 The lust of their hearts hath defiled their hands with 
 the sacrilege of Achan, Josh. vii. 21, to take gold and 
 silver, and Babylonish garments, of the spoils of 
 Jericho consecrated to God, Josh. vi. 19 ; or, if not 
 with so foul sacrilege as his was, because their pre- 
 decessors gave some of it perhaps yet with the sacri- 
 lege of Ananias and Sapphira, Acts v. 2, yea, though 
 themselves had given it. If they think to cover their 
 profane dealing with Achan's conveyance, by hiding the 
 prey, Josh. vii. 22, or to wash their hands with Pilate's 
 pretence, that they are guiltless of it. Mat. xxvii. 24, 
 they gave the advowsons freely to friends or servants, 
 they deceive themselves, for God is not mocked. 
 Gal. vi. 7, and he will find them out in a day when 
 thej' look not for him, and in an hour that they are not 
 ware of, and bring them to shame with more dread- 
 ful pimishment than either he did Achan, Josh. vii. 
 25, or Ananias and Sapphira, Acts v. 5. Wherefore 
 I heartilj' beseech the young gentlemen that be here 
 present, and all that are or shall be patrons hereafter, 
 in a religious reverence and fear of the Lord, to keep 
 themselves pure from this abomination, at least to re- 
 member the miserable end of Pilchard the Usurper, 
 who, being made protector of the king and realm, got 
 the realm himself, and robbed the king of it ; that, 
 if they deem their patronage to bo merely civil, and 
 the goods of benefices to be as common men's, not 
 363 
 
 sacred to the Lord, yet being made protectors there- 
 of, and of the pastors, they follow not his fault, whose 
 end they detest. Though, the very truth is (which I 
 wish they weigh too), that the church's goods, allotted 
 to the maintenance of pastors and teachers, are not 
 profane but sacred, and therefore the sin of them who 
 purloin them is sacrilege, not theft, wherein God is 
 spoiled, as himself pronounced, Mai. iii. 8, ' Will a 
 man spoil God, that ye do spoil me ? And ye say, 
 Wherein do we spoil thee ? In tithes and offerings.' 
 Howbeit, if church livings were impoverished by 
 none but by patrons, the case were not so evil, because 
 it is against the law. But they are distressed also 
 (beside other pensions and incumbrances) by appro- 
 priations, as the lawyers term them, or, as they arc 
 named commonly, impropriations ; whereof the con- 
 dition is the more grievous, for that in many parishes 
 there is not a vicar well and sufficiently endowed to 
 do divine service, and instruct the people, and keep 
 hospitality, which yet the law comniandeth,* if it were 
 obeyed. ' Josiah, in the eighth year of his reign, 
 began to seek the God of his fiither David ; and in 
 the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jeru- 
 salem from the high places, and the groves, and the 
 graven images, and the molten ; and in the eighteenth 
 year he sent Shaphan and others to repair the house 
 of the Lord his God,' 2 Chron. xxxiv. 3. Reforma- 
 tions of disorders cannot be made all at once, chiefly 
 when the church hath of long time been overgrown 
 with them, as then it had under idolatry, and hath 
 with us under popery. King Henry the Eighth, a 
 prince of noble memory, began to set forth the holy 
 word of God ; and his son (another Josiah, had he 
 lived) began to purge England from images, and 
 masses, and massing-altars, and superstitious. I 
 doubt not but our gracious queen and sovereign lady 
 desireth in the steps of her father and her brother, to 
 add this unto them, that workmen be maintained for 
 repairing of the church. But it lieth not in her High- 
 ness alone to bring it to effect ; the lords and the 
 commons have a stroke in it. Wherefore, seeing now 
 a parliament is summoned to be held shortly, let us 
 desire God in humbleness of spirit to incline their 
 hearts, that, although it be with loss of some part of 
 their own commodities, yet they will follow the zeal of 
 the Israelites for the tabernacle of assembly, Exod. 
 XXXV. 21. And as the religious professors of the 
 truth have shewed that church-livings appropriated 
 to others should in conscience find the pastors of the 
 church, so God grant that they who have the authority 
 may see it with a single eye, and bring it to pass with 
 an upright hand. Martin Bucer, int his godly re- 
 quests and advices presented to King Edward, treating 
 of skilful pastors to be ordained throughout the realm, 
 saith that their maintenance ought to be required of 
 them who receive the profits of the parishes, by appro- 
 
 * Ann. iv. Henr. iv. cap. xii. 
 t De regno Chr. lib. ii. cap. vii. 
 
16 
 
 RAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver. 5, 6 
 
 priation or any other wa}-. Bishop* Pilldngton (upon 
 Haggai) complaiuing that the pope robbed parishes to 
 feed bis monks, wisheth that the gospel may restore 
 that justly' which he took wrongfully awa}', and gave 
 them yet a right name of impropriations, because they 
 be taken away improper!}', and properly belong to the 
 parishes. But what should I mention bishops and 
 divines, of whom there havef many declared the same 
 mind, whenas MastcrJ Lambard, a gentleman and 
 lawyer, speaking of a Kentish benefice converted to 
 an appropriation, doth censure it with these words : 
 One, amongst many, of those monstrous births of 
 covctousness, begotten by the man of Rome in the 
 dark night of superstition, and yet sufl'ered to live in 
 this daylight of the gospel, to the great hindrance of 
 learning, the impoverishment of the ministry, and 
 the infamy of our profession. Hard may this seem 
 to such as have the livings; and some peradventure 
 will say of these speeches, ' The land cannot bear 
 them,' Amos vii. 10. But it is harder to suffer the 
 land to stand in those terms, in which God saith to 
 Judah, Mai. iii. 9, ' Ye arc cursed with a curse, for 
 that ye spoil me, even the whole nation.' And if 
 heathen men, Phihvni, Codrus, Curtius, have given 
 their lives to benefit their country with a temporal 
 blessing, and that uncertain too, what should Chris- 
 tians do to draw that blessing on it, which he who 
 cannot lie doth promise ? ver. 10, ' Bring ye all the 
 tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in 
 mine house; and prove me now herewith, saith the 
 Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of 
 heaven nnto you, and pour you out a blessing without 
 measure ; and I will rebuke the devourer for your 
 sakes, that he shall not destroy the fruit of your 
 ground, neither shall your vine be barren in the field, 
 saith the Lord of hosts ; and all nations shall call you 
 blessed, for ye shall be a pleasant land, saith the Lord 
 of hosts.' Wherefore let us, beloved, of the university, 
 get our country this blessing, as much as lieth in us, 
 by providing that pastors, where we have appropria- 
 tions, may bo maintained with their tithes, that there 
 may be meat in the house of God. I mean not 
 hereby that we should give away that by which our 
 schools and scholars be maintained ; for God hath 
 ordained ecclesiastical goods to find, not only priests 
 and Levites, but their offspring, even them who are 
 brought up to bo priests and Levites, and them who 
 bring them up ; the ' children of the prophets,' and 
 the prophets themselves ; that, if there bo enough in 
 our appropriations for the pastors' maintenance, be- 
 side that which we have for the nursery of pastors, as 
 
 * Exposit. of Ilntrf^ni (lie ]irfi))liot, cliap. i. 
 
 f M. Latimer in liis 1st and tith sermon jircachcd before 
 Kinp: Edward. ]\1. Fux. in tlie Acta and Mon., lib. iv. All 
 tlio bishops of Kni^land (300 years since), misl king in the 
 monks that they liad gotten benefices to be appropriated to 
 them, as appear by hlat. Wcstni. in Florib Hist., an. Vom. 
 l'2(;i. 
 
 X The perambulat of Kent in Fenabury. 
 
 commonly there is, we may with good conscience 
 receive our own revenue. My meaning is, therefore, 
 that, the rents reserved, we should allow the rest of the 
 livings to pastors, which I speak not so much for 
 those that publicly our university hath, to be let by 
 convocation, whereof the greater part bath shewed 
 well already themselves to be of this mind, as for 
 those that privately belong to our colleges, to be let 
 by the heads thereof and the fellows. 
 
 It is of an human and honest aflection that^ we 
 sometimes would pleasure other men therewith, our 
 friends suing for them. But if Job said to Zopbar 
 and his partners. Job. xlii. 7, ' Should you speak 
 wickedly- for God's defence ? ' how much less ought 
 we to do unrighteously for the favour of men ? And 
 may we not look for the plague that fell on Eli, 
 1 Sam. ii. 29, if, as he did 'honour his children above 
 God,' so we do our friends? Levi is commended by 
 the H0I3' Ghost, Dent, xxxiii. 9, for ' saying of his 
 father and of his mother, I look not on him ; neither 
 doth he acknowledge his brethren, nor know his chil- 
 dren : but they observe the word of God, and keep his 
 covenant.' All Christians are bound herein to be 
 Lovites, regarding neither father nor mother, son nor 
 daughter, in respect of God, when his word and cove- 
 nant Cometh into question. Mat. x. 37. AVhereforo, 
 silh this is a special point thereof, that ' all the tithes 
 be brought into the storehouse, that in his house 
 there may be meat,' we should observe and keep it, 
 though with the disfavour of friends whatsoever. And 
 as it bchovetb us to do it ourselves, so to wish that 
 others enjoy the blessing with us. In which case, the 
 duty that we owe to ' kings, and all in authority,' 
 1 Tim. ii. 2, doth bind us to pray for the high court 
 of parliament, that by their ordinance the church may 
 be repaired, and ' we may lead a quiet and peaceable 
 life in all godliness and honesty.' When Eliashib 
 the priest (the high priest of the Jews) had ' made 
 for his kinsman Tobias a great chamber,' Neb. xiii. 4, 
 where they aforetime did lay the meat-offering, the 
 incense, and the vessels, and the tithes and offer- 
 ings, appointed for the Levites and priests, as soon 
 as Nehemiah (the prince of the people) understood 
 thereof, it grieved him sore. Therefore he cast out 
 the household vessels of Tobias out of the chamber, 
 and brought thither again the vessels of the house of 
 God, the meat-offering, and the incense. And per- 
 ceiving further that the portions of the Levites were 
 not given them, who therefore were fled each into his 
 land, he reprovcth the rulers, and said. Why is the 
 house of God forsaken ? And assembling them, ho set 
 them in their place again. And all the Jews brought 
 the tithes into tho storehouse to be divided to them. 
 The pope, in tho iniquity of bis high usurped priest- 
 hood over Christians, endowed his kinsmen tho monks 
 with tithes and livings, by which aforetime the pastors 
 were maintained. Whereof it hath ensued, that many 
 a Tobias doth hold them until this day. Oh that it 
 
 364 
 
Vek. 7.] 
 
 SERMON IV. 
 
 17 
 
 might grieve, that it might grieve sore, our Nehe- 
 miah, the parliament, that they might dispossess 
 Tobias thereof, and again apply them to maintain 
 pastors. The antichristian council assembled at Trent 
 took order for restoring of the goods of benefices,* and 
 setting learned priests in them,f with disannulling of 
 advowsons,! and erecting lectures, and maintaining 
 teachers, § and seminaries of scholars in all cathedral 
 churches, II to set popery forward, and build up the 
 houses of Idumean idols. ' The children of this world 
 are wiser in their generation than the children of light,' 
 Luke xvi. 8 ; and Baalitcs more zealous for their 
 superstition than Israelites for the truth, 1 Kings 
 xviii. 19. But thou canst, Lord, and wilt (unless 
 our sins provoke thy wrath against us), cause the light 
 of thy countenance so 1 1 shine upon us, that the Chris- 
 tian court of our English parliament shall be as cai'e- 
 ful to build up thy house, and advance religion, that 
 the vessels of thy temple which Nebuchadnezzar took 
 away, 2 Chron. xxxvi. 10, and Belshazzar did drink 
 in, Dan. v. 2., be restored by Cyrus, Ezra i. 7, to 
 whom they are befallen ; that Elizabeth thy hand- 
 maid ' command the people to give the 'portion of 
 the priests and Levites, that they may be strong in 
 the law of the Lord,' as did thy servant Hezekiah, 
 
 * Cone. Trid. Ses3. 22, de reform, cap. xi. 
 
 t Sess. 24, de rtform. cap. xviii. J Cap. xix. 
 
 5 Sess. 5, de reform, cap. i. 
 
 11 Sess. 23, de reform, cap. xviii. 
 
 2 Chron. xxxi. 4 ; that pastors may be set again in 
 their places, and all the tithes be brought into the 
 storehouse to be divided to them ; that none of them 
 want, as Nehemiah provided, and thou commandest 
 by thy prophet. So shall they by whom this noble 
 work is wrought be ' remembered in it, and the kind- 
 ness that they shew on the house of God, and the 
 offices thereof, shall not be wiped out,' Neh. xiii. 14. 
 So shall ' the windows of heaven be opened ' to us, 
 and 'a blessing poured on us without measure,' Mai. 
 iii. 10, a temporal and eternal blessing ; for ' godli- 
 ness hath promise ' of them both, 1 Tim. iv. 8. So 
 shall the devourer be rebuked for our sakes ; and the 
 locusts, Il'3v. ix. 8 (the Jesuits and seminary priests) 
 shall not destroy our fruit; neither shall our vine (our 
 Christian vine) be barren, Isa. v. 1. So shall we be 
 called ' blessed by all nations ; ' for we shall be ' a 
 pleasant land,' a land that shall flow with the word of 
 God, ' more to be desired than gold, more sweet than 
 honey,' Ps. xix. 10. Finally, so shall Israel triumph 
 over his enemies, and the things of Esau shall be 
 sought out, his secret things shall be searched ; that 
 is, Christ shall reign, and antichrist shall be con- 
 founded. Which God grant, for his mercy's sake in 
 Jesus Christ, through the operation of his Hoh' Spirit, 
 to whom, three persons and one God, be all jjraise, 
 and honour, and glory, and power, for ever and ever. 
 Amen. 
 
 SEKMON IV. 
 
 All thy ciDifedernles have driven thee to the borders : the men that ivere at peace with tliee have deceived thee, and 
 prevailed arjainst thee ; they that cat thy bread have laid a wound under thee: titere is no understandim/ in 
 him. — Obadiah, Ver. 7. 
 
 THE prophet hitherto set down first the certainty of 
 the destruction of the Idumeans, and then laid 
 before them the grievousness of the same, cometh now 
 to this point which ensueth, which implieth both the 
 former, shewing that all their confederates and friends, 
 such as were nearest unto them, should join together 
 utterly to destroy them. Which circumstance, as it 
 argueth that they should certainly come to ruin, and 
 that no hope remained, that they should be delivered 
 from it, seeing such as they hoped should help them 
 from it should be prepared to bring them to it, so doth 
 it amplify the bitterness of it. David complaineth 
 grievously that his familiar friend, who went with him 
 into the house of God, Ps. li. 13, sli. 10, whom he 
 trusted, and who did eat of his bread, that such a one 
 should lift up his heel against him. If an enemy had 
 done him that dishonour, he saith he could have 
 borne it. Cajsar contained himself when the rest of 
 the senate'struck him with their penknives ; but when 
 Brutus smote him, ho said, Et tu quoque,mi fiH!* Even 
 
 * Xiphilin. ex Dionis Julio. Sueton. in Cesare. Parti- 
 cula 82. 
 
 3G5 
 
 so is the bitterness of this destruction herein declared, 
 that it should be wrought by their friends and con- 
 federates : All thy confederates, cCc. The same thing 
 also in effect is repeated and uttered diverse ways, to 
 lay it deeper in their hearts, and to put them the 
 better in mind thereof. For they that were 'in league 
 with them ' are called their ' confederates; ' the 'men 
 that were at peace with them,' they that ' ate their 
 bread ; ' and their ruin signified when it is said, have 
 ' driven thee to the borders,' have ' deceived thiie,' 
 ' prevailed against thee,' ' laid a wound under thee.' 
 All which is set out after the prophet's manner, when 
 he saith, have driven, liave deceived, &a, when he 
 meaneth that they should ; for that it should so surely 
 come to pass as though it were done already. The 
 means is said to be by fraud and guile, when it is said 
 'they shall deceive thee,' &c., whereunto is also added 
 to make up the mischief, that this treachercus dealing 
 should be so crafty, that they should not espy, much 
 less prevent it, when it is said, ' there is no under- 
 standing in him.' Whereof he also spcaketh more at 
 large in the nest verse, saying, ' Shall not I in that 
 
18 
 
 EAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver. 7. 
 
 clav, saith the Lord, even destroy tlie wise men out of 
 Edom ? ' 
 
 The point wLicb I would here commend to your 
 consideration is, that the Lord will work the overthrow 
 of Edom by his friends, which is meant in these words, 
 ' Thy confederates have driven thee.' The judgment 
 of the Lord executed by bis law upon entieers to 
 idolatry, disobedient to magistrates, unthankful chil- 
 dren, &c., is in sundry places of Deuteronomy knit up 
 ■with this sentence, ' So shall all Israel hear and fear,' 
 Deut. iv. 10, and siii. 11, and xvii. 13; whereby is 
 declared the end of punishments appointed by God, 
 and executed in justice upon offenders, namely, that 
 the rest might hear and fear, and learn not to otfend 
 in like manner, lest thej' incur the like vengeance. 
 The point, then, that we have to learn, is to under- 
 stand by the example of the justice of God executed 
 upon the Idumeans, that all their confederates should 
 drive them to the borders, &c. ; that if any have such 
 hatred against the servants of God as Edom had 
 against Israel, then that this judgment is denounced 
 against them. For the Lord hath determined that 
 who oppresseth hi.i friends, must be deceived and 
 plagued by their friends, and such as they reposed 
 greatest conlidence in. The Midianites, as it is in the 
 history of the Judges, chap, vi., oppressed Israel very 
 sore, so that, for fear of them, the Israelites made them 
 dens in the mountains and caves. When Israel had 
 sown, they came up and destroyed the fruit of the 
 earth, and left no food for Israel. Against them the 
 Lord sent Gideon, and to overthrow them ho used not 
 the bands of the Israelites ; but after that Gideon and 
 the company that were w^ith him bad blown their 
 trumpets and broken their pitchers, the Lord set 
 every man's sword against his neighbour, chap. vii. 
 Sennacherib the king of Ashur came against Jerusalem, 
 and Hezekiab the king thereof, with a mighty army, 
 2 Kings xix., thinking to make thrall to him all the 
 people, and Kabshakeh, with most arrogant and pre- 
 sumptuous words defied the Lord, who (he said) 
 could not deliver them. But the Lord first con- 
 founded his army, and bj' an angel destroyed them, 
 so that be was fain with shame to flee home, where 
 he armed his two sons, Adrammelech and Sharezor, 
 against him, who, when he worshipped his god in the 
 temple, slew him with the sword. 
 
 But the cruelty of Nero against the Cln-istians far 
 exceeded that of the Midianites and Sennacherib, in 
 60 much that he sewed them in tlie skins of wild 
 beasts,* and so cast them to dogs to be devoured, tying 
 them also to stakes, to burn in the night for lights. f 
 But the Lord raised against him bis council, his 
 friends, captains, subjects, &c., so that he found not 
 that favour which Sennacherib did, for ho could neither 
 have friend nor foe to do so much as kill him. J 
 
 ; * Suli). Sexr-rus, Hb. ii., et Tacit, lib. xv, cap. x. 
 
 t Pulpit, ot Tacit, ubi supra, ct Juveual. Sat. i. ver. 155. 
 J Suet, in Neron., cap. xlvii. Sulpit. lib. ii, Eutn p. hb. viii. 
 
 Yea, if men would not conspire against these ene- 
 mies of God's people, rather than they should lack 
 friends to destroy them, the worms out of their own 
 bowels should devour them, as befell to Herod, Acts 
 xii. 23, and Antiochus.* 
 
 AVherefore, whosoever have followed the cruelty of 
 the Edomites against the Israel of God, let them re- 
 member for their instruction that they shall be par- 
 takers of the same punishment with the Edomites. 
 And let us consider that, if the wicked draw his bow 
 to shoot at the poor and needy, though they whet the 
 sword to slay the innocent, yet their sword shall enter 
 into their own heart, and their bow shall be broken, 
 which the prophet thi-eateneth, not without exception, 
 namety, ' If the wicked turn not,' then ' the Lord will 
 whet his sword,' kc, Ps. vii. 12-16. And whereas 
 he travailed to bring forth a lie, his mischief shall 
 hght on his own head, and the wrongwbieh he imagined 
 against others shall fall down on his own scalp. 
 
 But the godly are at league with the stones of the 
 field, and the beasts of the earth. Job v. 23, Hos. ii. 
 18 ; but such as are not at peace with the Loi'd, a 
 stone shall fall on their head, as on Abimelech's, Judges 
 ix. 13, or lions shall fall on them, as on the Samari- 
 tans, 2 Kings xvii. 25. Wherefore, such as are godly, 
 let them yet be more godly, Kev. x.\ii. 11, and let the 
 wicked remember that all their confederates shall 
 drive them to the borders, kc. 
 
 Yet must we take heed that we imagine not that all 
 such against whom their confederates deal are in nature 
 and condition like the Idumeans. For as other chas- 
 tisements are common to the godly with the wicked, 
 though the effect fall not out alike in them both, so 
 also in this, to be deceived by friends, and principally 
 by those we be at peace with, do often happen unto 
 them. For we read of David, that his liimiliai- friend 
 had laid a snare for him, and such as were near imto 
 him, as Ahithophel, and his own son Absalom, 2 Sam. 
 XV. xvi. 
 
 That which befell to David happened also to Jesus 
 Christ, of whom David was a figure, as is plainly de- 
 clared in the 13th of John, verse 18, where as the veiy 
 words of David, Ps. xli. 9, arc applied to Christ, to teach 
 us the dealing of Judas : ' He that eateth bread with 
 me, hath lift up the heel against me.' Now, we luiow 
 that it is the chiefest blessing of Christians to be made 
 like to the image of Christ, Rom. viii. 12. No marvel, 
 then, if they have been so dealt withal, and that such as 
 haveate their bread have liftup their heels against them. 
 
 The example of the noble admiral of France, traitor- 
 ously murdered in Paris, now twelve years since, in 
 this case is so pregnant that we need not go further.f 
 With whom there were so many thousands murdered 
 by such as professed themselves their friends ; whereby 
 wo may perceive that this is no certain sign of Idu- 
 
 • Micb. Glycas in fine, part ii., annal. 
 •f- Viil. part 4 Comment, do statu Eelig. et Ecip. in Gallia, 
 sub Carulo 'J, anno 1672. 
 
 3GG 
 
Ver. 
 
 SERMON IV. 
 
 19 
 
 means, but that it is apparent that even in the church of 
 God there is falsehood iu fellowship, and in trust treason. 
 The diii'erence therefore in this point betwixt the 
 wicked and the godly is, 1, in the cause; 2, in the 
 comfort. 
 
 1. In respect of the cause, the wicked and un- 
 godly are worthily so served, making their confede- 
 racy in worldly respects, but the godly unworthily ; so 
 that David justly protesteth, ' If this \rickediiess be in 
 my hand,' &c. ; yea, ' If I have not delivered him, 
 that without any cause was mine enemy,' &c. 
 
 2. In respect of comfort. For that the wicked, 
 when they be so entreated of their friends, have no 
 manner of succour or ease which they can betake 
 themselves unto ; whereas the godly in this case fly 
 to the Lord, whom they find to be a sure rock and 
 certain defence, when the help of man faileth and is 
 set against them, as David being persecuted by 
 Absalom crieth out, Ps. iii., ' How are my adver- 
 saries increased, how many rise up against me ? But 
 thou, Lord, art a buckler for me, my glory, and the 
 lifter up of my head.' Wherefore, trusting in the 
 assured confidence and invincibleness of the Almighty, 
 he ' fearcth not, though ten thousand had set them- 
 selves against him.' This, therefore, bringeth a terror 
 to the wicked, when they be forsaken of their friends, 
 and have nothing to trust in but their wickedness ; 
 but a notable comfort is it to the godly, when, con- 
 tinuing in their goodness, they have the Lord always 
 to be at their side. So the wicked dare look for no 
 help of the Lord, but the godly are full of ' the con- 
 solation of the Holy Spirit.' So that the wicked may 
 say. If our friends be against us, who shall be with 
 us '? But the godly may say, ' If God be with us, 
 who shall be against us ? ' Rom. viii. 31. 
 
 AVhich consideration of the state of the godly, that 
 such as profess themselves their friends have set 
 themselves against them, may teach us how to answer 
 that objection of the papists, who because many have 
 revolted from us to them, yea, of our ministers, would 
 persuade the ignorant that our doctrine is naught. 
 A worthy matter, no doubt, if some, for thirty pieces 
 of silver to be paid in their seminaries, have gone 
 thither that they may betray Christ Jesns. And what 
 say they herein against us, which the Jews might not 
 have said against our Saviour, that one of his disciples, 
 yea, of his chief disciples, was set so against him 
 that he had betrayed him ? Another reason they 
 have like unto this, though not in all circumstances, 
 yet in the main ground, which is the dissension 
 amongst us, and such as are of other churches beyond 
 the sea, concerning certain ceremonies wherein we 
 differ from them. But seeing that the Lord knows 
 how to turn it to the profiting of his church, and when 
 it pleaseth him can reveal these things to us, why 
 should any make an argument hereof against the 
 truth of our doctrine, seeing we find that God hath 
 turned the like to his greater glory, as that dissension 
 367 
 
 of Paul and Barnabas, Acts xv. 39, and Paul and 
 Peter, Gal. ii. 11. 
 
 But as I shewed, by comparison of other points, 
 that the papists do most lively represent the Idumeans, 
 so also faileth it out that they should be betrayed by 
 their own confederates and friends, as were the 
 Idumeans : as by Albertus Pighius, in justification 
 by faith only ; * by Arius Montanus, in the sufficiency 
 of the Scriptures ; by And. IMasius, in relics ; by 
 Alphonsus de Castro, Espencajus, Cajetanus, &c., and 
 the schoolmen, in the rest of the points of superstition. 
 And Luther, Calvin, Bncer, fficolampadius, Zanchius, 
 Beza, &c., the most worthy warriors in the Lord's 
 battles, we know were sometimes of their friends, 
 some being friars, other priests and canons, and they 
 who were least f nursed up in popery. So truly is 
 the saving verified of them also, ' Thy confederates 
 have driven thee to the borders,' &c. Whose godly 
 example I wish may move them, if there be any here 
 of their confederates, to deceive them, and help to 
 drive them to their borders ; by the example of Saul, 
 who being made a Paul, revolted from the Pharisees, 
 and destroyed that which before he had builded. 
 
 Josephus reporteth J that Cyrus, who caused the 
 Jews to build the temple, and gave them back the 
 vessels thereof, was moved to do it by reading the 
 prophecy of Isaiah, Isa. xlv. 1, who two hundred years 
 before had named him who should do it. I beseech 
 God that these men also reading this prophecy, that 
 the friends of the Idumeans shall destroy them, may 
 be encouraged to do it, that this may prevail so much 
 with them as that did with Cyrus. For though they 
 be your confederates, friends, brethren, parents, chil- 
 dren, yet must you not be afraid to wound them spiri- 
 tually, for ' the wounds of a friend are sweet.' We 
 must destroy not their persons but their errors, and 
 to be cruel herein is piety. And such cruelty as this 
 is commanded by God, ' Cursed be he that withhold- 
 eth his hand from this blood,' Jer. xlviii. 10. 
 
 When Aaron had enticed the Israelites to idolatry, 
 and provoked them to the offending of God by wor- 
 shipping the golden calf, Exod. xxxii. 26, IMoses pro- 
 claimetb, ' Whoso pertaineth to the Lord, let him come 
 to me ; and all the sons of Levi gathered themselves.' 
 ' So they went from gate to gate through the host, and 
 slew every man his brother, every man his companion, 
 and every man his neighbour ;' and so 'they conse- 
 crated their hands unto the Lord,' and drew a blessing 
 upon them. But, alas, how far are we from doing this 
 same in the warfare of Christ, against our friends, 
 kinsfolks, and neighbours 1 Would to God many of 
 us were not carried away with that foolish pity of Ahab, 
 1 Kings XX. 31, 82, &c. When Benhadad had come up 
 to fight against Israel, but was discomfited, and was 
 
 * Controv. 2, edit. Par. 1549, quem idco reprehendit 
 Kuardus Tapperus, torn. ii. de Justificat. p. 32. 
 t Qu. ' at least ' ?— 1':d. 
 j AntiLXuit. Judai., lib. xi. cap. i. 
 
20 
 
 RAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver. 8, 9 
 
 fain to flso into a secret chamber to save his life, it 
 was told bim that the kings of Israel were merciful 
 kings. 'Wherefore he sent to him certain men, who 
 said, Thy servant Benhadad saith, I pray thee let me 
 live.' To whom Ahab said, 'Is he yet alive? he is 
 my brother.' Yea, said they, ' thy brother Benhadad,' 
 &c. ; and so was ho content to make a covenant with 
 him, and Ahab confederated himself with Benhadad. 
 But there was sent a man of God to Ahab, who told 
 him, 'Forasmuch as he had let a man scape out of bis 
 hands whom the Lord would have slain, his life should 
 be for his, and bis people for his.' There be to this 
 
 day too many Ahabs, who can ask whether their 
 brother Benhadad be alive, and willingly spare him, 
 hoping that he will one day remember them with the 
 like courtesy. So long as he is alive, he is their 
 brother Benhadad, yea, their brother Benhadad ; but 
 because thev let them scape whom the Lord would 
 have to be slain, their life shall be instead of theirs, 
 and their people instead of theirs. Yet, Lord, 
 spare thy people, and pour out thj' wrath on them 
 that know thee not, and on such as have not called 
 j upon thy name ; yea, Lord, pour thy wrath upoa 
 ! Benhadad, and let him not escape thine hand, &a. 
 
 SERMON V. 
 
 Shall not I in. that day, saith the Lord, destroy the wise men from out of Edom, and undcrstandiny from the 
 mount of Kmn. And thy strony men, O Teman, shall he afraid, so that the valiant of the mount of Esau 
 shall he' cut off by slauyhter. — Obadiau, Ver. 8, 9. 
 
 THERE be two things whereby we purchase to our- 
 selves safety against our enemies, wisilom and 
 strenyth ; wisdom in foretelling and preventing, strength 
 in repressing and withstanding the attempts devised 
 and practised against us. The Lord having shewed 
 that he would utterly destroy and bring to confu- 
 sion the Idumeans, for that "the matter seemed not 
 very likely, and the message not easy to be credited, 
 seeing they were furnished with wisdom and strength, 
 wherewith they were able to prevent and subdue any 
 mischief ; he sheweth how these things shall nothing 
 let his purpose, forasmuch as he would deprive them 
 of their wise men, in the 8th verso, and spoil them of 
 their strong, in the 9th verse. 'Shall noti,' &c. 
 Wisdom and policy bear the greatest sway in state 
 matters ; for arms abroad are of little force, unless 
 there be sage counsel at homo ; and seeing things 
 must by advice be determined before they can well 
 and duly be practised, therefore the prophet, declaring 
 the course which the Lord will take in bringing his 
 purpose about, beginneth at the wisdom, saying, 
 ' Shall not I,' &o., ' and understanding from the 
 mount of Esau,' that is, mount Seir, on which Esau 
 dwelt ; and by Seir is meant the land of Idumeans, 
 the part for the whole. Out of this land, saith he, 
 he would destroy the wise men and understanding, 
 and liring to nought the strength and power, and that 
 partly by taking from them wisdom and understand- 
 ing, i\s Jeremiah sheweth, chap. xlix. 7, partly by cut- 
 ting off, by slauglitor, the valiant of the mount of 
 Esau. The time also is specified, when it is said, in 
 that day. a day, though uncertain to them, to whom it 
 pertained mt to ' know the times and seasons which 
 God had hid in his own power,' Acts. i. 7, yet most 
 sure and certain to bim, who in his secret counsel had 
 appointed it ; which thing is also uttered by interro- 
 gation, to make it more effectual by sinking deep into 
 their minds. And so, first, having removed their wise 
 
 men, their strong men follow after, of whom he saith, 
 ' and thy strong men ;' and to assure them of it, 
 with piercing their hearts by conceiving it, as though 
 it were laid before their eyes, he turneth his speech to 
 them, when he saith, ' thy strong men, Teman,' 
 which was a part of that country, inhabited by a 
 nation which came of a nephew of Esau of that 
 name. 
 
 Some translations* have ' every one of the mount 
 of Esau,' but sith the Hebrew word ii;>j^ signifieth a 
 valiant man, differing from D1K> ^s rir doth from 
 homo, and arrio from uvS'-uzo: ; I take it here to be so 
 understood, that as in the former verse be shewed he 
 would destroy the wise men of Edom, and under- 
 standing from the mount of Esau, so in this verse ho 
 saith, that the strong men of Toman should be afraid, 
 and the valiant of the mount of Esau should be cut 
 oS by slaughter. 
 
 Thus are the faithful assured that the Idumeans 
 should be destroyed, notwithstanding all their pohoy 
 and power, because the Lord had appointed a day 
 wherein he would despoil them of their wise and 
 strong men ; which point ought of us diligently to bo 
 regarded, not only in respect of the means whereby, 
 but also of the time when, this work was appointed to 
 be wrought. 
 
 To begin with the day; we be hereby taught, that 
 as all ' the wcu-ks of God are justice and wisdom,' so 
 also that he appointeth wisely and justly the times to 
 execute judgment in ; for he pimisheth not by and by 
 such as offend, but ' is long-suffering and gentle' to- 
 wards sinners, Uom. ii. 4, giving time of repentance, 
 that they may know tlie truth, and come to an amend- 
 ment, out of the snare of the devil, 2 Tim. ii. '2-5, '2G. 
 For which purpose he calleth them, by benefits, ex- 
 hortations, threatcnings, punishmeuts, and exan\ples, 
 as the prophet, Isa. xxviii. "24, &c., setteth out by the 
 * Tremel. Genev. 
 
 3G8 
 
Ver. 8, 9. 
 
 SERMON V. 
 
 21 
 
 similitude of a husbandman : ' Doth the ploughman 
 plough all the day and sow '? Doth he break the clods 
 of his ground ? When he hath made it plain, doth he 
 not then sow ? Fitches shall not be thrashed.' For, 
 having threatened that God would destroy them, he 
 answereth to such scomers as despised the long-suf- 
 fering of God, shewing that sith the husbandman 
 hath divers times for several works, so that he doth not 
 all at once, but first plougheth, then soweth, reapeth, 
 thresheth, and that fitly, according to the diversity of 
 the gi-ain and corn, which is by the wisdom which 
 God hath jiiven him ; in like sort, or rather much 
 more, will the Lord, who is perfect wisdom, appoint 
 his time of calling, exhorting, threatening, &c., and 
 when none of these will serve, of mowing and threshing 
 also. 
 
 Great was the wickedness of the old world, Gen. 
 vi. 2, whenas ' the sons of God seeing the daughters 
 of men, that they were fair,' and following their lust, 
 not their- duly, ' took them wives of all that they 
 liked.' God was displeased with their sins, and gave 
 them a long time of repentance, even an hundred and 
 twenty years ; at which time, they not repenting, he 
 brought the flood of waters over them. When the 
 Ijord had promised to Abraham the land of Canaan, 
 he told him, that first his seed should be a sojourner 
 in a land that was not theirs, even four hundred j'ears, 
 for that ' the sin of the Amorites was not as then full,' 
 Gen. XV. 16, shewing plainly, that he had given them 
 a day of repentance, which being come, if they brought 
 not forth worthy fruit thereof, they should be mowed 
 dowTi. The wickedness of Ahab received such judg- 
 ment as it desei-ved, yet even for that shadow of re- 
 pentance, 1 Kings sxi. 27, 29, the plague was cast 
 oft" to his posterity. In the days of Josiah, Israel 
 was not plagued, &c., because his heart melted at the 
 hearing of the law of God, 1 Kings xxii. 19. The 
 rest of the threatenings of Isaiah and Jeremiah are of 
 like manner against the Tynans, Babylonians, Assy- 
 rians, Moabites, &c., appointing to some certain ex- 
 press years, as three, others seventy, some short, but 
 not mentioned ; a short time, but a time also is 
 threatened by John Baptist, when he said, Mat. 
 iii. 10, ' Even now is the axe laid to the root of the 
 tree.' 
 
 That which we are to regard more specially is, that 
 the times of judgment appointed for the Amorites, 
 Ahab, Jews, &c., are not only to be respected for 
 themselves, but to be considered as figures of that 
 great judgment for which there is a time appointed, 
 which is called a dai/ in Scripture for an excellency : 
 as the apostle preached to the Athenians, Acts xvii. 
 31, that God had ' appointed a day in which he will 
 judge the world in righteousness by that man which 
 he hath appointed.' And though he seem slack in 
 coming, yet is he not, for he saith, ' till the number 
 be accomplished.' ' The Lord will come as a thief in 
 the night,' and he shall sit on his throne of majesty, 
 3G9 
 
 ' before whom the earth and heavens shall fly away, 
 the earth and sea shah yield up their dead, the booka 
 shall be opened, and each man shall receive his judg- 
 ment.' Which point St Peter, 2 Epist. iii. 11, having 
 handled, exhorteth us to consider ' what manner of 
 persons we should then be, in holy conversation and 
 godliness,' who should ' look for and hasten unto the 
 coming of this day of God.' 
 
 On which occasion I am also to desire you, that 
 you would diligently consider, if God have appointed 
 a day for temporal and eternal punishments, how 
 patient each one of us ought to be in all afiiictions, 
 how wise in all behaviour. Patient, that we fret not 
 ourselves, nor be carried away with any evil afi"ection ; 
 when we sec God not presently execute his judgments, 
 that therefore we should set our hearts to evil, James 
 V. 7, 8. Wise, that we stand in the fear of God, and 
 offend not as wicked persons, for whom another day 
 is appointed, the last and worst of all other. Where- 
 fore we have need of patience, &c., as we are exhorted 
 thereunto by the apostles, Heb. xii. 36, that we be 
 not discomforted though we see the wicked prosper, 
 and live in jollity, lest otherwise we fall into the sin 
 of murmuring, as did the Israelites, being ready to fall 
 away from the profession of God because the rod had 
 rest upon them for a while. And having seen so great 
 works wrought by God's hand in Egypt, yet at the 
 Red Sea they feared lest they should have been 
 swallowed up of Pharaoh ; but Moses biddeth them 
 ' be still, and see the salvation of the Lord,' Exod. 
 xiv. 13, 14, for that he knew there was a day ap- 
 pointed when Pharaoh should be discomfited, which 
 thing is spoken not only of the Israelites concerning 
 Pharaoh king of Egypt, but also to the comfort of all 
 true Israelites, and to the revenge of all that are like 
 Pharaoh. For though they shoot out their branches 
 for a while, and ' flourish as a green bay tree,' yet so 
 soon as you shall pass by them, they shall be so gone 
 that ' their place shall know them no more.' What 
 greater affliction abode the Jews than under Antiochus ? 
 Yet from the time that the abomination was set up, 
 as Daniel shewcth, it was less than four years. The 
 saints of God, indeed, are troubled with impatiency, 
 and would gladly see their desire upon the wicked, 
 that God's name might be the more glorified in the 
 salvation of his saints ; which is set down in the Revela- 
 tion, where ' the souls under the altar do cry, How 
 long, Lord, holy and true ;' but ' white long robes 
 were given unto them,' and it was said that they 
 should ' rest for a little season,' &c., Rev. vi. 10, 11. 
 Let us not then discourage ourselves with impatiency, 
 let us not fret ourselves, lest we be moved to evil, for 
 the saints confess that God was holy and true, true in 
 his promise, who will no doubt take revenge of his 
 enemies, hoi}' in granting repentance to sinners. Let 
 us call to mind the end that fell upon Pharaoh, An- 
 tiochus, &c., and other miscreants, and let us wait the 
 Lord's leisure, remembering that to the saints were 
 
 A a 
 
22 
 
 RAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver. 8, 9. 
 
 given white robes, the sign of grace in this life, and 
 of glor}" in the life to come. 
 
 Moreover, as we hereby do learn patience, that we 
 fret not at the prosperity of the wicked, so are we also 
 to be wise, that wo offend not after the manner of the 
 ungodly through hope of escaping the judgment of God, 
 Rom. ii. 2, having before our eyes the day which the 
 prophet here speaketh of, and much more, that 
 whereof this is a sign and figure, remembering that 
 the slower our punishment is in coming, the heavier 
 will it be when it comcth. AVlien Amnon had defiled 
 himself and his sister Tamar, following his filthy lust, 
 2 Sam. xiii. 1-1, 1-5, he straight was so displeased 
 with her that he could not so much as abide her sight, 
 which is the first plague that God layeth on such lust. 
 There followed after another, when he was put to the 
 Bword ; but the third most heavy and grievous was 
 behind, which was to be ' cast with whoremongers 
 into the lake that burneth.' How little joy had 
 Absalom after he began to rebel against his father ! 
 For within few days the senseless creatures practised 
 the like disobedience against him that he did against 
 his father, so that the_y, which were made to have 
 served his benefit, wrought his destruction, 2 Sam. 
 xviii. 9. The rich man's soul, which was set at case 
 for many years, as he thought, Luke xii. 19, 20, bow 
 suddenly heard he his judgment, that ' in that night 
 it should be taken from him !' The heathen and 
 enemies of Christ promised themselves great good by 
 Julian, hoping that he should live to root out all 
 Christianity, insomuch that Libanius * the sophist, 
 meeting with a Christian schoolmaster, asked of him 
 in disdain what the carpenter's son (for so in con- 
 tempt they termed our Saviour) was then doing ; to 
 whom the schoolmaster made answer, that the car- 
 penter's son was making a coffin for his master Julian. 
 And so it pleased God, that Julian, in his war against 
 the Persian king, was slain and brought to a shame- 
 ful end.f 
 
 Now, these things are written to let us know, that 
 not only such as offend in lust, as Amnon ; in disobe- 
 dience, as Absalom; in covetonsness, as the rich man; 
 in impiety, as Julian, shall be punished oven as they 
 were ; but that it is undoubtedly true which Solomon 
 Baith, Eccles. xii., that ' God will bring into judgment, 
 every work with every secret thing, bo it good or evil ;' 
 wherefore, let us learn his exhortation, to ' fear God, 
 and keep his commandments, which is the whole duty 
 of man.' Which, though I have sufficiently declared 
 by examples of the Scriptures, yet as the apostle used 
 the sentence of the poet Jlenandcr, alter other souml 
 proofs, so, for the youth that would hear what a poet 
 saith, I will allege the saying of the [rince of poets. 
 When Tnrnus had taken the spoil of Pallas, he received 
 this threatening : — 
 
 * Vid. Sozom. lib. vi. cap. ii. Hist. Ecclcsiast. et Hist. Tri- 
 partit. lib. vi. cap. xliv. et Niccph. lib. x. cnp. xxxv. 
 t Hist. Tripart. lib. vi. cap. xlvii. Nicepli. ubi sup. 
 
 Turno tempiis erit, raagno cum optaverit emptum 
 Iiitaclum Palhiuta, et cum spolia lata diemque 
 Odeiit.* 
 
 which how truly it fell out, is in another place de- 
 clared, when being stricken to the heart he heard 
 these words : — 
 
 Pallas te hoc vulnere, Pallas 
 Immolat, et pccnam scelcrato ex sanguiue sumit.t 
 
 We are to deal with Pallas (not Pallaa, PaUaiUis, but 
 Pallaa, Palladosl), that is, with the wisdom of the High- 
 est. AVe ourselves are his, both bodj' and soul ; he hath 
 redeemed us, and made us his own. If, then, we make 
 ourselves thrall to sin and wickedness, we spoil and rob 
 him ; and then let us assure ourselves the time will come 
 when we shall wish that we had foregone these spoils, 
 when it shall be said, ' Go, ye cursed, into hell lire.' 
 
 Let us learn, then, to remember that day, and out 
 of this place, that God hath appointed a time wherein 
 he will avenge himself of his enemies; and not only 
 that, but which is another point, the means by which 
 it shall be wrought, which is, by taking away their wise 
 men, and bereaving them of strongmen, that being thus 
 bereaved of such as might stand them in stead, they 
 may receive the vengeance prepared for them. How 
 God doth deal with nations in these matters, the his- 
 tories shew, and the prophet Isaiah plainly, when he 
 saith he will ' take away the wise,' ' eloquent,' ' arti- 
 ficer,' Isa. iii. 1-3; meaning, that howsoever they per- 
 suaded themselves that by those means and enemies 
 they could not be destroyed, being furnished in such 
 manner against all manner assaults, j'et God would 
 do it by taking away whatsoever might any way stand 
 them in stead. It was not to be thought that Babylon, 
 having in it such strength and wisdom, could be so 
 taken, as it was by Cyrus ; hut we read that when 
 they gave themselves to drunkenness and riot, it came 
 to pass. Wherefore let us not put our confidence in 
 flesh and blood, persuading ourselves that because our 
 nation is mighty in strength of people, our prince wise, 
 our counsellors provident, onr munition great, victuals 
 sufficient, &c., that therefore we are sure, and out of 
 all danger; for God can take away our wise and strong 
 men. And though ho leave us the men, yet he can 
 take all wisdom and strength from them, and whatso- 
 ever we bring home, seem it never so great, 3-et can 
 the Lord ' blow upon it,' as the prophet speaketh, 
 Haggai i. 9, ' and it shall fall awaj'.' 
 
 Here, then, is good comfort for us, if wo serve and 
 love the Lord ; for from whom will the Lord take un- 
 derstanding? Not from Pavid, but from Absalom; 
 not from Israelites, but from Edomites ; not from 
 Ile/.ekiah, but Sennacbcrib. Or if ho take under- 
 standing from Israel, David, Hezekiah, yet not from 
 David to destroy liim, not from Hczekiah when he 
 calls upon him ; and if he failed the Jews, yet the 
 
 • Virg. JEn. lib. x. 1 I,ib. xii. in fine. 
 
 ■J Tliat is, not llio son of F.vnndtr, spoken of by Virgil,. 
 but llie goddess of wisdom. — Ed. 
 
 370 
 
Ver. 10, 11.] 
 
 SERMON VI. 
 
 2.3 
 
 true Israelites shall be strengthened from above ; 
 though David he troubled, yet shall ho not want his 
 wise Cushai and strong Joab, 2 Sam. xvii. 8, 9 ; and 
 although the counsel of men fail, and strength be 
 nothing, the Lord will send an angel to slay the 
 Assyrians, Isa. xssvii. 36 ; but as for Edom, let his 
 strength be never so great, his wise men never so 
 many, they shall be quite destroyed. Though Absa- 
 lom have with him Ahithophel, yet God can ' make 
 his counsel foolish;' though Sennacherib his armies be 
 strong, yet may he lose them all, and himself also be 
 murdered by his sons in the temple of his gods. And 
 as the Scripture teacheth us this of Absalom, Senna- 
 cherib, Idumeans, so must we think it to be verified 
 against all that deal as they did. Wherein, not to 
 call you to consider the Scribes and Pharisees' dealing 
 against our Saviour and his apostles, I come to the 
 papists. Wherein I commend the consideration hereof 
 to such as peruse the story of the church, how God 
 hath taken wisdom from them, and bereft them of 
 their stout men. Even from the time that Wyclifl'e 
 in England, John Huss and Jerome of Prague in 
 Bohemia, made profession of the gospel, how things 
 amongst them have fallen from evil to worse, even 
 their own complaints do sufficiently shew, namely, by 
 the Councils of Constance and Basil, and of iEneas 
 Sylvius, and by whole countries falling away from 
 them. Luther, against whom they most speak all 
 wicked speeches, how wonderfully was he holpen by 
 the mighty hand of God, whenas they by their deal- 
 ing set forward that which he preached ; which seeing 
 they will reject when it is taught them out of Sleidan,* 
 let them learn of Guicciardini, declaring that Pope 
 * Sleitlan, lib. i. et xxiii. 
 
 Leo the Tenth was the cause of that which was done 
 in Germanj','"' when his bulls and indulgences were sent 
 in such vile and beastly manner, that they were sold 
 in shops, and so that the sellers and merchants played 
 the money they took for them at dice ; and all the 
 world knew that the money was not gathered (as they 
 pretended) to make war against the Turks, but indeed 
 to maintain the pomp and lust of the pope's sister, 
 who had made a bishop her deputy for that purpose. 
 Wherefore he saith that the pope went about indeed 
 to suppress that Luther had preached, but he used 
 not fit medicines ; and though he excommunicated 
 them that followed him, yet he redressed not the fault 
 he spake against. Whereby it is declared how God 
 ' took away wisdom ' (from the Idumeans) from Pope 
 Leo ; since which time what success hath followed in 
 England, Scotland, Poland, and other countries, the 
 world seeth, and w^e perceive how God in part hath 
 fulfilled that which he hero threateneth, that their 
 ' wise men should fail, and their strong men perish.' 
 The full accomplishment we yet see not, the time 
 being not yet come ; for God hath his degrees. But 
 howsoever the Jesuits make show of wisdom and 
 knowledge, yet God can take both wisdom and know- 
 ledge from them; as we see he hath done, both^in 
 their doctrine, discipline, and ceremonies especially, 
 wherein their folly most notably appeareth. Let any 
 man read their pontifical, and let him say whether 
 God hath not taken all their wisdom from them. 
 Lord, finish thy work which thou hast begun ; take 
 ' wisdom and strength from the mount of Esau, that 
 mount Sion may rejoice,' &o. 
 
 * Guicciarcl. lib. xiii. ad annum 1520; et PoIyJ. Virg. 
 Hist. Angl. lib. xsvii. 
 
 SERMON VI. 
 
 For thy cruelty ar/ainst thy brother Jacob shame shall cover thee, and thou shall be cut fffjor ever. When thou 
 stoodest on the other side, in the day thai the strangers carried au-ay his substance, and strangers e itered into 
 his gates, and cast lots tipon Jerusalem, even thou wasl as one of them. — Obadiah, Veb. 10, 11. 
 
 OUR Saviour, to kindle the minds of his disciples 
 with a desire to go on towards heaven, and not 
 to look back to the enticements of the world, willeth 
 them to 'remember Lot's wife,' Luke xvii. 82, whereby 
 he teacheth us, that in the stories of the Scriptures 
 we are not only to note the event, as, namely, that 
 she was ' turned into a pillar of salt,' but the causes 
 also ; as for that she being delivered from Sodom, yet, 
 contrary to God's commandment, looked back again 
 to it,' — the which thing the prophet setteth here before 
 us in the destruction of the Idumeans; for having 
 hitherto declared the event which should fall on them, 
 namely, that they should be brought down and de- 
 stroyed by such means as God had appointed, not- 
 withstanding all their wisdom and strength, he in 
 this place sheweth the cause hereof, which was their 
 371 
 
 cruelty against their brethren : ' For thy cruelty 
 against thy brother,' Gen. xxv. 25. The nations of the 
 Jews and Idumeans came by descent from Abraham 
 and Isaac, for which cause they are called brethren; 
 and as the proper name of Edom is used to signify 
 his otfspring, so are the Jews noted by the name of 
 Jacob, brother of Edom ; wherefore, denouncing here 
 utter destruction to the Idumeans for their hard deal- 
 ing towards the Jews, he saith, ' For thy cruelly against 
 thy brother.' 
 
 The cruelty shewed was, that when strangers and 
 aliens, even the Chaldeans, took Jerusalem and spoiled 
 it, ' dividing the prey by lot,' after the manner of 
 soldiers, and ' carrying away ' their substance, they 
 ' stood on the other side,' not only not helping them 
 in this their great necessity, but even furthering what 
 
24 
 
 RAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver. jo, 11. 
 
 they could their destruction. For when Nebuchad- 
 nezzar (as it is recorded in the 2d of the Chronicles, 
 the last chapter ver. 17, 18, 19), carried away the 
 treasure of Jerusalem, burnt the temple, pulled down 
 the walls, made havoc of the people; the Idumeans 
 etood by crying, ' Raze it even to the foundations,' Ps. 
 exxxvii. 7 ; neither only exhorted they the Chaldeans 
 to this cruelty, but put their hands also thereunto, 
 and did even as they, which appeareth in the 12th, 
 13th, and 14th verses, by the rehearsal of the particulars. 
 But at this time it shall be enough to observe in 
 general, the cruelty of the Idumeans against the Jews 
 in these two verses : ' For thy cruelty against thy 
 brother Jacob.' 
 
 The Hebrew word used in this place, DDH, signifieth 
 any wrong done by force and injury ; and so for the 
 agi'eoment of Simeon and Levi in that cruel murder of 
 Shechemites, it is said, Gen. xlix. 5, 7, that the ' instru- 
 ments of cruelty were in their habitations.' Some- 
 times also it is used for such wrong as is done by 
 fraud and subtilty, as when false witnesses are called 
 ' witnesses of cruelty,' Ps. xxxv. 11, or cruel witnesses. 
 In this place it is taken for both, for they are accused 
 of cruelty, not only for that they entered into the gate 
 in the day of destruction, ' laid hand on their sub- 
 stance, stood in cross ways to cut off them that should 
 escape,' but also for that they ' helped them not, but 
 looked on their affliction, and rejoiced at it.' Whereby 
 we are taught to withhold both our hands and hearts 
 from all kind of cruelty, whether it be i^TOUght by 
 force or fraud, neither to have * any by deeds, not by 
 affection, and that we are not to suffer any to be 
 harmed, whom we may rescue and deliver ; which is 
 a lesson for us to be learned and practised towards all 
 men. For ' God created man in his own image,' 
 Gen. i. 27, standing in perfect righteousness, which 
 although by the sin of Adam it be defaced, yet is this 
 image remaining in some part, and very notable 
 monuments thereof as yet remain even in the most 
 corrupt ; whereupon the heathen, by the light of 
 nature, gathered that, because of that conjunction of 
 men in humanity, they were one to love another, and 
 detest all cruelty ; f whence those general laws of 
 courtesy arose, to shew the way to him that wandcreth, 
 to suffer another to light at our candle, not to debar any 
 of our water stream, to help with our counsel such as 
 needed it. And so we see the Samaritan, Luke x. 
 .'50, 33, finding the wounded person (though likely a 
 Jew, who were because of their religion so great 
 enemies, that they would neither eat nor talk, nor 
 have any familiarity one with another), j'ct moved with 
 natural affection, ' when he saw him, he had compas- 
 sion on him, and went to him, bound up his wounds, 
 poured in oil and wine, put him on his own beast, 
 brought him to an inn, and made provision for him.' 
 Which duty, that it bindeth all by the general law, 
 which is, ' Love thy neighbour as thyself,' our Saviour 
 
 • Qu. ' tiarm '? — Ed. f Cic. ofTic. lib. i. ct ii. 
 
 sheweth, when hereupon he willeth the Scribe, to 
 vthom he telleth this history, to ' go his ways, and do 
 likewise,' ver. 37. Wherefore seeing, by the law of 
 nature and reason, and the bond of humanity, we are 
 to love all men, it is manifest that then we are to 
 abhor and refrain from all injuries whatsoever. 
 
 But if neither the law of God, reason, nor nature, 
 can move us hereunto, let us consider the punishment 
 which is threatened, and hath lighted on them that 
 have not fulfilled this law ; for albeit the punishment 
 which is here laid down, is not threatened to each 
 sort of men that shew cruelty to another whatso- 
 ever, j'et in the holy Scriptures there are some 
 plagues denounced against every one whatsoever. The 
 cruelty of the old world was chiefly shewed upon the 
 brood of Cain, yet the Lord said to Noah, that ' the 
 earth was filled with cruelty,' Gen. vi. 13, wherefore 
 he would destroy it. The Shechemites were aliens to 
 Israel, yet they unlawfully possessed that which be- 
 longed to Jacob and his sons ; yet because Simeon 
 and Levi murdered them in so cruel manner, Gen. 
 xxxiv. 25, Jacob ' curseth their wrath, because it was 
 cruel, and their rage, for that it was fierce,' Gen. xHx. 
 7, wherefore he saith that they should be ' divided in 
 Jacob, and scattered in Israel.' A man would have 
 thought the zeal of Saul had been praiseworthy when 
 he slew the Gibeonites, which were a remnant of the 
 cursed Amorites, but the Lord plagued Israel for it, 
 2 Sam. xxi. 1, neither ceased the famine, tiU such 
 time as David delivered up to be hanged of Saul's 
 sons seven, as the Gibeonites demanded, which being 
 done the plague ceased. So greatly doth the Lord 
 detest tyTanny and cruelty, though it be shewed to 
 the brood of Cain, towards uncircumised Shechemites, 
 or profane Gibeonites, yea, on such whom he halh in 
 his judgment appointed to destruction, though not by 
 that means. 
 
 Whosoever he shall be therefore, with whom thou 
 shalt have to deal, I say not if he be a p.apist but a 
 Jew, but he he a Turk or atheist, or whatsoever infi- 
 del, remember to use him as a man, even because ho 
 is a man. Man cannot he god to man ; it was an 
 higher title than ought to have been given either of 
 Cicero to Lcntulus, or Virgil to Augustus ; * but if 
 any man play the part of Lycaon, and become a wolf, 
 then shall not the punishment of Lycaon be removed 
 from him. f The Idumeans, how wicked they were, 
 and how they were threatened, we see here ; yet when 
 the king of Moab had taken the king of the Idumeans' 
 son, and burnt him on the wall, in hope to get by that 
 means the victory, the Lord threatened liy Amos, 
 chap. ii. 1, 'For three transgressions of Moab, and 
 for four, I will not turn it away ; because it burned 
 the bones of the king of Edom into lime : there- 
 fore I will send a firo into Moab : I will cut off the 
 judge out of the midst thereof, and will slay all the 
 
 * Eclog. i. 
 
 t rausiiiias in Arcalicis, Ovid Jfclnivi. lib. i. 
 
 372 
 
Ver. 10,1].] 
 
 SERMON Vr. 
 
 25 
 
 princes thoreof with him;' for 'with what measure 
 we mete, v.ith the same shall it bo measured to us 
 again.' The Idumeans were wicked, yet because they 
 burnt the king's son so cruelly, they shall be burnt 
 lor it themselves. 
 
 As God is the creator of all, so is ho also the 
 Saviour of all concerning the blessings of this life. 
 But as he is called the Saviour of all, but chiefly of 
 the elect, 1 Tim. iv. 10, so detesteth he all cruelty 
 that is done to any, but especially that which is 
 shewed towards his people ; which is clear bj' this 
 which is here said, that because of his cruelty towards 
 Jacob, &c. Such are all his chosen servants, as the 
 prophet in the psalm saith, Ps. cxxxv. 4, that ' the 
 Lord hath chosen Jacob for himself, and Israel his 
 chosen treasure.' By the name, then, of Jacob are all 
 the chosen represented, for all believers are of the 
 seed of Abraham, Rom. ix. 4, 7, 8, the children of 
 Jacob, they that are his chosen. Of whom ho hath 
 such care, that he ' rebuketh even kings for their 
 sakes.' Abimelech, whcnas unaware he would have 
 taken Sarah, whom Abraham said to be his sister, the 
 Lord in a dream forbiddeth him, that unless he with- 
 held himself he was but a dead mao, Gen. xx. 30. 
 Pharaoh oppresseth them ; the Lord delivereth them, 
 and drowneth him, Exod. xiv. 27. For God remem- 
 bereth for ever the covenant which ho made with 
 Abraham, and the oath which he sware unto Jacob. 
 Yea, though they were ' but a few, and strangers in 
 the land,' Ps. cv. 12, 15, yet he ' suffered no man to 
 do them violence, but reproved kings, &c. Touch 
 not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm.' 
 All Christians are the Lord's unoiulcd, and all are 
 prophets in some sort, though not in special, as was 
 Abraham ; and this promise is made to a thousand 
 generations. Wherefore, as the Lord promiseth that 
 he will punish Damascus, Tyrus, &c., for their iniquity 
 and cruelty towards his people, Amos i., ii., so 
 assuredly shall just punishment follow all them that 
 shall behave themselves in such order ; j-ea, the 
 punishment that is threatened Moab is in some respect 
 for Israel's sake, because that cruelty was shewed on 
 the king of Edom's son, when the Idumeans took 
 part with Israel. ' For three transgressions, and for 
 four ;' as though he should say. Though they have 
 committed many iniquities, which I have spared, yet 
 because they continue to oppress my people, I will 
 pour out my vengeance on them, so that the fire shall 
 fall upon their walls and consume them, even ac- 
 cording to their iniquity against the people of God. 
 And the metaphor of fire here used putteth us in mind 
 of the general promise of God to all his children, 
 namely, that he will be ' a wail of fire about them,' 
 Zech. ii. 5, to shield and defend them, that who 
 approacheth to them shall be consumed. For God 
 taketh it as done to himself whatsoever is practised 
 against his servants ; whosoever toucheth them touch- 
 eth him. When Sennacherib had bragged against the 
 373 
 
 Jews, and threatened them in most cruel manner, 
 the Lord, speaking to him by the prophet, saith, 
 not because thou handiest my servant so cruelly, but 
 ' because thou ragest against me, I will put my hook 
 in thy nose, and bring thee home,' Isa. xxxvii. Ii9 : 
 as the Lord did indeed, where his own sons, while he 
 was worshipping his idols, murdered him. I need not 
 speak of Herod, Diocletian, Julian, &c., of whom the 
 ecclesiastical histories * write, which plainly shew, 
 that like sins provoke like plagues. To be cruel 
 therefore against Jacob is an ofl'ence which drawcth 
 with it great vengeance. 
 
 Which as it is great, by whomsoever it be com- 
 mitted, so is it of necessity much more if it be com- 
 mitted by him that is brother to Jacob. Wherefore 
 the prophet saith, ' for thy cruelty to thy brother ;' 
 the indignity whereof is amphfied in the words fol- 
 lowing, where, speaking of them that spoiled and 
 ransacked their city, and slew them, he saith, ' and 
 thou also wast as one of them.' For although we be 
 bound to abstain from all inhumanity, yet are we 
 more bound to refrain from it, towards such as are of 
 the same country, city, society, kindred, &c. ; and 
 though we be to love all men, yet are we not to love 
 all men alike. For our Saviour himself, though he 
 loved ' all those whom the Father had given him,' 
 yet certain it is that he loved John more entirely than 
 any of the rest, so that he is noted by that title, ' the 
 disciple whom Jesus loved,' John xxi. 20. So that 
 here by the name of brother, added by our prophet, 
 we may gather the sin of Edom to be the greater, be- 
 cause he dealt thus with him that was his kinsman 
 according to the flesh. For the bonds of nature re- 
 main still, notwithstanding religion, which cometh by 
 grace. The heathen, entreating of the duties which 
 men owe one to another, maketh the first degree to 
 contain all men, because they be men ;t the next, 
 such as are of one people, language, cit}', kindred ; the 
 nearest of man and wife, childi-en, &c. ; which doctrine 
 is a remnant of that light wherewith Adam in his 
 perfect knowledge was endowed. For even so God 
 requireth greater courtesies to be shewed by the 
 Israelites to the Idumeans than to other strangers ; 
 and Moses giveth the reason, ' because he is thy 
 brother ;' and yet greater of the Jews one to an- 
 other ; greater also of such as are of the same kindred, 
 as St Paul teacheth, ' If any have nephews or kins- 
 men,' &c, whereby he shewcth that he is first to 
 provide for them ; and again, 1 Tim. v. 8, ' If there 
 be any man that provideth not for his own, and, 
 namely, for them of his household, ho denieth the 
 faith, and is worse than an infidel.' He hath denied 
 the faith, for faith dissolveth not these duties which 
 children owe to their parents, parents to their chil- 
 dren, &c. Ho is ' worse than an infidel,' because 
 amongst them the fathers cast not oQ their children, 
 the children do their best to help their parents in their 
 * Sulpit. Severus, lib. ii. f Cic. lib. i. OiEo. 
 
26 
 
 RAIXOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver 10, 11. 
 
 need. Let us learn therefore to be wise in perform- 
 ing the duty we owe to all men, according to the 
 degrees by God prescribed, considering the prophet 
 here sheweth that the Idumcans should have been 
 more courteous and gentle to Jews, because they were 
 brethren. 
 
 Sic frafrem Pollux altorna morte redemit 
 Itque reditque viara toties.* 
 God forbid we should shew such deadly hatred as was 
 between Eteocles and Polyuices ! From this affinity 
 which is of them which come of the same parents, 
 we are to rise to them of one city, nation, &c. ; and 
 so to them also of one league and one accord. Hiram 
 and David, though not brethren by the flesh, yet in 
 amity and league, so that Solomon the successor so 
 also calleth him, 1 Kings is. 13. If I require the 
 same of us towards the French and Scots, and other 
 our confederates, it is no more than the Tyriau prince 
 received at the hands of Da\-id and Solomon. Now 
 how much more, if an Englishman do an injury to an 
 Englishman, may he that standeth by say, ' Why 
 strive you together, seeing you be brethren ? ' T 
 come nearer, to them that are of one corporation, yea, 
 of one society, having, as it were, one father, joined 
 in one fellowship of study and learning, wherein Cicero 
 requireth a likelihood of manners and affection. But 
 the nearest bond of all is religion, whereof they be all 
 brethren, by one Father,'of heaven, Mai. ii. 10, born 
 of one mother the church. Gal. iv. 20, fed with one 
 bread of life, preserved by one hope, justified by one 
 faith, sanctified by one Spirit, serving one God, the 
 only Lord of all, Sic, 1 Cor. x. 3, 17. For, though 
 the papists speak scornfully of this name, that the 
 faithful call one another hretlimi, they being desirous 
 to defend that peevish and superstitious distinction 
 of such as call themselves /c/nre or brethren, yet in 
 the Acts of the Apostles we know that the name is 
 common to all Christians, and not proper, as they 
 would have it, to any one sect, no more than the 
 name of Jesuits, which some of them would ap- 
 propriate to themselves. 
 
 Now, as St Paul, Eph. iv. 4, would have us to ' do 
 good to all men, but especially to them that are of the 
 household of faith,' so are wo with this bond of re- 
 ligion tied so much the faster, as grace is superior to 
 nature. Wherefore we are to remember the exhorta- 
 tion of the apostle hereupon, ' that no man oppress 
 his brother, for the Lord is a revenger of such things,' 
 1 Thes. iv. C. What, then, shall become of them who, 
 neglecting the bonds of nature and grace, deal with 
 their brethren no otherwise than did the Idumeans 
 with the Israelites, carrying away the substance, re- 
 joicing at their harms, standing on the other side ? 
 What shall we say of them who deal witli their brother 
 Naboth, as Ahab and Jezebel did, 1 Kings xxi. 1 ; 
 whoso hands be full of blood, and their houses stuffed 
 with bribes ; which grind the faces of the poor, pull 
 * Virg. Mn. vi. v. 121. 
 
 the skin from their flesh, break their bones in 
 pieces, and chop them as meat for the pot, Micah iii. 
 2, 3 ; of such as eat and devour up their brethren 
 with usury, which consume them by law and suit, 
 which spoil them by monopolies, by engrossing, by 
 false wares, subtle bargains, by enclosing of commons, 
 enhancing of rents, by robbing the church, in pulling 
 away the maintenance of the ministers, possessing 
 their right by impropriations, by impoverishing col- 
 leges, by thrusting labourers and husbandmen out of 
 their house-ground, and placing there a shepherd with 
 his dog, by ' joining house to house,' land to land, 
 living to living,' Isa. v. 8, as though they meant alone 
 to live upon the earth ; and shall not the dogs once 
 lick these men's blood, and the fowls of the air feed 
 on their carcases ; or shall not hell open her mouth 
 wide, to swallow down their glory, riches, and them- 
 selves also ? Shall not the Lord say in that last day 
 to all these, 'Depart from me, ye wicked,' to dwell 
 with the devil and his angels. Nay, shall it not be 
 more dreadful for them than this, if anything may be? 
 For he cannot say to these men, ' Depart from me ; 
 for I was an hungered, and ye gave me no meat ; I 
 thirsted, and ye gave me no drink,' &c.. Mat. xsv. 34, 
 &c. ; but rather he may say. Depart from me, for I 
 had meat, and by force you took it from me ; I had 
 drink, and you spoiled me of it ; I had a house, and 
 you thrust me out of it ; I had clothes, and you pulled 
 them from my back ; I was in health, and ye drove 
 me into sickness ; I was at liberty, and you impri- 
 soned mo. Who is wise to consider this while it is 
 time, lest that hour come on him unawares, which 
 shall come on all of them as a snare ? Wherefore, let 
 us remember the words of the prophet, ' For thy 
 cruelty towards thy brother Jacob, shame shall cover 
 thee.' 
 
 But the hand of the papists hath been chief in 
 cruelty, and therefore we may be sure shall be chief 
 in the punishment. For their brethren, which only 
 desired redress, and sought after reformation of their 
 disorders, they have not only cast ofl', but destroyed, 
 and that in most savage manner. Yea, they have 
 done that which hardly hath been found in any bar- 
 barians, having taken up bodies when they were 
 dead (yea, rotten), and have burnt them as lime. To 
 speak nothing of their lesser cruelty, as of those great 
 numbers which they have roasted, but to take away 
 all pretence, the first whom they murdered, John 
 Huss, called to their council by safe conduct of the 
 emperor, did they not, contrary to all right and their 
 own faith, burn him, when he had committed himself 
 into their hands?* Insomuch that the emperor 
 Sigismund, could not be satisfied for the breaking of 
 
 * Vid. nnrrat. de cxhumatione, Buceri et Ph.igii, Tracoei, 
 Wielefi, nn. Pom. 15'J8. Witness Giiliclm. Linwood (who 
 tlicn lived) glos. in I'lovinc. constit. Angl. tit. do Magist. 
 cap. ii. for Wycliffc died 131)5, Walsing. in Ilypodigm. 
 Neustr. p. 037. 
 
 374 
 
Ver. 12-14.J 
 
 SER5I0N VII. 
 
 27 
 
 his promise, till by their decree, which is in the tenth 
 session of that council, the}' signifiod that their autho- 
 rity was such that they might disannul what he had 
 appointed. And a silly shift is that of our country- 
 man, who, to solve the matter saith, Imperator promi- 
 sit, orbis C'hristiaiius, major imperatore, dissolvit* 
 What, I pray you, calleth he oibcm Chriitianiiw, but 
 the bishops gathered together thither? And had they 
 authority over their emperor, to cause him brealc his 
 word and faith, &c. ? Even so Saul, 2 Sam. xxi., thought 
 it lawfid for him to break the oath which Joshua had 
 made to the Gibeonites, Josh. ix. But themselves do 
 at last begin to be ashamed of this dealing ; howbeit 
 it is recorded to their eternal shame and reproach, 
 that they not only have burned men's bones as lime, 
 but that against all equity, their own word and pro- 
 mise ; so that they are enforced to defend it with that 
 axiom of theirs, which the very heathen would be 
 ashamed of. Fides data hareiicis noii est servanda. 
 
 ' Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the pro- 
 phets ;ind stonest them that are sent to thee, how often 
 would, &o. ; therefore is thy habitation left desolate,' 
 Mat. sxiii. 27. If their habitation was left desolate 
 because they slew the prophets, then much more 
 papists', for they have slain both prophets and people. 
 I will not speak of the fires which they h.ave kindled 
 in all places, neither of the Spanish inquisition (which, 
 for the crueltj' of it, is even become a proverb). The 
 massacres in Franeef have no excuse in the world. 
 But they have not here made an end, but from pro- 
 phets and people, they have set upon princes, as the 
 late attempt upon her Majesty plainly declared. For 
 though God suffered not the light of Israel (as David's 
 people spake of him, 2 S.am. xxi. 17), to be extin- 
 guished, yet it was no less cruelty in them, who had 
 iully purposed to have done it ; and whereas they have 
 had some pretence for their other dealings, there is 
 none in the world for this. The rebels in the north 
 made protestation, that they meant not to take away 
 
 * Campian rat. iv. Ctesar obsiguavit, Clividtianus orbis 
 resignavit, major Csesare. 
 
 f Vid. Comment, de Kelig. ct Eepub. in Regno Gall. 
 
 the prince, but certain bald counsellers, as they said, 
 who were about her.* The late libeller (concerning 
 Ireland) saith that the pope hath of old had title unto 
 it, and princes are not wont to lose their titles, though 
 they have no possession ; but this commending of the 
 practice of the altar, the suborning of such a subject 
 to dispossess his lawful prince, not only of living, but 
 of life too, what man not besotted can choose but 
 detest ? When there was war betwixt Pyrrhus king 
 of Epirus and the Romans, PjTrhus's physician made 
 promise unto Fabricius that he would privily despatch 
 him,f which Fabricius refused, and sent him back to 
 his master, declaring the matter unto him, and coun- 
 selling him to look to himself. Lord, how much 
 worse ai'e the popish Romans than the old Romans ! 
 They would not receive a man that offered to do such 
 a mischief, these prick men forward, and seek after 
 with great rewards such as will attempt it ; they dis- 
 covered it to their enemies, and warned them to look 
 to themselves, these hasten the matter by what means 
 they can ; they thought it altogether unlawful, and de- 
 tested it as abominable, these commend it as lawful, and 
 defend it to be meritorious. When Pyrrhus for a re- 
 compence sent them back some of their soldiers which 
 they had taken, they would not receive [ofj him a re- 
 ward for that which they thought humanity required, 
 but sent him back as many prisoners of theirs. These 
 labour by all means to keep the matter close, and 
 think it happy for him that can do it ; and may we 
 not then say, that undoubtedly Fabricius shall rise at 
 the last day in judgment against them ? The blood 
 of Abel crieth for vengeance against all those who 
 thii-st after the blood, both of prophets, people, and of 
 prince. Behold, Lord, thy sanctuaiy with the eyes 
 of mercy and compassion, infatuate the counsel of Ahi- 
 thophel, disappoint the practices of the bloodthirsty 
 and cruel men, that we, being safe mider the shadow 
 of thy wings against all the cruelty of thy enemies, 
 may see thy judgments upon the ci'uel Idumeans, and 
 glorify thy name therefor. 
 
 "■ See Cardinal Alane's Epistles. 
 t Cic. de ofSc. lib. iii. et in Ljelio. 
 
 SEEMON VII. 
 
 But thou shouldst vol have heholdeii the day of thij brother in the daij that he was made a stranr/er ; neither shouldst 
 thou have rejoiced over the children of Judah in the day of her destruction ; thou shouldst not hare spoken inso- 
 lently in the day of affliction . Tliou slwuldst not have entered into the yate of my people in the day of their de- 
 stntction ; neither shouldst even thou hare looked on their affliction in the day of their distress, nor have laid hands 
 on their substance in the day, dc. : neither shouldst thou hare stood in the cross-irar/s, to cut off them that should 
 escape; neither shouldst thou have betrayed the remnant in the day of their destruction. — Obadiah, Ver. 12- 14. 
 
 THE prophet having generally in the former verses 
 delivered the cause of the destruction of the 
 Idumeans, viz., their cruelty which they shewed to 
 the Israehtes their brethren, when Jerusalem was 
 sacked, at what time they shewed themselves as their 
 enemies, he doth now in these words particularly lay 
 375 
 
 the same out, that the poisoned sore of then- barbar- 
 ousness being declared, the justice of God in cutting 
 them off might be shewed unto them. 
 
 Which causes in particularity are delivered by way 
 of admonition, wherein is opened what they should 
 have done ; and they concern either, 
 
28 
 
 RAINOLDS ON OBADIAII. 
 
 [Ver. 12-14. 
 
 1. Their affections ; or, 
 
 2. Their actions. 
 
 1. Their affections, hatred and envy, testified by 
 their gladness and rejoicing at their harms and afflic- 
 tions. 
 
 2. Their actions arc either concerning, 
 
 (1.) Words, which were proud and spiteful: Thou 
 slwiihlst not have spoken insolcnthj ; or, 
 
 (2.) Concerning deeds, spoiling them [1.] of goods ; 
 entered into the gate; laid luoid. on substanre : [2.] of 
 life ; stood in the breach to ait off them that escaped ; 
 betrayed the remnant. 
 
 Wherefore in these points consisted the cruelty of 
 Edom, in wishing, speaking, and doing evil against 
 Israel. 
 
 Well-willers cannot look on our miseries, or abide 
 to see them, for grief and sorrow. As we read of 
 Hagar the mother of Ishmael, thnt, when her son was 
 like to die for water, she cast the child under the tree, 
 and went and sat over against him afar off ; for she 
 said, ' I will not see the death of the child,' Gen. xxi. 
 15, 16. But here the evil will, that the Edomitcs 
 bore, appeareth, and the harm they wished them, in 
 that they ' rejoiced to look upon the affliction of their 
 brethren.' 
 
 Neither could they keep this evil will within them, 
 but they uttered it in their speech, ' speaking proudly' 
 against them, or as it is in the Hebrew, making their 
 mouth great or wide, blJJl. Which here being 
 plainly set down, is by others elsewhere more plainly 
 opened, when they cried, Ps. cxxxvii., ' Kaze it, raze 
 it, even to the foundations ;' and again, Ezek. xxxv. 
 10 and XXV. 8, ' Behold the house of Judah is like 
 unto all the heathen.' 
 
 Besides, here they stayed not ; but to their evil will 
 and naughty words tliey added naughty deeds, for 
 they ' entered into the gate, laid hands on their sub- 
 stance ;' and, as though it had been a small thing to 
 rob them, they proceeded further, and took away their 
 lives, by killing some by present death, for whom 
 they waited in the breaches ; others by lingering 
 death, whom they betrayed, that so they might die in 
 torments and captivity. And all these, albeit very 
 grievous in themselves, yet are more increased by the 
 circumstances, 
 
 1. Of persona; and 2, of times. 
 
 1. Persons. {!.) ]h/ n-hom ; a brother ; wherefore 
 add, ' neither oughtcst thou,' to note the indignity. 
 (2.) Agninst whom ; a brother ; not beholding the 
 day of thy brother. (3.) Mij people. 
 
 2. The circumstance also of the time increaseth the 
 crucify ; in the day he iras iiiiide a alranijer, in the dai/ 
 of affliction. Whereby is declared what marvellous 
 savage hearts they bore ; fur then even enemies are 
 moved to pity. Wherefore, to shew the grievousness 
 in respect hereof, this clause is repeated in each branch. 
 
 And when it is also said that they ' stood in the 
 breach and betrayed the remnant,' not sparing such 
 
 as had escaped, we see that on all sides their cruelty 
 is amplified. 
 
 Wherefore they are justly reproved when they are 
 admonished not to have done that which they did. 
 By which reproof of Edom we are admonished to have 
 two things, if v,-e will neither be idle nor unfruitful in 
 the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ, namely, 
 
 1. Patience, in that they did ; 
 
 2. Brotherly love, in that they should have done. 
 1. It is a hard and heavy message, that the children 
 
 of God must sufler so great miserj' and cruelty, and 
 to bear it also ; a great grief it is, that our enemies 
 should look on our affliction, and rejoice ; greater to 
 enter into our gates and take away our goods, greatest 
 of all to take away our life ; yet is it more than this, 
 to kill us after we have escaped ; especially to suffer 
 all this of our brethren. Yet is there no remedy : the 
 godly in all this must be patient, and suffer all these 
 things ; and that not only of strangers, but also of 
 our brethren. 
 
 ' The gate that leadelh to life is narrow and strait.' 
 We are to sit down and cast accounts, for we are to 
 build a costly work. We are born as the sons of 
 Jacob under the bondage of Pharaoh, so under the 
 thraldom of Satan, that spiritual Pharaoh. Christ is 
 our Moses, by whom, thi'ough baptism, as through 
 the Red Sea, we are led to the land of promise ; but 
 before we come thither we are to pass through the 
 wilderness, where is want of meat and drink, and 
 other necessaries, besides wild beasts and noisome 
 serpents, &c. Yet this must we pass through before 
 we can come to Canaan, that is, heaven, which flowetb, 
 not as did that with milk and honey, but with such 
 joj' and comfort as tongue cannot utter, neither have 
 at any time entered into the heart of man. 
 
 Now seeing, unless wc pass through the wilderness, 
 we cannot enter into Canaan, we mu.st be content to 
 bear whatsoever affliction is therein ; but if wo mur- 
 mur and rebel, he hath sworn in his wrath that we 
 shall not enter into his rest. So hard a thing is it, 
 nay, so impossible, to enter heaven, but through many 
 tribulations. 
 
 ' If any man will come after me,' saith our Saviour, 
 ' let him take up his cross daily, and follow me.' 
 The death of the cross was not only most grievous, 
 but most shameful also ; and so much the more, for 
 that such as wore to be handled most dcspitefuUy were 
 put to carry their cross themselves, for they had favour 
 shewed them who had others to help ; yet were not 
 this worst, if they wore to do it but once, or to die 
 but once, but when we are commanded to do it dailj-, 
 it is a sore matter ; yet must those that will follow 
 Christ be content to do it, to bear all affliction, even 
 most grievous and shameful, even the cross. For 
 Christian men's life is death, and that daily, that 
 they may say with the church, ' For thy sake are we 
 killed daily,' not the whole day only, but every day. 
 Christ Jesus the Son of God, who ' thought it not 
 
 37G 
 
Ver. 12-U.] 
 
 SERMOX VII. 
 
 robber}' to bo like unto God,' was content for our sake 
 to endure all miseries, even tbe death of the cross, 
 with all the indignities that Edom put Judah unto. 
 For they in the day of his affliction stood staving and 
 looking upon him, they rejoiced against him ; those 
 goods he had the}- took and divided amongst them, 
 lastly, they put him to a most villanous death, as 
 himself had before shev.'ed by David, a figure of him : 
 ' I am become a stranger to my br^■lhren, au alien to 
 my mother's children.' ' They stood staring and 
 looking on me, they gave me gall,' &c. ; ' all that look 
 on me have me in derision,' &c. ; ' dogs have com- 
 passed me about, &c. ; they part my garments amongst 
 them, and cast lots on vaj vesture ; they pierced my 
 hands and feet,' itc. For albeit that some of these 
 things were performed against our Saviour by the 
 heathen, yet were both Pilate and the soldiers but 
 ministers of the Jews, his brethren, who were they 
 that sought for him, betrayed him, delivered, accused 
 him of treason, aud that cried out against him, 
 ' Crucify him,' &c. 
 
 This esnmple of Christ, who was thus cruelly en- 
 treated and put to death in such pitiful sort by his 
 brethren, is set forth for a pattern to us, to learn by 
 like patience to suffer the like cruelly ; because, in- 
 deed, that we are prepared and ordained for the like, 
 as Peter declaretb, 1 Peter ii. 21, 'Hereunto are ye 
 called ; for Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an 
 examjile, that we should follow his steps.' And Paul 
 saith that we are ' hereunto predestinate, to be made 
 like unto the image of the Son of God;' and, ' if we 
 will reign with him, we must also suffer with him.' 
 
 The primitive church, which immediately followed 
 Christ, had sufficient proof hereof, as in the stoning 
 of Stephen, Acts vii., the imprisonment of Peter, the 
 often persecutions, even by tlic professors of tbe faith, 
 and such as in part had it, of all the church, espe- 
 cially of Paul, who was 'abundant in labours, in stripes 
 above measure, in prison pleuteousl}', in death oft, in 
 perils among his own nation, among false brethren,' 
 2 Cor. si. 23. Afterward, how barbarously the true 
 Christians were dealt withal by the Donatists, Circum- 
 cellians, etc., who dismembered their bodies, put out 
 their eyes, beheaded and bm'ned them under the em- 
 perors Yalentius, &c., the monuments of those daj's 
 and the ecclesiastical histories do abundantly shew. 
 
 And in our time, tbe papists have in this point 
 dealt so outrageously, that all the other which we have 
 mentioned seemeth nothing to it. A fresh example 
 whereof is that committed by them about this time 
 thirteen years, in Paris, under Charles the 9th, when 
 in that realm there were slain thirty thousand Chris- 
 tians, and that not in war or battle mentioned, as was 
 this of the Idumeans, but under the pretence of friend- 
 ship, shadowed by the marriage of the king's sister to 
 a Christian prince.* In which most treacherous and 
 
 * Vid. Comment, de stiitu Relig. et Reipub. in Kegno 
 Gall. par. ii., &c. 
 377 
 
 bloody practice were all the points observed that arc 
 here noted in the Idumeans. 
 
 Looked. For it is recorded that on Bartholomew 
 night the queen mother, with the rest, went out of the 
 palace to see the carcases of such as they had mur- 
 dei'ed in the city.* And besides, when they caused 
 the body of that worthy admiral to be hanged upon 
 the gibbet, they went out of the city to fill their eyes 
 with that cruel sight. 
 
 licjoiced. They caused, for joy hereof, procession 
 to be made throughout Paris ; and when Gregory 
 XIII. heard of it, he caused the hke joy to be shewed 
 in his city, the guns to be shot off from his castle of 
 Saint Angelo, and mass to be sung in honour of this 
 noble deed in Saint Lucius' Chiu'ch, a French saint. f 
 And so, as in that city neither Sylla, Ca;sar, nor any 
 other, had ever triumphed over citizens, though over- 
 come with just war, not traitorously murdered by un- 
 just cruelty. Moreover, by parliament it was enacted, 
 that in memory hereof there should be kept each year, 
 on St Bartholomew day, a general procession through 
 Paris. 
 
 Opened the mouth. Which appeareth by the words 
 of the king, who, swearing after his manner, said, 
 that heaven with its weather seemed to rejoice at their 
 deeds ; words of tbe murderers of the admiral, &c. 
 And by tbe words of the president of the parliament 
 of Paris, j who signified that ail was done by the king's 
 authority (contrary to that which he had, in his 
 letters, signified to other princes), commending the 
 whole deed with that saying of Louis, one of theii' 
 kings. Qui ncscil dissiniularc, ncscit reijnare, He knows 
 not how to reign that knows not how to feign. § Be- 
 sides the thing commended with an oration, and the 
 cardinal of Lorraine set up monuments of it, which also 
 Genebrard and Surtus, the most impudent bolsecks 
 that ever wrote, 'j have in their chronicle commended 
 with this slander, that it was done because of their 
 conspiracy'. 
 
 lUinsackinr/ substance. They not only entered into 
 the gate, but houses of the oppressed, rifling them at 
 their pleasures ; 3'ea, so gi'eedy were they of gain, that 
 they slew some that were very papists,*' to the end 
 that some of their complices, which were nest to pos- 
 sess their goods, might by that means be enriched. 
 
 Slain. How the}" slew not only those that fell hito 
 their hands, but such as were escaped also, may ap- 
 pear by the sending of letters, after this butchery done 
 at Paris, to Lyons, and other places, that they might, 
 to fill up the measure of the king's iniquity, dustroy 
 the remnant.''^"* 
 
 We here in England have not yet (God be praised), 
 
 « Vid. part 4, sub Carolo 9. lib. x., xi., xii., ful. 3'j, &c., 42. 
 t Ubi supra, fob 5U. 
 
 J Cliristop. Tlmanus, ann. I57'2, vid. ubi supra, fob 43. 
 § Loco supra citato, tliis speech commended by Tliuanus. 
 11 Vid. eos anno 1571. f Vid. fol. 41, et passim. 
 
 ** Fob 44, 45, ic. 
 
80 
 
 EAIXOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver. 12-14 
 
 felt this manner of cruelty ; but seeing it is our lot to 
 abide it, we must, for our part, be prepared for it, and 
 arm ourselves with patience against it come, though 
 we be not free presently, for all that they dare do ; 
 for there want not among us false brethren, or such 
 as in their hearts murder us. And albeit we sufl'er 
 not so much as Abel did of Cain, yet feel we as much 
 as Isaac did of Ishmael, namely, scoflfs and slanders. 
 Such were David's brethren, of vv'hom he saith that 
 they tore him in pieces ; his ' familiar friends with 
 whom he took sweet counsel,' &c., which is so certain 
 to befall likewise unto us, that our Saviour, out of the 
 prophet Micah, chap. vii. 5, 6, saith that ' the son 
 shall rise against the father, &c., and a man's enemies 
 shall be even they of his own household.' But, as it 
 is there by the prophet laid down for a comfort to the 
 godly, vers. 8-10, ' Let not the enemy rejoice, for 
 though I fall, yet shall I rise again, &c., mine eyes 
 shall behold her; now shall she be trodden down, as 
 the mire in the streets.' 
 
 2. The second thing to be of us considered, was in 
 that which they should not have done ; wherein, as 
 hath been said, we are moved to brotherly kindness. 
 Wherein I request you to remember the points of 
 cruelty which have been laid out, and said to have 
 been found in them. 
 
 (1.) Bejoice. This joy at other's harms ought to 
 be far from us, being a token of hatred and envy, 
 Ezek. XXXV. For if we go to the root, as it is delivered 
 elsewhere, it is evident that it proceedeth from an 
 evil mind ; for whom men hate, him wish they evil 
 unto, and would gladly see it fall on him.* Where- 
 fore it proceedeth from the heart, as even the outward 
 gesture also ; which our Saviour declareth, when he 
 saith, that ' out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, 
 &c., and an evil eye,' meaning the effects of an evil 
 eye and envious. For many there are that see well, 
 and yet have evil eyes ; namely, such as delight at 
 the harm of their brother, and sorrow at his good. 
 Whei'efore we must beware of both effects, namely, 
 that we neither behold the prosperity of others with 
 grief, nor their adversity with joy. 
 
 And for the former, we must be so much the more 
 diligent in avoiding it, because a good mind is some- 
 times subject unto it. When a young man told 
 Joshua that Eldad and Medad prophesied in the host, 
 he willed Moses to forbid them. Num. xi. 27. L'>ut 
 Moses rebuked him : ' Enviest thou,' saith he, ' for 
 my sake ? yea, would to God that all the Lord's 
 people were prophets, and that the Lord would put 
 his Spirit upon them.' 
 
 But as for the latter, which is to rejoice at the ad- 
 versities of others, it is not so incident to the heart 
 which is sprinkled with any drop of gi-aco ; because 
 that, even naturally, wo pity such as be in misery. 
 Howbeit, if there be any such among us, let him re- 
 member what the wise man saith : that ' ho who 
 * Cic. dc Ojjic , lib. ii., Qucm q\iisqiic odit, [leriisse expefit. 
 
 rejoiceth at the harm of another, shall not himself 
 escape unpunished. The sum is this, that we look 
 to our heart, the fountain of these afi'ections, and 
 piirify it. The heart, as the philosophers say, in 
 natural generation, is first framed, and in spiritual 
 regeneration it is first formed. Wherefore we are 
 first to look that it be pure ; for what the heart con- 
 ceiveth, that the tongue uttereth, and what the tongue 
 speaketh, the hand pract'seth. 
 
 (2.) The second thing is, that we speak not against 
 our brethren, neither exhorting the enemies, Ezek. 
 XXV. xxsv., nor scoffing and deriding our brethren, as 
 the Idumeans. To exhort men to do evil, I hope we 
 may learn how dear it will cost us by the example of 
 the Jews, who, exhorting the Romans to slay our 
 Saviour, and being admonished of the great wicked- 
 ness, answered, ' His blood be upon us and on our 
 children ;' and so it was indeed. But how sore it was 
 upon them the noble'"' history of Jerusalem's destruc- 
 tion, which followed within the compass of their 
 children's life, doth sufficiently declare, of whom were 
 slain l,100,000.t 
 
 For taunting, as not only doers but abetters are 
 culpable in faults, so these scoffers as well as the 
 doers of evil, and so much the more because they 
 scoft' the Lord himself, as when they said, ' The land 
 wherein the Lord is.' How heavy the hand of the 
 Lord was on Rabshakeh for this blasphemy, we have 
 an evident example. I will not go so far in this 
 assembly as to speak of such gross blasphemy, but if 
 there be any among us which are not afraid to abuse 
 the words of Scripture in scoff, as did those wicked 
 Jews which had in their mouth, ' The hurden of the 
 Lord,' Ac, let them consider the punishment 
 threatened against such scorners, and be afraid there- 
 of. A shame it is, if the Council of Trent condemn 
 such wickedness, for us to use it. :- Wherefore, if any 
 profane cogitations concerning God's word rise in our 
 minds, let us betime quell these imps of Babylon, 
 ' dashing them against the stones,' that they go no 
 further. 
 
 (3). The third thing is, that wo take from them, as 
 not their life, so neither their living, whereby their life is 
 maintained; for altliough we go not so far as to como 
 to sacking, yet, if we lay hands upon the goods of 
 Judali, whetiier public or private, we play the part of 
 Edom. I am loath to speak that which 1 should here 
 touch. Do not they commit this wickedness which 
 take money for that which was provided to maintain 
 the poor, either in the university publicly, or privately 
 in any college ; which sell the poor for shoes, or come 
 not so low as those beggarly judges, but make their 
 own advantage by what means soever; but they will 
 not say that they lay hands on them, but that they take 
 that which is cfl'ered. Alas, poor souls ! do they 
 offer it? Yea, even as men their purses on Salisbui-y 
 Plain, they yield their goods to save their lives. This 
 
 * (iu. ' noliililir?— ICn. t "^'i'l- Hegosip. lib. iv., &c. 
 
 378 
 
Ver 15, 16.] 
 
 SERMON VIII. 
 
 31 
 
 was right Verres's answer,* he took nothiug but wliat 
 was otiered him ; or they will say that themselves 
 receive nothing, but yet, as Mr Latimer f said, their 
 wives shall, or the steward of the kitchen. 
 
 Now, if this be blameworthy, being done in private 
 goods, how much more in public; the wise steward, 
 Luke svi., when he should be put from his office, 
 meaning to provide for a dear year, ' called together all 
 his master's debtors, saying to the first. How much 
 owest thou to my master? and he said, An himdred 
 measures of oil. And he said, Take thy writings, set 
 down quickly, and wiite fifty,' &c. The steward can- 
 celled not the obligations, but made them anew, and 
 so ' made him friends of his master's goods.' I would 
 to God this practice wore not too common among us, 
 by public goods to make us private friends in our own 
 suits, &c. ' The Lord commended the wisdom of this 
 unthrifty steward;' he commended his policy, not his 
 hoiies/i/ : and, if he were among us and were to speak 
 of stewards, he would commend the policy of our 
 stewards no less than that of the wise steward. The 
 Pharisees gave thirty pence, which were indeed thirty 
 shekels, about, in value, two shillings a piece, which 
 they took out of the public treasury, unto Judas to 
 betray our Saviour. When Judas had returned them, 
 they would not ' put them again into the treasury, 
 because it was the price of blood, but bought there- 
 with a potter's field to bury strangers in.' The 
 Pharisees gave thirty pieces of silver ; if it had been 
 thirty pieces of gold, or thrice thirty, it had been 
 fitter for my purpose. 
 
 For the sin is, such of them that have given much 
 more out of the public treasury, to compass such 
 things, as when they have them they may betray the 
 souls of Christians. And, whether this practice be 
 rife among us, I leave to their consideration who 
 wisely consider the dealing of the world ; but let 
 such men as be faulty herein consider the end of the 
 
 * Vid. Cic. Verrin v. 
 
 t In Ills sermon before King Edward. 
 
 givers and takers, whereof the one strangled himself, 
 the other were ovei'thrown in the destruction threatened 
 against them, and for the money, what end it had we 
 see ; I speak not because it buried strangers, but it 
 served to no purpose but to bury carcases ; and so 
 shall this money serve to none other end but to bury, 
 not the carcases but the souls of such in hell tire 
 which stain their hands with it. 
 
 (4). The fourth thing is to abstain from murder. 
 I will not propose unto yoix so high a degree of this 
 sin, but exhort such as to whom it appertaineth, to 
 beware that they murder not the souls whereof they 
 have charge. The surest death, and most pitiful, 
 is the famine of the soul, and the want of the preach- 
 ing of the word is famine ; and reason, in the mouth 
 of the poet, hath taught us that it is a most miserable 
 thing to die with hunger. AVherefore, in this case, it 
 belongeth to masters who have charge and care of 
 servants, pastors of flocks, magistrates of people, to 
 see that they be not negligent in their duty, and that 
 their hand be not deep in this iniquity, and that they 
 be not defiled with the blood of souls, which Christ 
 hath redeemed with his precious blood. Oh that they 
 would at length consider wisely of it! And here 
 should I speak to the magistrate of the city, if he were 
 present, in that matter which hath been often moved 
 unto him, for the provision for such as might minister 
 the word unto them, which, in the apostle's judgment, 
 is necessarj'. ' No man, at any time, goeth to war on 
 his own charges ; ' and, if this city can be content to 
 set out soldiers for the prince, will they not be pre- 
 vailed to famish soldiers against Satan, the enemy of 
 their souls, against whom they are continually to strive? 
 The example of Cambridge hath been proposed unto 
 them, but if they were not worse than them of Asia, 
 and the barbarians of Macedonia, they would be moved 
 to do somewhat herein. These were content to send 
 relief to the saints at Jerusalem, but they will not 
 succour such as are amongst them, which are not 
 troubled with bodily but spiritual hunger. 
 
 SERMON VIII. 
 
 For the day of the Lord is near iqmn'alL the heathen: an thou hast done, it shall be done unto thee ; thy reward 
 shall return upon thine head. When you have drunk upon mine holy mountain, all the heathen shall 
 drink contiuually ; yea, they shall drink and simllow up, and they shall be as thouyh they had not been. — 
 Obadiah, Ver. 15, 16. 
 
 rj'lHE thoughts and affections of man's heart are so 
 _L corrupt and froward, that he is seldom by com- 
 mandment restrained from evil, unless there be ad- 
 joined to the breach of the commandment some 
 punishment. Neither are we always moved there- 
 withal, especiallj' if we know or be persuaded that that 
 which is threatened be far otf. For it befalleth very 
 often that the pleasant lust and pleasure of sin for a 
 season overweigheth the fear which we should conceive 
 of the punishment which is yet to come, according to 
 379 
 
 that of the wise man, Eccles. viii. 11 : ' Because sen- 
 tence against an evil work is not executed speedily, 
 therefore the heart of the children of men is fully set 
 in them to do evil.' The prophet, weighing this, thought 
 it a small thing to teach us by the wickedness of the 
 Idumeans, that we should fell after the same manner 
 of sin, and therefore putteth us also in mind of the 
 punishment which was to light on the ungodly. 
 Which also he doth the rather, to comfort the godly, 
 for so grievous as the calamities which for the present 
 
.•52 
 
 EAIiNOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver. 15, 16. 
 
 time the best are both to see and feel, that unless 
 they ' went into the sanctuaiy of the Lord,' to ' see 
 the end of these men ' whom ' God hath set in slippery 
 places,' it must needs fall out that ' their feet should 
 slip, and their goings slide,' Ps. Ixxiii. Wherefore, to 
 raise up the spu-it, which striveth against the flesh, and 
 to beat down the flesh, which fighteth against the spirit, 
 the Lord saith by the prophet, ' For the day,' &c. 
 
 By the da}" of the Loi'd is meant the time of the 
 Lord's judgment ; that is, the time which he hath ap- 
 pointed to execute judgment. By the heathen are 
 meant the nations set against the Jews ; as were the 
 Phihstines, Tyrians, Medes, Babylonians, &c., and 
 such as were mentioned, Jeremiah xxv., where the 
 matter which is here handled generally is more fully 
 in particular opened. And as Edom is amongst them 
 there counted, so here, having in the former verse 
 opened the threat against all enemies, in the verse fol- 
 lowing is he namely mentioned. Howbeit, lest the 
 Jews should in the mean season be discouraged and 
 broken, with the manifold miseries which they abode, 
 he shewoth that their enemies should suft'er far greater, 
 and this also to their gi-eater comfort is uttered in 
 God's person, ' On my mountain.' 
 
 Afflictions, by a metaphor, are here called a drinking 
 of strong drink, as of wine, because that as men, by 
 taking more than enough, become drunk, so that their 
 heads wax giddy, their bodies distempered, &c., and 
 some so disquieted that they die of it ; so men, by 
 sufi"ering afllictions, become astonished, their bodies 
 disordered, &c. 
 
 The meaning then is this, that though they endured 
 for a while many and sundry miseries, yet should 
 their enemies feel far greater ; for it is said of the 
 godly, that they should ' drink on his holy mountain,' 
 but the heathen ' continually,' implying that they 
 should abide this punishment for a time, but the ene- 
 mies for ever. Again, that they should ' drink,' but 
 the other should ' drink and .swallow up, and be as 
 though they had not been.' Which difl'erence is yet 
 more fully declared by Jeremiah, chap. xxv. 2, 15, 
 'Take a cup, stagger, wax mad, vomit; ' yet of the 
 Jews which vvfere carried captive to Babylon, he saith 
 that after seventy years they should bo delivered. 
 
 We arc to note that sundry temporal things in the 
 Old Testament are shadows of things eternal. Noah 
 Lis ark, which was bonie up by the waters, signified 
 the church borne up and saved by tliat which baptism 
 representeth ; the puuishmcnt of Sodom figured the 
 eternal tire ; the land of Canaan, whereinto Joshua 
 brought the Israelites, was a sign of the kingdom of 
 heaven, whereunto we are brought through the wil- 
 derness of this life by Jesus Christ. So this chas- 
 tisement for the time of his children, and continual 
 drinking of the ungodly, are figures of the short cor- 
 rection which God will lay on his children, and the 
 most dreadful and eternal punishment which shall fall 
 on the head of the ungodly. 
 
 For the mountain significth the church ; the Jews 
 the godly; their drinking, atllictions. The heathen all 
 ungodly ; their continual drinking, their eternal punish- 
 ment ; their swallowing, itc, their toniients most 
 grievous, which, though we see partly accomphshed in 
 this life, yet shall it more be seen in the life to come. 
 For when the godly have a little sufl'ered here, they 
 shall have ' all tears wiped from their eyes,' and the 
 imgodly shall drink and_swallow,' &c. ; that is, suffer 
 endless and unspeakable torments. 
 
 Hereout are there many tilings to be observed. 
 
 1. C'difse of these punishments, /or, respecting the 
 sins in the former verses. 
 
 2. Tiwc when, near. 
 
 8. Equilij of the punishment, as tJiau hast, done to 
 them. 
 
 4. Freedom of the godly, \L-hcii you liave drunk. 
 
 5. Gricvousness of the punishment, continually. 
 
 6. By way of the metaphor of di'inking, the filthi- 
 ness of drunkenness. 
 
 1. The iniquities which the Idumeans wTought 
 against the Jews were they that provoked this dread- 
 ful vengeance. And because the heathen were like 
 unto them, they are to be punished also in the like 
 manner. The sins of the Idumeans consisted, as hath 
 been before declared, in ' rejoicing at the atfliction of 
 their brethren, in ' speaking ' evil against them, in 
 ' spoiling ' them of theii' goods and substance, and in 
 ' killing ' of their bodies. Wherefore, as hath been 
 said, if we offend in the like, if in greater, we must 
 look to receive the like reward. 
 
 So that if our hearts be open to all manner of 
 ungodly thoughts, and wicked lusts, our tongues pre- 
 pared to unrighteous speech, our hands set .to rob, 
 whether it be the goods of private or public persons, 
 if we kill not the bodies but the souls of men, let us 
 learn this lesson, and dread this severe punishment. 
 ' For the wrath of God for such things comcth on the 
 children of unbelief.' For such thinys, saith the 
 apostle, not only for the same. ' Enoch prophesied of 
 such, saying. Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thou- 
 sands of his saints, to give judgment against all men, 
 and k) rebuke all the ungodly among them of all their 
 wicked deeds, which they have ungodly committed, 
 and of all of their cruel speakings which wicked sinners 
 have spoken against him,' Judo 1-1, ttc. The Lord 
 will come to judge the wicked for their deeds, for their 
 cruel speaking, and for their thoughts, the fountain 
 and spring thereof. This was prophesied by Enoch 
 before the flood, and then performed. Judo applicth 
 it as spoken against all the wicked. Paul useth this 
 execration, 1 Cor. xvi. 22, ' If any love not the Lord 
 Jesus, let him be accursed, Maranatha.' The Syriac 
 words signify, the Lord cometh, and are the first words 
 of that prophecy. of Enoch, a denouncing of that 
 severe punishment, which shall come on the head of 
 all sinners, as certainly as the Lord shall come to 
 judgment. Here, that wo deceive not ourselves in 
 
 380 
 
Ver. 15, 16.] 
 
 SERMON Vlir. 
 
 33 
 
 judging of this love to Christ, our Saviour hath set 
 down a ready note to discern it by. ' If ye love me, 
 keep my commandments.' I come not to the parti- 
 cular note of pastors, which our Saviour hath laid 
 down to be this, ' If thou love me, feed my sheep ; ' 
 ' If thou love me, feed,' &c. ; so earnest, so tender, so 
 careful a charge noted in this repetition would be 
 deeply considered of them that are in that place, if 
 there be any love in them ; if there be not, then I 
 pronounce not this curse against non-residents, but St 
 Paul doth : ' If any man love not the Lord Jesus' — 
 as these do not which feed not the lambs and sheep of 
 Christ — ' let them be accursed, Maranatha.' Here 
 also all hypocritical Christians are warned to consider 
 their ways, which content themselves with an outward 
 profession, and think themselves safe while thej' remain 
 in the visible church. But our Saviour sheweth, that 
 he is the vine, we the branches, his Father the hus- 
 bandman, so that each branch, though he be in the 
 outward^'.bark listened to the vine, yet if he bring not 
 forth fruit, ho is cut off, and cast into the fire. It 
 profitcth him nothing to have been in the vine, if he 
 be fruitless. But if these speeches of Enoch, Jude, 
 Paul, and our Saviour do the less touch us, because 
 they be far off, and so we pamper ourselves, esteeming 
 the pleasures of sin for a season greater treasures 
 than the kingdom of heaven ; let us consider the next 
 point ; — 
 
 2. That is, near. When Jonah, sent to the Nine- 
 vites, cried in their streets, ' Yet forty days, and 
 Nineveh shall be destroyed,' the people of Nineveh 
 ' believed God, proclaimed a fast, and put on sack- 
 cloth, from the greatest of them unto the least.' I 
 have not the function of Jonah, but the commission of 
 John Baptist, Mat. iv., to tell you that 'even now the 
 axe is laid to the root of the tree, and every tree that 
 bringeth not forth good fruit is cut down and cast into 
 the tire.' How near or far off it is to every one can I 
 not tell ; yet I am certain, that seeing the axe is even 
 now laid to the root, that it is not long to any. Where- 
 fore, ' while it is yet called to-day, let us not harden 
 our hearts,' Heb. iii., ' while it is light, let us walk in 
 the light; while it is day. Ictus work; the night cometh 
 wherein we shall not work,' and before that day come, 
 which shall make an end of all days. For it is assur- 
 edly pronounced to be ' near upon all the wicked.' 
 
 This is spoken not only of the particular judgment 
 of each man, but also of that day, so called by an 
 excellency the day of judgment, which God hath ap- 
 pointed wherein to judge the world by Christ, as Paul 
 taught the Thessalonians, which before God, with 
 whom ' a thousand years are but as one day,' is no 
 doubt near, though, as men count far and near, I know 
 not whether it be far or near. ' It is not for us to 
 know the times and seasons, which the Father hath 
 placed in his own power.' He speaketh not only of the 
 certain hour, but of the times in general, so that there 
 is condemned the rash presumption of those which 
 381 
 
 take upon them to deliver the year and season of the 
 Lord's coming to judgment, as that fond prophecy of 
 Eliah, cot the prophet, but a rabbin of the Jews, who 
 hath written that the world should eudure but six 
 thousand years, which is a Talmudieal dream,* worthy 
 that sink of the Jewish filthiness, which yet neither 
 the Jews from whom it came do believe, for then 
 must they believe that their Messiah is come, which 
 they deny, the world having continued five thousand 
 five hundred and thirty years. So much the more 
 blameworthy are some Christian chronicles, which 
 have alleged this dream as a thing of some weight, 
 and that is worse, have fathered it upon Elijah. 
 Wherefore, whether that great day he far or near off, 
 I know not ; neither will I deny that it is near, for 
 it may be nearer than any imagine. For it ' shall 
 come as a thief in the night.' And although mockers 
 and Ecorners do laugh at it, yet shall they once no 
 doubt feel it. 
 
 The particular judgment of the wicked, as it was 
 then said to be near, so may we say that of all such 
 it is so now. For though there were no more but the 
 general administration of things on the earth, we are 
 thereby sufficiently taught, that ' man which is born 
 of a woman hath but a short time to live,' &c., which 
 if it may be truly affirmed of all men, then how much 
 more of the wicked, which ' shall not live out half 
 their days.' Who thought that Sennacherib in all his 
 power should have been murdered of his own children 
 in the temple of his own gods ? Who would have 
 believed that Bclshazzar, in the midst of his banquet, 
 should have received his sentence of destruction, and 
 so suddenly to be slain by the conspiracy of his sub- 
 jects ? The rich man, whose land was very fruitful, 
 even then when he bade his soul take her rest, had her 
 taken from him. There is none of us hath greater 
 charter of his life than Sennacherib, Belshazzar, or the 
 rich man. Sith that each particular man's judgment 
 cannot be far off, and may be very near ; for the old 
 cannot live long, the young 7naij die very quickly; let 
 us remember to abstain fi-om sins, which then shall be 
 revealed to the confusion of those that have committed 
 them. Let us not flatter ourselves with long days, 
 hoping the punishment shall be deferred, lest that 
 befall us which is reported of the J'oung man in the 
 seventh of the Proverbs, whom the harlot with her 
 craft caused to yield, telhng him that her husband was 
 not at home, but was gone a far journey : ' So he was 
 enticed with her flattering lips, and followed her 
 straightways, as an ox thafgoeth to the slaughter, 
 and as one fettered to the instruction of fools ; till a 
 dart struck through his liver.' 
 
 Christ is a prince, which indeed is gone into a far 
 country, yet he looketh that his talents, which he hath 
 left behind him, be employed till he come. And he 
 is not gone so far, but that he will come on the sudden 
 
 * Vid. Aug. Enarrat. in Ps. Ixxxix., and fib. xviii. cap. 
 liii. de Civ. Dei. 
 
34 
 
 RAINOLDS ON OBADIAII. 
 
 [Vee. 15, 16. 
 
 again, and ' happy is that servant whom, when he 
 Cometh, he shall find doing his dnt_y.' 
 
 3. The equity which the Lord will use in this 
 judgment is declared, when it is said, ' As thou hast 
 done, it shall be done to thee ; thy reward shall return 
 upon thy head.' Reason plainly sheweth that the 
 punishment should be equal to the faults, as the 
 ancient laws of the Romans, which they received from 
 the Grecians, have plainly declared; but more evi- 
 dently in the laws of the Hebrews, wherein we mustneeds 
 think that equity appeared most clear. Lev. xxiv. 19, 20. 
 The law commanded ' a tooth for a tooth, &c. ; as he 
 hath done, so let it be done to him.' Adonibezek 
 acknowledged this for a just judgment even by the light 
 of nature, when he confessed, when the thumbs of his 
 feet and hands were cut off, that God had rewarded 
 him, for that he had caused seventy kings, having 
 their thumbs cut ofl', to gather scraps under his table, 
 Judges i. 7. Absalom killed Amnon his brother, 
 and was not he himself slain ? Joab slew Abner and 
 Amasa, but he himself was slain whilst he laid hold 
 on the horns of the altar. But what speak I of several 
 men, seeing this equity of God's judgment shineth 
 most clear in empires and kingdoms, 1 Kings ii. 31 ; 
 the Assyrians, IMacedonians, Babylonians, &e., who 
 as they had spoiled many nations, so were they them- 
 selves also spoiled ; but most notable in Rome, who 
 in a few years was so often sacked and spoiled by the 
 Goths, Vandals, &c. In our days we have seen that 
 abbeys and monkeries, which had made havoc of 
 churches, and their patrimony, how that God hath 
 taken vengeance of them and spoiled them also. 
 
 Now, seeing the judgment is one where [the] sin is one, 
 let such take heed as possess the goods of the church 
 by their punishment, lest that these goods so gotten, 
 as a canker, consume the rest. ' Woe to thee,' saith 
 the prophet, ' that spoilest and was not spoiled ; when 
 thou ceasest, thou also shalt be spoiled !' ' Look, with 
 what measure we mete, with the same measure shall 
 we be measured to.' His iniquity, his own, and no 
 other, shall return upon his own head. 
 
 But here we must beware that we condemn not 
 God's punishment, if the punishment seem greater 
 than the offences, in that they are to be punished con- 
 tinually which have sinned but for a time, for the cir- 
 cumstances besides increase the greatness of the fault. 
 I will stand but on one, which is the person against 
 whom the offence is committed. It is of Babylon : 
 ' Give her double according to her sin,' Rev. xviii. 
 How agreeth this '? Double punishment, and yet ac- 
 cording to] the sin ? Forsooth, because an offence 
 against the godly is twofold greater than that of ano- 
 ther. Shimei cursed David ; it had not been death 
 towards another, but because it was against the Lord's 
 anointed, ho was justly slain by Solomon. Now, if 
 the punishment of traitorous words against a temporal 
 prince rightfully deserve a temporal death, do not trai- 
 torous words against an eternal King deserve eternal 
 
 punishment ? Wherefore, seeing they have offended 
 the majesty of him that is infinite, it is reason that 
 their punishment should be in time infinite, that so 
 some way the proportion may be answered. 
 
 The foundations of those parts of doctrine and in- 
 struction which hitherto have been opened, are yet ad- 
 vanced higher in the 16th verse by these two points: — 
 
 1. That the godly are afflicted in this life for a 
 while in measure. 
 
 2. That the punishment of the wicked is without 
 measure or end. 
 
 But before I enter into the declaration hereof, I 
 will note the harm which proceedeth of excessive drink- 
 ing, which the prophet setteth here before our eyes, 
 when he calleth afflictions and punishments by the 
 name of drinking ; for thereby are we taught that, as 
 men oppressed with grief have their hearts troubled, 
 their bodies distempered, their sjjirits languishing, 
 their life shortened, &c., so the excess of drinking 
 weakeneth also the body, endangereth the soul, 
 draweth on many diseases, &c. Yea, many go so far 
 that they even quaff up their death with it. As it is 
 reported that Alexander, proposing a reward to him 
 that could drink most,* there were twenty-one pre- 
 sently killed thereby, and he which got the victory 
 died within three days after. And although I have 
 less cause to fear this vice in Christian men, much less 
 in Englishmen, least of all in Oxford, yet the great 
 plenty of wine sellers lately increased causeth me to 
 dread, lest by degrees we come unto it. Wherefore 
 let us consider in this metaphor of drinking and 
 swallowing up, that not only the great afflictions of 
 this present life are signified, but also the dreadful 
 and endless torments of the life to come. Which 
 yet is not so meant, as though the very drinking were 
 condemned. For wine was created of God to cheer 
 the heart of man ; not of the evil man alone, but of 
 the good likewise, as God hath ' made his sun to 
 shine not only on the good but on the bad also.' And 
 although in the law, the high priest were forbid to 
 drink wine when he entered into the tabernacle of the 
 congregation, that he might ' put a difference between 
 the holy and the unholy, the clean and the unclean,' 
 &c., Lev. X. 9, yet in the New Testament, where 
 the ceremonies being abolished, the things only re- 
 main, hereby sobriety and temperance is commanded 
 us. Wherefore Paul counselled Timothy to refrain 
 from drinking water, and to ' use a httle wine for his 
 stomach,' 1 Tim. v. 23 ; wherefore the moderate 
 use of wine is lawful, but to use it immoderately 
 bringeth drunkenness. Wherefore Paul willeth us 'not 
 to bo drunk with wine, wherein is excess,' Eph. 
 v. 18. The word which the apostle there useth is 
 more forcible, expressing the desperate estate of 
 drunkenness, whom safety itself can scarce save. For 
 by it we arc not | only) brought to most unseemly deeds, 
 as that of Nonh, and wicked as that of Lot, but more 
 * V.Je riutarcli in vita Alex. ITag. 
 382 
 
Ver. 15, 16.] 
 
 SERMON Vril. 
 
 grievous also, if thc_y may be, which the wise man most 
 lively hath expressed : Prov. sxiii. 19, 'To whom is woe '? 
 to wiiom is sorrow ? to whom is strife ? to whom is mur- 
 muring? to whom are wounds without cause '? and to 
 whom is the redness of the eyes ? Even to them that 
 tarry long at the wine, to them that go and seek mixed 
 wine. Look not thou upon the wine when it is red, 
 and when it sheweth his colour in the cup, or goeth 
 down pleasantl}'. In the end thereof it will bite like 
 a serpent, and hurt like a cockatrice. Thine eyes 
 shall look upon strange women, and thine heart shall 
 speak lewd things. And thou shalt be as one that 
 sleepeth in the midst of the sea, and as he that 
 slcepeth in the top of the mast. They have stricken 
 me, shalt thou say, but I was not sick ; they have 
 beaten me, but I knew not when I awoke : therefore 
 will I seek it yet still.' How excellently describeth he 
 the evils and inconveniences that proceed from this 
 intemperancy, the woes, sorrows, contentions, wounds, 
 sores, not only of the body, but also of the soul ! To 
 what filthiness and grievous offences it prepareth us, 
 how dangerous and perilous, whose biting is like that 
 of a serpent and cockatrice, the senselessness of sin 
 or punishment, with the endurance and continuing 
 with hardness of heart in the like wickedness. Which 
 yet were all the less if they were only temporal, but 
 they are also eternal ; the woe is continual, and end- 
 less. 'Woe to them,' saith the prophet, Isa. v. 22, 24, 
 ' that are mighty to drink wine, and to them that are 
 strong to pour in strong drink !' The prophet in 
 the words following describeth the woe : ' As the flame 
 of fire consumeth the stubble, and as the chafi' is con- 
 sumed of the flame, so their root shall be as rottenness, 
 and their bud shall rise up as dust.' Let us, there- 
 fore, hence learn that our prophet, by the metaphor of 
 drinking representing the endless and unspeakable 
 troubles of the wicked, commendeth unto us sobriety 
 and modesty in the use of God's creatures, lest that 
 we draw upon us plagues spiritual and temporal, cor- 
 poral and eternal. 
 
 Now, leaving the words, let us consider the things 
 themselves. It is said here that the Jews themselves 
 should drink, to signify that all the godly must suffer 
 tribulation ; all must drink, but in some measure. 
 Which thing also our Saviour taught his disciples, 
 and that also by this similitude, Mark x. 39, ' Ye 
 shall drink of the cup that I shall drink, and be bap- 
 tized with the baptism that I am baptized with ;' 
 whereby he signifieth that they should be partakers of 
 afflictions with him. The diflerence betwixt the suffer- 
 ings of Christ and Christians is this, that his were so 
 infinitely great, that'ours compared to his are nothing; 
 and yet so great they are, that, although not for the 
 same cause, yel are we ready to say, ' Father, if it be 
 possible, let this cup pass,' Mat. xxvi. 89. But it is 
 not possible ; for as ' it behoved him first to suffer, 
 and then to enter into his glory,' so must we 'through 
 many tribulations enter into the kingdom of heaven.' 
 383 
 
 What prince more godly than Josiah ? what pro- 
 phet than Jeremiah ? yet were they not freed from 
 aiflictions. Yea, so was Jeremiah therewithal hum- 
 bled, that he crieth out for the bitterness thereof : 
 ' Woe is me, my mother, that thou hast borne me a 
 man of strife, and with whom this whole land con- 
 tendeth. I have not lent on usury, nor have men 
 lent me, yet every one doth curse me,' Jer. xv. 10. 
 These are blessed times, and like to those of Josiah ; 
 yet assure thyself that there is a measure of affliction 
 for thee to abide. Even they that lived under Josiah 
 were to go into captivity for a season. But even in 
 Babylon the Lord promiseth comfort and peace unto 
 them, and after seventy years return to their own 
 land. Now these things were spoken also for us, that 
 we might have comfort and sure hope that there shall 
 be an end of our tribulations. 
 
 It is written of Xerxes" that when ho beheld from 
 the top of a high mountain his great and mighty host, 
 how he wept in recordation of their mortality, for that 
 of a huge number, within the compass of a few years 
 there should not be one left alive. We may behold in 
 spirit a great army of Christian soldiers throughout 
 all Christendom, whom when you remember, you do, 
 I hope — myself know that I rejoice — to remember 
 that within these few years they shall all be delivered 
 from Babylon, that is, from all adversity and misery 
 of this present life, and be brought to that heavenly 
 Jerusalem where we shall rest in all joy and safety. 
 
 It is when you shall have drunk. The godly, then, 
 as we have said, must needs drink, and that more is, 
 they must drink before the heathen. For 'judgment 
 must begin at the house of ^God,' as Peter teacheth ; 
 after that the Lord hath punished his people, then 
 will he visit the f)roud heart of the king of Babel. 
 When Jerusalem must be destroyed, it must begin at 
 the sanctuary, Ezek. ix. 6. See how the apostles in 
 the Acts are first persecuted and aiHicted, whenas yet 
 the bitter potion was not given to the Jews,t namely, 
 the sacking of Jerusalem and destruction of the 
 people ; such is the lot of God's servants, not only to 
 be afflicted, but also first and foremost ; but hereunto 
 is annexed a great comfort, that they shall drink but 
 for a while, not continually ; that they shall not 
 swallow up, but driiik. Both which the apostle hath 
 declared : ' Our light afiliction, which is but for a mo- 
 ment,' 2 Cor. iv. 17 ; and in another place, 1 Cor. 
 X. 13, ' There hath no temptation taken you but such 
 as appertaineth to man ; and God is faithful, which 
 will not suffer you to [be] tempted above that you be 
 able, but will even give the issue with the temptation, 
 that ye may be able to bear it.' 
 
 On the other side, the punishment of the ungodly 
 is continual, as is here declared, for it is saiil they 
 shall ' drink continually, and swallow up, and be as 
 though they had not been.' ' In the hand of the 
 
 * Hcrodot, lib. viii. 
 
 t Vid. Sever, lib. ii. et Glye. annal. part iii. H gisip. lib. y. 
 
36 
 
 RAIXOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Vkr. 17,18. 
 
 Lord,' saith the prophet, Vs. Ixxv. 9, ' is a cup, the 
 wine is troubled, and the wicked shall drink the 
 dregs thereof, and suck them out.' The godly must 
 drink of this cup, but they must drink the upper part ; 
 the ungodly they must swallow down the dregs and 
 lees of°it. These dregs are the torments everlasting, 
 and endless punishments, ordained for Satan and his 
 aucels in hell, ' where the worm dieth not, and the 
 fire is not quenched.' ' On the wicked,' as it is in 
 the psalm, ' will the Lord rain snares and brimstone, 
 storm and tempest ; this shall be the portion of their 
 cup,' Ps. xxxi. G. They shall be ' as though they had 
 not been,' for their temporal punishment ; they shall 
 be worse than if they had not been, as was said of 
 Judah. 
 
 Here, then, is a lesson for all ungodly persons, 
 papists, infidels, murderers, whoremongers, &c., and 
 all such as receive not the truth, but have pleasure 
 in ungodliness ; nnmely, that unless they return from 
 their "wicked ways, they shall have their portion in 
 
 this cup, and swallow the dregs of God's heavy wrath 
 and destruction. In the Revelation, chap. xiv. 9-11, 
 it is said, that ' all which receive the mark of the beast 
 shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, yea, of the 
 pure wine, which is poured into the cup of his wrath,' 
 and shall be ' tormented in fire an I brimstone before 
 the face of the Lamb,' &c. AVherefore, let us learn 
 this for our instruction and comfort, that we follow 
 not the wicked to sin, for fear of their plagues, but 
 continue in the obedience of the Lord, that we may 
 be sure of that stay and comfort which is here pro- 
 mised to the faithful. Howbeit if there were no more 
 comfort but this, that our enemies should be punished 
 more than we, it were not enough to countervail the 
 heaviness of the cross, which, in the mean while, the 
 godly must bear. The prophet goeth farther, and 
 raiseth us up higher in strong consolation, setting be- 
 fore our eyes the infinite joys which the godly shall 
 enjoy, when, being delivered from all afthctions, they 
 shall triumph over their enemies. 
 
 SEEMON IX. 
 
 But upon mount Sion shall be deliverance, and it shall he holy ; and the home of Jacoh shaU possess their posses- 
 sions. And the house of Jacob shall he a fire, and the house of Joseph a jlame, and the liouse of Ksaii stubble, 
 and then shall kindle in them, and devour them ; and there shall be no remnant of the house of Esau : for the 
 Lord hath spoken it. — Obadiah, Ver. 17, 18. 
 
 THE first sense and meaning of these words is, that 
 the Jews, which should be carried captive to 
 Babylon, should return again to their own land, and 
 destroy the Idumeans. By mount Sio)i, the fortress 
 of Jerusalem, the beauty of Jewry, is meant all the 
 land of Judea, and thereby all the people. By these 
 words, then, Iha upon mount Sion, &c., the prophet 
 meant, that the Jews should be dchvered out of cap- 
 tivity, cleansed from their sins, become holy and right- 
 eous, ' repossess their possessions,' and by adding 
 that ' the house of Jacob should be a fire, &c., and 
 Esau stubble, that they should be kindled and burn, 
 and be consumed till none were left alive,' and that 
 the Jews with the Israelites should destroy the Idu- 
 means, even as the flame and fire consumeth the 
 stubble till none be left, which the prophet sealeth 
 with this infallible mark, ' The Lord hath spoken it.' 
 As it hath been said before, that the temporal 
 things in the Old Testament are figures unto us of 
 things spiritual, so is there in these words another 
 further moaning than that which I have opened, 
 namely, that the church of God shall at length bo de- 
 livered from bondage, and cleansed from sin, endued 
 with holiness, and so recover that everlasting inherit- 
 ance, which they were deprived of, and that they shall 
 adjudge the wicked and ungodly, all their enemies, 
 unto eternal fire, whereby they shall all be consumed. 
 And in this sense is that lively doctrine fully verified, 
 which in the other is not so fully, wherein, as in a 
 
 picture slenderly shadowing the lineaments, some part 
 only is obscurely expressed. For although the Jews, 
 after their return, conquered the Edomites,* yet were 
 they not consumed as that none of them remained. 
 For Josephus writcth,f that some lived even at the 
 sacking of Jerusalem, to kindle and set on fire the 
 Jews. Wherefore, the especial meaning of this place 
 is, that the church of God shall be delivered from the 
 captivity whei'ein it is held, endued with holiness, in- 
 herit heaven, whence they were exiled, their inherit- 
 ance, and consume [their enemies] till none of them 
 be left, because the Lord hath said it. 
 
 The church of God, therefore, that is, all the godly, 
 shall be delivered ; the enemies from whom, their 
 sins, the chains and bands, from which they shall be 
 loosed, are the pains and torments due unto sin. 
 These cords are loosed, when we believe and embrace 
 the gospel, wherein Christ Jesus is preached unto us, 
 who savcth us from our sins, and from the consequents 
 of our sins ; and as they who were carried away cap- 
 tives returned to their possessions, who wore con- 
 tent to receive the proclamation of Cyrus, so all such 
 as, upon the proclamation of Christ's gospel, receive 
 and embrace the same, are more sure to be delivered. 
 This deliverance is to return back from 15.il)ylon to 
 Jerusalem ; that is, from the captivity and slavery of 
 this world, to the kingdom of heaven. 
 
 In those which arc thus to be delivered, tliere is 
 * 1 Mach. v. 3. t Lil) iv. cap. ult. 
 
 384 
 
Ver. 17,18.] 
 
 SERMON IX. 
 
 37 
 
 required holiness of life. For so also it is said in the 
 Gospel, that we are ' delivered from our sins to serve 
 God in holiness,' &c. ; and it shall bo well, Siiith the 
 prophet, but to whom ? To the just and holy, not the 
 wicked and profane; to such as are careful to perform 
 their duty towards God and man ; to such as sanctify 
 the Lord in their soul and body. There is ' a book 
 of remembranca written before the Lord,' Mai. iii. 16, 
 but it is for them ' that feared him, and thought upon 
 the Lord ;' there is life for them that seek immortility 
 and glory, &c. Let us then assure ourselves, that if 
 we mean to attain deliverance, and the fruit thereof, 
 the repossessing of our inheritau e, we must bo holy 
 and just, ere we be ' delivered from the hands,' &c. 
 For although it may be that some of them were not 
 holy at such time as they were dispossessed, yet needs 
 must they be holy before they can possess them again. 
 ' Such were some of you,' saith Paul, ' but 3'e are 
 washed.' Let this, then, be especiaJiy noted of us, 
 that none can receive the crown but such as fight,' 
 1 Cor. vi. 9-11. The possessions are the kingdom 
 of heaven, which we possess by inheritance. No 
 Canaanite or polluted person can enter into the Lord's 
 inheritance, into the kingdom of heaven. And as the 
 godl}' are delivered, so there is another benefit pro- 
 mised them, namely, that for their sakes the wicked 
 shall be consumed ; for it is said, ' The house of 
 Jacob shall be fire.' Where first we may note, the 
 emphatical speech, when he saith, ' The house of 
 Jacob shall be a fire,' when he meanoth that it shall 
 be like, the name of the thing, as it is usual, being put 
 for that which is resembled to it. 
 
 Which, indeed, were not worthy the noting, but for 
 the fanatical imagination of transubstantiation, which 
 they will needs prove; for that it is said, ' This is my 
 body,' whence they conclude that therefore it is his 
 body indeed. But so might we hence also gather that 
 the house of Jacob was fire indeed, &c. For all 
 mystical speeches be not like to that of our Saviour ; 
 yet this is common to them, that the names of the 
 signs are given to the thing signified, and so Christ is 
 called a vine, his Father a husbandman, his disciples 
 branches ;''' and if the papists had had any occasion to 
 maintain any error on this place of the prophet, as tbey 
 have upon that of our Saviour, they might hence with 
 greater show have gathered that Edom was transub- 
 stantiated into stubble ; for that it is in the Hebrew that 
 Edom shall not only be stubble, but into stubble. For 
 their own schoolmen confess that those words of Christ 
 do not prove that the bread becometh Christ his body. 
 * Vid. August, ep. xxiii. ad Bonifac. 
 
 It is said that the godly shall, consume them, &o. ; 
 which is also meant when it is said that Christ shall 
 receive his chosen to judge the world, which is not 
 only meant of the apostles, but of all the saints. As 
 St Paul saith, ' Know ye not that the saints shall 
 judge the angels,' the wicked angels ? God indeed is 
 he who judgeth, but because he worketh it for his 
 chosen's sake, they are said to do it. As it is said, 
 that ' whatsoever is done to one of the little ones, is 
 done to him ;' and ' whosoever receiveth the apostles 
 receiveth him,' because this is done for his sake ; so 
 that it is attributed to the godly which God doth for 
 their cause. As it is in the commandment, ' Honour 
 thy father, &c., that thy days may be long,' the words 
 are, 'that they may prolong thy days;' that is, thy 
 parents, not as though they could do it, but for that 
 the parents pray to God for the prosperity of their 
 obedient children, which they therefore are said to 
 work, because God for their sake doth it. In the 
 sixteenth of Luke, we are commanded to ' make us 
 friends of the unrighteous mammon,' that when we 
 have need, ' theij may receive us into their habita- 
 tions ;' not as it the poor and needy, whom we help, 
 should do it, but for that God for their sakes doth it. 
 Even so is it here said that the people of God should 
 consume their enemies, because God would do it for 
 their sakes, which is gathered by the apostle, Heb. 
 xii. 29, that ' our God is a consuming fire.' 
 
 The List point, which is the seal of all, is this : ' The 
 Lord hath spoken it.' This is the only anchor-hold, 
 indeed, in all tempests. For if we would lean 
 on the words of man, let us remember they are 
 liars. Flesh and blood is not sufficient to assure and 
 strengthen us ; but only the word of the Lord, who 
 perl'ormeth all that he saith, who is ' not as man to 
 lie, nor as mortal man that he should repent. Shall 
 he sptak and not perform '?' Num. xxiii. 19. For so 
 certainly as he cannot deny himself, so certainly will 
 he perform what he saith. Which his name TVhV that 
 he here useth confirmeth us. As he saith to Moses, 
 I have appeared to them not in my name "'TV 7^i, 
 but in my name Jehovah, which is he that maketh 
 his promises to be ; and so would he then be called, 
 for that he would then make good the things which 
 he had before promised. In like manner, let us 
 remember that he hath appeared unto us in his 
 name Almii/hty, in the works of his creation and re- 
 generation, but in his good time he will appear to us 
 in his name Jehovah, and most certainly perform all 
 his promises. 
 
 SERMON X. 
 
 And Ihctj shall possess the south with the mount of Ksau ; ami llie plain willi the Pliilistines : and they shall pos- 
 sess the fields of Ejiliraim, with the fields of Samaria, ivith Benjamin and Gilead. And this liost carried 
 into ciiptivilt/ of the children oj Israel, shall possess tliat iihich was the Canaanites' unto Zarejihath, and they 
 385 B b 
 
38 
 
 RAIXOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
 [Ver. 19-2]. 
 
 of Jerusalem tliat ircre carried into capllntij shall possess that which is in Sepharad, ivilh the cities of the 
 south. And saviours shall come up to mount Sion to judr/e the mount of Esau ; and the Idmjdom shall be 
 the Lord's. — Obadiah, Ver. 19-21. 
 
 OF these three verses the two former are diversely 
 translated and expounded, by reason of the 
 diverse significations of the words. And the diificulty 
 seemeth to be such in my eyes that I dare not take on 
 me particularly to avouch the meaninp; of the prophet 
 in each word, but submitting myself to yom' judg- 
 ments, and to any that shall yield reason of any other 
 exposition, I will impart unto you that which in my 
 opinion seemeth most likely. Which is that which 
 agreeth wilh the circumstances of the text, and gene- 
 ral drift of the prophet ; which is evident by that 
 which hath been set down already, and that which is 
 afterwards added in the last verse. So that we shall 
 not greatly err, if in this or that particular word we 
 hit not on the particular meaning of the prophet, so 
 long as we keep the general doctrine without en'or. 
 
 It hath been said before that the seed of Jacob 
 should possess their ancient inheritance, and destroy 
 their enemies. These points are here again handled, 
 but so that it is promised they should not only repos- 
 sess their ancient right, but also much more, by ex- 
 tending the bounds and limits of their possessions 
 every way. 
 
 The land of promise is so situated that it hath on 
 the south the land of the Idumeans, called here the 
 mount of Esau ; on the west a low plain, which was 
 the country of the Philistines ; on the north lay 
 Ephraim and Samaria, and on the east Gilead, &c. ; 
 as Joshua, the best geographer, hath taught us, 
 chap. xiii. The meaning is, then, that look how far 
 the borders of their dominions in former times ex- 
 tended, so much should they repossess, yea, that they 
 should stretch out farther on every side and possess 
 much more. Samaria is here mentioned, with certain 
 shires, as it were, on the north, because of the diffi- 
 culty which seemed to be in winning them, for that 
 the king of Assyria having taken Samaria and led 
 away the people captive, had peopled that city and 
 the country about with many strangers. And for 
 the like cause it may seem that Benjamin is hero 
 named, for that, being little and seated among many 
 enemies, they were in greatest danger to be dispos- 
 sessed, kc, had they not received this promise, that 
 even their borders by the seed of Jacob should be 
 inhabited. Now whereas they were divided into two 
 peoples, Israel and Judah, the Israelites were carried 
 away captives by Shalmanezer, and Judahby Nebuchad- 
 nezzar ; wherefore in the words following, the promise 
 is made unto both, laying down the borders of both 
 the kingdoms, &c. This being laid down, followoth 
 the other point, of the destruction of the enemies ; 
 ' saviours shall come up to mount Sion to judge the 
 mount of Esau,' where, by the name of sariour, the 
 rulers and governors are meant ; for to judge is to 
 
 rule and execute judgment in right of the oppressed, 
 as it is generally used in the book of Judi/cs. And 
 this they shall do by coming up to Sion, the strongest 
 fort in Jewry. Finally ' the kingdom,' it is said, 
 ' shall be the Lord's ; ' to note the happy state of the 
 faithful, having such a one for the governor, so mighty 
 and therefore able, so merciful and therefore willing, 
 to keep them safe from all evil, and to participate with 
 them all good things. 
 
 The performance of all this was in part represented 
 by the bodily restitution of Judah and Benjamin, 
 when by proclamation of Cyrus, Zerubbabel, Joshua, 
 &c., came and built Jerusalem, and continued by 
 Judas Maccabeus who judged the Edomites ; and so 
 are these called saviours, where notwithstanding God 
 doth this by them his lieutenants, as he also said to 
 Samuel, ' 'They have not refused thee, but me.' But 
 this fully performed and perfected in the deliverance 
 of our souls by Christ, who himself preached to the 
 lost sheep of the house of Israel, and then by his 
 apostles, sent from mount Sion into all the world, and 
 so were Idumea and Palcstina, &c., subjected, when 
 all were joined to make one flock. As also the king- 
 dom is Christ's, ' King of all kings and Lord of all 
 lords,' of whom the augcl said that he should reign 
 for ever. And out of controversy the prophet meant 
 not so much the former bodily as the latter spiritual 
 deliverance and restitution, even as the event plainly 
 showed. For although that the men of Judah returned 
 under Nehemiah, &c., yet the people'of Israel were 
 never so restored. So that assuredly we are to think 
 that by corporal benefits spiritual blessings are signi- 
 fied ; by the Jews and the Israelites, the spiritual 
 seed of Abraham; by repossession of Canaan, the 
 possession of the graces of the Holy Ghost : a mys- 
 tery touched before, and to be had in remembrance 
 for the better understanding of IMoses and the prophets ; 
 for it pleased God by lively figures to foster the ex- 
 pectation which his people had of Christ. Joseph 
 and Samson, the one a Nazaritc of his brethren, the 
 other for his brethren, figures of Christ who should 
 come out of Nazareth, as the evangelists shew ; sold 
 by his brethren, as Joseph ; slain for their salvation, 
 as Samson. Blood on the posts — the angel must not 
 touch those that are marked with Christ's blood. 
 The high priest with all his ornaments, figures of his 
 redemption, as the apostle to the Hebrews sheweth. 
 Serpent exalted — Christ raised on the cross. The 
 stiug of the serpent, and dragon in the Revelations, 
 shall not hurt us, looking on him that savcth us from 
 all our sins ; for as Moses brought the Israelites to 
 the border of Canaan and sight of it, but none except 
 Joshua could bring them into possession of it, so the 
 law may shew us the blessings and promises of God, 
 
 386 
 
Yer. 19-21.J 
 
 SERMON X. 
 
 39 
 
 Ijiit Christ by his gospel maketh us enjoy them. So 
 David's 'stone refused.' Jonah in the belly of the 
 whale, and his toi'ments — Christ's death and resur- 
 rection. And even so these things here handled, are 
 by the apostles expounded of Israel and Judah accor- 
 ding to the faith; that place of Isaiah ix., Zebulon 
 and Naphtali, Mat. iv., when the light of the truth 
 shone amongst them ; that which is in the last of 
 Amos, James v.. Acts, ix., applied not only to Israel 
 according to the flesh, but according to the spirit also ; 
 in the place where it was said, 'Yc are my people,' 
 fulfilled in Christians, when they are called the sons 
 of God. As James, Paul, Matthew, expounded those, 
 so we these ; namely, that both the Jews and Gen- 
 tiles chosen to be the people of God shall repossess 
 that which was signified by the land of Canaan, of 
 which we were deprived by our own sins. Which 
 opinion is diligently to be marked against the frantic 
 dreams of Jewish rabbins, who dreaming their men 
 that now live to be they who should be thus set in 
 possession, do not expound that which here is said of 
 such as were led captive, of them that Shalmanezer and 
 Nebuchadnezzar led away, but of those that Titus in 
 the destruction of Jerusalem made captives.* And 
 because they saw themselves since dispersed through 
 diverse parts of the empire, by Canaan they say is 
 here understood Germany, by Zarephath France, and 
 by Sepharad Spain ! And so when it is said they 
 should possess the south side and the plain, they say 
 is meant that they shall not have the hills, which are 
 not for tilling, but the plain and bottoms of the hills. 
 Against which peevish exposition we need not say 
 much, only we may note that it cannot stand with the 
 circumstances of the text. For when it is said ' this 
 host,' it is evident that he spoke of his own time ; that 
 is, of such as presently wei-e here carried into cap- 
 tivitj-. 2. Zarephath is elsewhere in Scripture, 1 Kings 
 xvii.. Gen. x., set down for the border of [Zidon]. As 
 for that which thej' allege out of a tradition, that with 
 them the names signify these countries, so deserve they 
 to be blinded that believe such dreams ; for they say, 
 that when Joshua expelled the Canaanites, manj' of 
 them fled into Germany ; whereas, in the 1st, 2d, 3d 
 of Judges, it is said of such as were not slain, that 
 they remained in this and that tribe. 3. Where 
 here the prophet speaketh of Judah and Jerusalem, 
 as of two distinct parts, it is manifest that Titus only 
 led away them of Jerusalem, for the Israelites, after 
 their captivity b}' Shalmanezer, were never restored. 
 4. AVhero they add, that Sepharad being a proper 
 name, cometh near to the name wherewith they call 
 Spain, it is plain, that although the Chaldee para- 
 phrast expoundeth it as a proper name, yet it is not 
 the name of Spain, and it might be the name of some 
 place then known that now is not. But the Hebrew 
 word may be taken for a common name, signifying as 
 
 * Vide Joseph, et Sever., lib. ii. ; et Glyc. aiinal., part 
 iii. ; et Ilcgesip., lib v. ; Cyril, in Isa. lib. i., oral. i. ii. iii. iv. 
 387 
 
 much as a bound or limit of dominion ; being made of 
 two words which have that signification. But these 
 be like the dreams of their ancestors, of the sitting at 
 the right and left hand in the kingdom, and of the 
 Chiliasts and Mahomet, whose bliss they say shall 
 be to pamper up their bellies, &c. But the prophet 
 meant spiritual blessings,* the joy of the faithful in 
 the service of God and glory of the saints, which was 
 begun by Christ at his first coming, is continued by 
 bis servants till his latter coming, which shall be then 
 perfected. John saw sealed not only of the twelve 
 tribes, but of all tongues. Rev. vii. ; a point to rejoice 
 in, as 13th Acts, ' The Gentiles wore glad, and glori- 
 fied the word of the Lord,' ver. 48. By this means 
 the true Israelites are admitted to partake of the 
 twelve tribes, and of those trees that grow on both 
 sides the river. Rev. sxii. 2. 
 
 The means by which all this shall be accomplished 
 is lastly set down by ' saviours coming up to Sion.' 
 This, in figure, was performed when Zerubbabel with 
 the rest came upvfrom Babylon to build Jerusalem ; 
 these, which restored that city and timple, are called 
 saviours, as in truth such as restore us to our ancient 
 inheritance, &c. Properly, indeed, none but God can 
 be called a Saviour, as in Isaiah and Hosea, ' I, even 
 I, and there is no Saviour besides me ;' but he 
 is so called as a principal agent, men as ministerial 
 instraments. So the name of Jesus proper to our 
 Saviour, because he should save hispeople ; otherwise 
 Paul exhorteth Timothy, 'For so shalt thou save thy- 
 self and them that hear thee ;' so all the ministers of 
 the gospel, yea, all Christians after a sort, are called 
 saviours : as James v., ' If any err from the truth, 
 and another convert him ; let the same know that he 
 shall save a soul from death, and cover a multitude of 
 sins.' Which is understood of every one, that by ad- 
 monishing another keepcth him or withdraweth him 
 from sin. ' Some save with fear, pulling them out the 
 fire,' Jude ; which is the duty of every Chris! ian man ; 
 for that is a question worthy of Cain, 'Am I the keeper 
 of my brother ?' There should be such a care in us 
 towards our brethren as was in Joseph, who not only 
 dealt with bis father for them, but counselled them 
 not to fall out by the way. Would to God we had 
 many Josephs and few Cains, who, when they have 
 murdered their brethren, demand whether they are 
 their keepers. Now, if this bo required of all, how 
 much more of ministers, into whoso mouth the word 
 of salvation is put ? For which cause Timothy is 
 expressly warned to 'continue in exhortation,' &c., 
 for so he should ' save himself and his hearers, 1 Tim. 
 iv. 16 ; if he do not exhort, &c., and continue therein, 
 he is no saviour, but a destroyer. The condition of 
 his own salvation is this. If thou do thus, thou shalt 
 save thyself, else not. Let them, then, which are in 
 
 * Vid. Just. dial, cum Trypbon. Hieron. lib. xviii. in 
 Isa. in pref. Et de Scriptor. Eccles. Subverbo, Papias. Trateol. 
 de liferet. lib. ix. 
 
40 
 
 EAINOLDS ON OBADIAII. 
 
 [Ver. 19-21. 
 
 hat place wliieh Timothy was in, consider to what 
 they ai-e called, even to teach and exhort, and that 
 not only all in general, but every particular wicked 
 man. As God giveth in commandment to his pro- 
 phet, ' If thou tell the wicked man — if not, his blood 
 shall be required at thy hand.' What then shall be- 
 come of such watchmen, as either cannot or do not 
 warn ; of the unlearned, that can only read and not 
 teach ; of ' dumb dogs, that cannot bark ; non-resi- 
 dents, who teach not at all, and though they preach 
 their quarter sermons, yet are not such as perform 
 the commandment of Paul, to continue ? But such 
 shepherds shall have their portion with goats, and not 
 with the sheep ; both the blind and the blind guide 
 shall fall into the ditch. 
 
 They also who are to be taught are here to learn 
 their duty ; for if none can be saved but such as 
 call upon the name of the Lord, and none can call on 
 him that believe not, and none can believe unless 
 they hear, it is evident, that if we will be saved wo 
 must hear. 2 Kings iv., the Shunamite telleth her 
 husband that she would go to the man of God ; he 
 asketh her what she wiU do, seeing it was neither the 
 Sabbath nor new moon ; whereby we gather that it 
 was the use of this good woman, at such time, to re- 
 sort to Carmel, where the prophets did then use to 
 instract the people in faith and religion. There be 
 few women amongst us like this Shunamite. She went 
 certain miles ; these will not walk a few paces to hear 
 the same doctrine which she learned. As for the men 
 of this city, neither will they take the pains to come. 
 I would they did provide that the man of God might 
 come to them ; or that there were in them that love 
 
 to God's ministers which was in this woman, 2 Kings 
 iv. 10, who provided for Elisha a chamber, a bed, &c., 
 ' that when he came that way, he might come in and 
 abide there.' It was said that this matter was in good 
 forwardness, but is hindered ; if so be it, I must 
 say as Paul, Gal. ii. 1, 3, '0 .ye foolish Galatians, 
 who hath bewitched you, that having begun in the 
 Spirit, you would now be made perfect by the flesh ?' 
 Made you such account of your hogs. Mat. viii. 84, 
 that for them you request Christ to ' depart from 
 your coasts' '? 
 
 We should here speak of the second effect of God's 
 word, whereby it is a ' savour of death in them that 
 perish,' when it is said, ' they shall judge Esau ;' but 
 of this hath been spoken heretofore. It remaincth 
 then to say somewhat of this last point, which is of 
 God's kingdom, whereof I need not speak, because we 
 are taught daily in our petition to say, ' Thy kingdom 
 come.' Only consider what a happiness it is to be of 
 that kingdom. If the queen of Sheba thought Solo- 
 mon's servants happy, that had him to rule them, how 
 much more they which have a gi-eater than Solomon, 
 Christ Jesus, the Lord of lords, and King of kings ! 
 AVherefore we are willingly to submit om'selves to 
 his commandments. God forbid any of us should 
 say, ' Why should this man reign over us ?' No 
 greater felicity than to be under his gracious, peace- 
 able, and righteous government. For if we feel some 
 taste of comfort in the government of Queen Eliza- 
 beth, what and how great shall we enjoy under him '? 
 Which the Lord in goodness make us partakers of. 
 Amen. 
 
 END OF RAINOLDS ON OBADIAH. 
 
EAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
THE 
 
 PROPHECY OF HAGGAI 
 
 INTERPRETED AND APPLIED. 
 
 IN SUNDRY SERMONS. 
 
 BY THAT FAMOUS AND JUDICIOUS DIVINE, 
 
 y 
 
 JOHN RAINOLDS, D.D. 
 
 EDINBURGH: JAMES NICHOL. 
 LONDON : JAMES NISBET AND CO. DUBLIN : G. HERBERT. 
 
 M.DCCC.LXIV. 
 
TO THE CHRISTIAN READER. 
 
 READER, I shall premise a few words concerning; 
 both the author and work. For the author of 
 it, it was Doctor John Rainolds, a man emiuent both 
 for learning and piet}^ No man, methinks (saith 
 one*), is happy on earth to him that hath grace for 
 substance, and learning for ornament. This verse is 
 wi'itten about Dr Rainolds his picture : Inccrtum est 
 fiu'iit doclior an mdlor. It is doubtful whether he 
 were more learned or pious. When Bellarmine came 
 out first, both the universities chose one in each 
 academy to confute him. Oxford (for I must ever 
 give that the pre-eminence) chose Doctor Rainolds 
 for their champion ; Cambridge, Doctor ^^^litaker for 
 theirs. Whitaker was more nimble, for he went over 
 a gi'eat part of Bellarmine' s controversies, and so 
 solidly confuted him, that it is credibly related by 
 some Englishmen that travelled into Italy, that Bellar- 
 mine himself procured his pictm'e out of England, and 
 placed it in his study, secretly admiring him for his 
 great learning ; and when he was asked by another 
 Jesuit, his friend and companion, why he would have 
 the picture of that heretic, he was wont to answer, 
 that although he was an heretic and an adversar}', j'et 
 he was a learned adversary. Whitaker, that honour 
 of our schools, and angel of om- church, learned Whi- 
 taker, than whom our age saw nothing more memor- 
 able, f what clearness of judgment ! what sweetness 
 of style ! what gravity of person ! what grace of carriage 
 was in that man ! Who ever saw him without rever- 
 ence, or heard him without wonder ? Doctor Rainolds 
 (whom a very reverend divine compares to a pen too full 
 of ink) thought at the first, that in two or three years 
 he should have been able to have gone over all Bellar- 
 mine's controversies, but he was seven years about the 
 very first of them, De Libris Apocrypliis, which yet he 
 finished not neither, insomuch that one Mr Walter 
 Travers jested with him, and told him, he was so 
 long in reading the Apociypha here, that he would 
 read the canonicals in heaven ! Yet his conference 
 with Hart, and that work together, do amply discover 
 his great abilities ; and he is justly styled by one of 
 * Dr Hall, Decade First, Epist. vii. t i>r Hall, ibid. 
 393 
 
 onr own wi-iters,* ponlificioriim malleu.f, ct patria 
 sine duJcissimiiiit decus, the hammer of the papists, and 
 most sweet ornament of his own country. Doctor 
 Rainolds alone was a well fm-uished library, full of 
 all faculties, of all studies, of all learning: the memory, 
 the reading of this man were near to a miracle. f For 
 this work of his, it was reviewed and perfected by that 
 reverend divine Master William Hinde, sometimes 
 preacher of God's word at Bunbury, in Cheshire, whose 
 intention was to have printed it in his lifetime, he 
 having set forth some other of the same author's 
 works, as that on Obadiah, these sermons immediately 
 following thereupon, to be handlcil in the Doctor's 
 ordinary com'se of preaching, as appears in the first 
 page of these sermons. This copy therefore being left 
 with me (by Master Nathaniel Hinde, a minister in 
 Stafi'ordshiro, and sou to the foremeutioned Master 
 William Hinde), with a desire also of the publication 
 of it, I thought good to preface thus much in the be- 
 half both of the author and work. It is (I suppose) 
 the best copy that is extant ; and though he wholly 
 finished not the second chapter of Haggai, yet because 
 the main subject of that book is the building of the 
 temple, it will not seem unseasonable for these times, 
 wherein reformation should be the aim of all ; and in 
 another respect also this work may be suitable to the 
 present season, because this learned and religious 
 author in this hook seems to favour the Presbyterian 
 way. AMiatever it be, I commend it and thee to 
 God's blessing ; and rest, 
 
 Thy hearty wcllwisher, 
 
 Edward Leigh. 
 
 ••■■ Parkerus in prsefat. arl lilj. Je Dcsceyisu Christi ad Inferos. 
 
 t Dr Hall ubi supra. Raiiioldua fuit, tloctrinje et omne 
 genus eru'litionis Gazoi>liylacium dixeris. Scriptores opinor 
 omnes, prophanos ecclesiasticos, sacros, concilia, patres, 
 historias evolverat ; Linguaruni quajcunque theologo, vel 
 adjumento sunt, vel ornamento, callentissinius: Ingenio acer 
 agilisque, judicio gravis et inaturus ; labore raagis quam 
 adamantius, ipse indcfatigabilia ; sic in omni disoiplinarum 
 gcncre vcrsatus, quasi in singulis operam suam omnem 
 posuisset. — Crakanth. Dcfens. Jiccles. Ani/lic. c. Ixix. 
 
AN EXPOSITION UPON HAGGAI. 
 
 SERMON I. 
 
 la the second year of Darim the'kinri, in the sixth month, the Jjrst day of the month, came the nvrd of the Lord 
 by the hand of the jirophet Hayyai unto Zerubhahel the Hon of Shealtiel, a prince of Judah, and to Joshua 
 the son of Josedcch, the hiyh priest, sayiny, Thus hath the Lord of Jiosts charyed me to say, This people say. 
 The time is not yet come, the time that the Lord's house shrdl he huilded. Then came the icord of the Lord 
 by the hand of the prophet llayyai, sayiny, Is it time for yon, sirs, to sit down in your ceiled houses, uhiles 
 this house lies waste? — Haggai I. 1-4. 
 
 YOU have heard, in the conclusion of the prophecy 
 of Obadiah, the promise of deliverance made by 
 God unto the Jews, and in them to all his chosen, that 
 their enemies should be overthrown, and they restored 
 to their ancient inheritance, which should be performed 
 by saviours, which should come up to mount Sion to 
 judge the mount of Esau, and that the kingdom should 
 be the Lord's ; which that you might see how it was in 
 shadow performed to the Jews, and in truth to all the 
 chosen of God, I thought good to entreat of this pro- 
 phecy of Haggai, wherein the same is delivered unto 
 us. In which we are taught, that the temple having 
 been begun to be built long before, and the work in- 
 termitted, was with much ado continued by Zerub- 
 babej and Joshua, who were thereunto moved by the 
 ministry of Haggai, prospered b}' the assistance of 
 the godly, encouraged by God's word and grace of his 
 Spirit, which represcnteth unto us the frame of the 
 spiritual house, Heb. iii. 6, the church which Christ 
 built by his apostles, 1 Cor. xiii. 9, 10, which were 
 Bent from Sion as was prophesied of them : ' The 
 doctrine shall come from Sion,' Isa. ii. 2, Micah iv. 2. 
 Next, if we consider the circumstances of the times, 
 lets, helps, the persons, people, princes, priests, deal- 
 ings, it may be an example unto us, and to such as are 
 to deal any way in the building of the church, how to 
 behave themselves therein. Moreover, by the conse- 
 quence that once more he w'ould ' shako the heavens 
 and the earth, bring the Desire of all nations, and fill 
 that housa with glory,' Haggai ii. G, 7, he compre- 
 hendeth the fulfilling of all his promises made to his 
 church in Chn Jesus. Finally, ho layeth down the 
 everlastingdestrucuo of the heathen, when he sheweth 
 that he will ' destroy tjie throne of kingdoms, and the 
 
 strength of the kingdom of the heathen,' &c., Haggai 
 ii. 22, and set Zerubbabel (that is, Christ, of whom 
 he was a sign) ' as a signet, for I have chosen thee, 
 saith the Lord of hosts,' Haggai ii. 23, whereby was 
 signified the princely estate of the kingdom of the 
 Jews, under the King of kings, and utter ruin of all 
 those that should set themselves against Christ and 
 his church. So the words of the doctrine touched 
 darkly by Obadiah shall be opened more at large in 
 the expounding of this prophet Haggai. 
 
 The prophet, first, by commission from God, re- 
 proveth the people for neglecting the building of the 
 temple, convincing them of sloth, which he doth 
 partly by rebuking the care which they took, every 
 man in the building of his own house, and partly by 
 the chastisements which God had for their sins laid 
 upon them. This, that we may understand the better, 
 we arc to remember out of the 4th of Ezra, verse 1-5, 
 that whereas by the appointment of Cyrus they had 
 laid the foundation of the temple in his days, the 
 building of the temple was hindered by the people of 
 the land, who discouraged the Jews, troubled them in 
 building, and hired accusers to accuse them to the 
 king of Persia, so that in the days of Ahasucrus and 
 Artaxcrxcs they were stayed for going forward, 
 Artaxcrxcs decreeing that they should cease. When 
 Artaxerxes was dead, and Darius reigned in his stead, 
 ver. 21-24, they ceased also from the work, pretend- 
 ing tliat liaving been often forbid before by Cambyses 
 and Darius Histaspes, and not receiving any licence 
 from the new king, they might either be liindered as 
 before, or accused of treason for breaking tlie former 
 king's commandment ; and, lastly, that it was not yet 
 time to do it. The prophet in the first verse noteth 
 
 394 
 
Yer. 1-4.] 
 
 SERMON I. 
 
 diligently the time, the year, the month, nnd day when 
 he received this commission from God. In verse 2 
 he proposeth their fault, which in verse 4 he reproveth, 
 both which are uttered by mentioning the messenger, 
 with the commandment of God in verse 3 ; and in 
 verse 1 the two persons by whom chiefly the work 
 was to be set forward, the times are especially noted, 
 to shew what just cause the Lord had to reprove them, 
 having so long neglected his will, and the just cause 
 of punishing them for their neglect. 
 
 In the reproof we may note five things : jini, the 
 time when this commandment was given to the pro- 
 phet ; second/ 1/, the author thereof, the Lord; thirdhj, 
 the persons by whom the thing was to be done ; 
 foiiiilihj, the fault that was committed by them, they 
 said the time was not yet come; jifthh/, the reproof 
 itself, 'Is it time for you, Sirs'?' Which circum- 
 stances, as they are first to be considered of us, so 
 shall we make our best profit by them, if we compare 
 our church with theirs ; for as the Jews were long in 
 bondage in Babylon, but at length were brought back 
 by Cyrus, 2 Chron. xxxvi. 22, 23, Ezra i. 1, ii. 3, so 
 our ancestors were held long under the bondage of the 
 spiritual slavery of Kome, which is spiritual Babylon, 
 Eev. sviii. 2, 21, whence by the means of Henry VIII., 
 as they by Cyrus, they were delivered. The Jews 
 being restored, laid the foundation of the temple, but 
 were not able to go further, by reason of enemies that 
 procured them displeasure with the kings of Persia. 
 God hath dealt more graciously with us, to whom he 
 hath granted gracious princes to set forward this work, 
 yet notwithstanding are not we so forward as they ; 
 for whereas they had laid the whole foundation in the 
 days of Cyrus, we in many places have not laid that. 
 For what is the foundation that is first to be laid ? 
 The apostle teacheth, even the doctrine of the begin- 
 nings of Christ; as the doctrine of repentance from 
 dead works, and of faith towards God, the doctrine of 
 baptisms, Heb. vi. 1. Now, how far the people are 
 from these things in many places, we may hear of 
 those that speak out of experience ; for sundry there 
 are, who, when they hear tell of these things, wonder 
 at them, as the Athenians did at Paul, Acts xvii. 
 18, 20, and marvel what so strange a doctrine mean- 
 eth ; which is a lamentable thing, considering how mer- 
 cifully God hath dealt with the churches elsewhere. 
 And as it is said by the prophet, ' He hath caused it 
 to rain upon one city, and not to rain upon another,' 
 so two or three cities wandered to one city to drink 
 water, but were not satisfied. The word of God, and 
 doctrine of religion, is in Scripture compared unto 
 rain, Isa. Iv. 10 ; the preaching thereof unto the 
 dropping and falling down thereof, Hcb. vi. 7, 8 ; 
 for which cause the prophets are commanded to drop 
 their words, Ezek. xxi. 2. Some cities amongst us 
 have had this rain to drop upon them, others have 
 not; yea, it hath dropped upon one part of a city and 
 not upon another, yet have they had clouds hanging 
 395 
 
 over them, but clouds without water, Jude, ver. 12; 
 labourers that have seemed to put to their hands, and 
 yet but seemed only; ambassadors without tongues, 
 Isa. 1. 4, without the tongue of the learned ; builders 
 without hands, hands to lay the foundation ; yea, the 
 doctrine of baptism is strange to many that long since 
 have been baptized and hands laid on them, as justly 
 may be feared to no great purpose. 
 
 Many there are, again, which have stayed at the 
 foundation, but have not held ou to build the walls ; 
 they have not been led ou to perfection, and instructed 
 in "the wisdom of Christ. For we are not always to 
 be sucking of milk, we must at length be acquainted 
 with strong meat ; there is the beginning and the per- 
 fect knowfedge also, Heb. v. 12, 13, 14. Wherein 
 again appcareth the fault of many, who, as though they 
 were only appointed as nurses to feed their children 
 with milk, are able to do no more, whereas they should 
 be stewards, fit to dehver a portion to every one of the 
 family, 1 Cor. iv. 1, not only to lay the foundation, but 
 to raise up the walls also. Howbeit, yet God hath 
 dealt more mercifully with some, that the foundation 
 hath not only been laid, but the walls also built, and 
 they raised even to the roof, l)ut that hath wanted ; 
 that is, the doctrine of Christ hath been preached, but 
 there hath wanted assistance of such as, by discipline, 
 should correct the unruly, admonish the faulty, sus- 
 pend the oflenders, excommunicate the stubborn, and 
 absolve the penitent, such as were among the Jews 
 the archisynagogi,* by whom notorious oflenders were 
 excluded from the society of the faithful. Such our 
 Saviour spake of. Mat. xviii. 15-18, when he com- 
 manded that if our brother had aught against us, we 
 should first admonish him privately ; if he would not 
 hearken to us, to take two or three with us, and to tell 
 him his faults ; if he would not hear them, to signify 
 it to the church; if he w-ould not obey them, to hold 
 him as a heathen or publican : such as the apostle 
 appointed in every city that small faults might be by 
 them reproved, gi-ievous oflenders excommunicated, 
 Acts xiv. 23, as the incestuous person was dealt 
 withal by the Corinthians, 1 Cor. v. 6, such as were 
 in the primitive church, as appeareth by the practice 
 thereof.f The necessity and commodity whereof in 
 the church of God, if "it appear not by that which 
 di-s-ines and protestants have taught, by the use of the 
 Jews, by the commandment of Christ and his apostles, 
 the practice of the primitive church, as Paul willeth 
 the Corinthians to their shame, to set up those which 
 were least esteemed in the church, if there were not 
 one wise man among them to judge betwixt brother 
 and brother, 1 Cor. vi. 4, 5. So will I send them that 
 are not satisfied with that which hath been said for 
 this point, unto a popish la-ivjer ; his words are these : j 
 
 * Sigon. (le Rep. Hebr. lib. ii. cap. viii. 
 t Teitull. in Apolop. 
 
 ; Bodin. metliod. Hist. cap. vi. p. 220 ct p. 378 3/9 
 Paris edit., anno 1572. 
 
RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 Illud apud Generates laiidahile, si quid iisqiiain 
 gentium, quodque reinpuhlicam ej/icit, si non opihiis, 
 el imperii magnilitdiiie, eerie virtutibus, etc pietule, 
 florentem : Ilia scilicet ponlijicum censura, qua nihil 
 majns, aut divinius cogitari potuit, ad coerccndas 
 hominum cupiditates, el ea villa, qua legihus hn- 
 manis ac judiciis emendari nulla modo piossunl : luce 
 tamen coertio, ad Christi normam dlrigitur, iacenter 
 primiun et amice, deinde paulo acerhius, turn nisi 
 pareas, sequilur inlerdictio sacrorum, gravis et efficax. 
 Interdictionem animadversio magislraluum : ridiculum 
 est enim, ut ait Seneca, ad legem honum. [non] esse. Ita 
 fit, ul_ qua legibus nusquam riiidicanltir, illic sine 
 vi el lumullu coerccanlur ah Us censoribus, qui 
 summam virtutis opinioncm de seipsis excitariint. 
 Igilur nulla merclricia, nulla ehrietates, nulla sal- 
 tationes, nulli mendici, nulli atiosi in ed ciritate repieri- 
 untur. ' That thing is commendable amongst those 
 of Geneva (if anywhere), which makes a common- 
 wealth flourish, if not in riches and extent of empire, 
 yet certainly in virtue and piety, viz., the censure 
 of these of chief authority in the church, than which 
 nothing can be thought of greater or more divine, 
 to restrain the Lrregular appetites of men, and such 
 of their vices, which, by human laws and decrees, 
 could in no manner be reformed. And this coercion 
 hath borrowed its direction from the rule of our 
 Saviour Christ ; first, to proceed calmly and in a 
 friendty manner, then more roughly, and last of all, 
 if there be no obedience, a hea\'j' and powerful inter- 
 diction of holy ordinances followeth, and the punish- 
 ment of magistracy that interdiction. For it is a 
 ridiculous thing, saith Seneca, that a good man should 
 not stand for a law, insomuch that it comes to pass, 
 that such things as nowhere are adjudged by law, 
 there without force or tumult they are constrained by 
 those censors, who have raised for themselves a high 
 esteem of their vii-tues. Therefore no whoring, 
 drunkenness, no lascivious dancing, no beggars nor idle 
 livers, are fouud in that city.' This testimony is much, 
 proceeding from a papist, highly commending this 
 divine order, and thereby reproving the want thereof 
 in their church. But is it to be hoped that in other 
 places we should find no dancing, when there are 
 dancing-schools in the chief cities'? that there should 
 be no idle persons among us, when there are so many 
 so ill occupied? that there should bo no gamesters, 
 ■while there are divers publicly ptinnitted, not only in 
 houses of the town, but also in halls and colleges of 
 the university? I am loath to move this sink any 
 more, therefore I leave it to the consideration of that 
 which hath been said. How necessary it is to lay the 
 roof upon the building, to preserve the work, and to 
 keep out the snow and rain ; that is, all manner of 
 vices that hurt and injure the building, and cannot 
 otherwise than hereby be redressed : as idleness, riot- 
 ousncss, drunkenness, swearing, which for want here- 
 of swarm among us, not only to the discomfort of God's 
 
 servants, but also to the destruction of them that are 
 pestered with them. So then, if we compare our church 
 with that temple of the Jews, we see that in some 
 places the foundation is not yet laid, in some the walla 
 not built ; finally, that the roof yet wanteth to the 
 perfecting of the work, which I would the rather wish 
 you to mark, for that through the whole prophecy I 
 will speak nothing but what shall necessarily appertain 
 to some part hereof. 
 
 Now let us come to consider the circumstances ; and 
 fir-st, the time. It is said, ' in the second year of 
 Darius, in the sixth month, in the fii-st day of the 
 month.' Who this Darius was there is some diflfer- 
 ence in judgments amongst the learned ; some think 
 it to be Histaspes, some Ai-taxerxes, &c. But not to 
 stand upon the refutation of those opinions, or naming 
 of them that were of that mind (who are rather to be 
 commended for their diligence in labouring to find out 
 the truth, than reproved for not meeting with it), I 
 will set down that which seemeth host to agree with 
 the course of the Scripture and verity of the histoi-y. 
 It seemeth, therefore, that Darius here mentioned was 
 he that was sm-named Kolhus, the bastard, as may be 
 gathered by the fourth and seventh chapters of Ezra, 
 In the fourth chapter it is said that Artaxcrexcs, who 
 forbade the building of the temple, reigned before 
 Darius, Ezra iv. 5, 11, 24 ; in the seventh it is said, 
 ' After the death of Darius, in the reign of Artaxerxes, 
 the Jews had leave by him to build the temple,' Ezra 
 vii. 1. This, then, must be that Darius which came be- 
 tween the two Artaxerxes, of whom the former was sur- 
 named Longimanus, father to this Darius, and the other 
 Mucmon, who was his son ; so that it appeareth by the 
 course of the history written by Ezra, that this Darius 
 was he whom histories call Darius Nothus, Darius tho 
 bastard. Now, from the time of Cyrus king of Persia, 
 when the foundation began iii-st to be laid, Ezra iii. 
 10, unto tho reign of this Darius, is accounted of 
 some 100 years ; but because it was a custom amongst 
 them, when (heir kings went to war, to appoint their 
 sons kings in their room, it cometh to pass that tho 
 same years may be accounted in the reign of tho son 
 which are in the father's, as Artaxerxes is said to have 
 reigned sixty -two years, whereas he reigned eighteen 
 years before his father died, wherefore, haply, the 
 number of those j'cars was less than that number. 
 But suppose it were eighty or sixty, and, if j'ou will, 
 somewhat above forty, as the Jews seemed to have 
 received by tradition, when they said in the Gospel, 
 ' Forty-six years was the temple in building.' It was 
 a long time, no doubt, from the laying of the founda- 
 tion to the perfecting of the work. Which may 
 be a lesson for the godly and zealous preachers of 
 God's word not to be discouraged, though all things 
 succeed not according to their desire and hope, and 
 not to faint in their ministry, taking for their example 
 the prophet, who, though the word had ceased a long 
 time, yet was not discouraged, despairing that his es- 
 
 39C 
 
Vee. 1-4] 
 
 SERMON I. 
 
 liortation would take no success. Kome (as they say) 
 was not built in one day ; no marvel, then, if Jerusa- 
 lem be not, for it is easier and sooner done to build 
 the tower of Bab3'lon than the tower of Zion, the 
 chapel of the devil than the church of God. Therefore 
 such as desire and wish for building of the church are 
 not in any case to cast awaj' all hope, though thiugs 
 be not done with expedition ; for, if we consider the 
 times, there are no more years passed since the laying 
 of the foundation among us than these which were 
 passed from the reign of Cyrus to the time of Darius. 
 Wherefore, as the prophet and other godly persons 
 did, let us also wait the good leisure of our God, con- 
 tinuing each one in his calhng to further the work, and 
 pray unto God that he would stir up the spirit of 
 Zerubbabel and Joshua, that is, all such as be put 
 in authority, to perfect this holy work. 
 
 This Darius was not, for his civil behaviour, so vir- 
 tuous a prince as many of his predecessors, but noted 
 to be faulty in sundry things, yet did he suffer the 
 Jews to build the temple ; ym, when their enemies 
 accused them, he caused the monuments to be searched, 
 and found out the grant of Cyrus, which he ratified, 
 giving them besides, out of the king's revenue, money 
 towards their expenses, Ezra vi. 1, 8. Yet this 
 Darius, that dealt with them so religiously, did marry 
 his father's sister, through perjury deprived his elder 
 brother of the kingdom, and put him to a most cruel 
 death, as Ctesias, who lived in his days, hath 
 written. This is noted against that naughty Jesuit 
 Allen, who, in his infamous libel against the defence 
 of the execution of justice, would allege it as some 
 stain and discredit to our religion, because the restor- 
 ing thereof amongst us was wrought by Heniy YIIL, a 
 wicked man (as he saith) ; by king Edward, a child ; 
 by^her Majesty, a woman. I will not speak anything 
 of the persons, what a man, what a child, what a 
 woman ; let us suppose they were defiled more than 
 any slanderous person can say, yet that hindereth 
 nothing, but that they might set forward and jn'omote 
 the truth, and God's religion. For even Darhis, an 
 incestuous person, perjured, 3'ea, even a murderer of 
 his own brother, set forward the building of the 
 temple; yet it was no discredit to the work, nor to the 
 godlj- that laboured with all their might therein. No 
 man can be a discredit to the gospel, neither doth 
 the truth of Christ's religion depend upon the person 
 of each one of them by whom it ijleaseth God to pros- 
 per it. Solomon, the best king, even he that first built 
 the temple of God, did raise up a high place to Chc- 
 mosh, the abomination of Moab, 1 Kings xi. 7, and 
 unto Blolech, the abomination of the children of 
 Ammon. Jehu, that was worse than he, pulled down 
 the house of Baal, &c., 2 Kings x. 27. Constantme, 
 that Christian emperor, was not without some blemish 
 for the murder of his son. "Wherefore, as the temple 
 in Jerusalem was not to be refused because the Persian 
 kings furthered the building thereof, so no more is our 
 397 
 
 religion and church to be abandoned, whatsoever they 
 were that furthered the promotion thereof. And as 
 Darius the bastard was no discredit to Haggai's pro- 
 phecy, so may we note against the Jesuit slanders, 
 that to the truth no discredit can come by them that 
 favoured it ; for whatsoever the princes are whom God 
 stirreth up to maintain it, the gospel is to be 
 reverenced and embraced for itself. 
 
 The month also is noted, when it is said, ' In the 
 sixth month,' because that it is the custom of the 
 Scriptures not to give the proper names to the month, 
 whereby they are called, but to note them by their 
 order, as the first, second month, &c. There are 
 some which mislike that this use is not rather observed, 
 than that which we have for the profane use of the 
 mouths and days of the week ; but chiefly they mis- 
 like the retaining of the names of feasts, as Christ- 
 mas, Michaelmas, Candlemas, where the use of the 
 names of mass, derived from that abomination, seemeth 
 to savour of some superstition and profaneness. To 
 which, though haply it might be said that some of 
 those names might seem not so to have been framed, 
 but rather to have come from the old Saxon language, 
 as in the names of Lammas, &c. ; yet if we grant 
 that thence they were derived, it followeth not that we 
 may not note or call the days or months otherwise 
 than after the manner that is here used. For as I 
 acknowledge a godly mind in them that desire to 
 speak in more religious sort, and to banish as much as 
 in them lieth the remembrance and names of all ido- 
 latry, so of the things I say, as St Paul doth to the 
 Corinthians, ' Art thou called being a servant ? caro 
 not for it : but yet if thou maycst be free, use it rather,' 
 1 Cor. vii. 21. If we live amongst them that use no 
 other names for these times, we may (seeing otherwise 
 they cannot understand us to whom we speak) use 
 these words and names, and care not for it ; but if 
 we be amongst those that have left the use of them, 
 we are to use the other rather.* As for the manner 
 which is mentioned in the Scripture, not only the Jews 
 named their months after their order, as in this place, 
 but sometimes they also used their proper names also, 
 as in Moses, the mouth of Abib, &c. ; and after their 
 return from Babylon, they did not still follow their 
 number and order, but sometime they used the Chal- 
 dean language, and the names which they gave their 
 months, as appeareth in the books of Nehemiah, 
 Ezra, Esther, where are mentioned the months of 
 Nis(ni,Zinan, Elul, Shcpat, Ttbeth, Adar,Cislcu, seven 
 of the Chaldeans' months, the names of some of which 
 came perhaps from the idolatry of the Chaldeans, 
 which may appear by one of them called Tammin, of 
 the solemn feasts of Tammuz, which they celebrated, 
 with weeping and lamentation, yearly in the fourth 
 
 "* Deos nationum nominari lex prol.ilipt non utique na 
 nomina eoruni pronimciemus quae nobis, ut dicaraus, conver- 
 satiocxtorquet, sedlioc precepitnedeosvocciiiusillos. — Tertul, 
 dc Idijlat. cap. xx. Sigon. de Ecp. Hebric, Ub. iii. cup. ii. 
 
10 
 
 EAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap 1, 
 
 montli ; of which superstition the prophet speaketh, 
 when he mentioneth the women that wept for Tam- 
 muz, Ezek. viii. 14. Wherefore, although the pro- 
 phet calls it here the sixth month, it followeth not 
 that we may not, or thcj' mi^ht not, call it by any 
 other name ; for in Kehcmiah, the same month is 
 called FJul, Neh. vi. 15. And this liberty have the 
 children of God used, not only in the names of times, 
 but of places also and persons. Daniel was called by 
 the name of Belteshazzar, Dan. i. 7 ; iv. 8, 19 ; and 
 V. 12 ; which name was imposed upon him by the 
 idolatrous king, and was derived from the name of 
 Bel, the idol which the Chaldeans worshipped ; yea, 
 Daniel speaking of himself, giveth himself that very 
 name. St Luke mentioneth ApoUonia, where through 
 St Paul passed, Acts svii. 1, which city had its name 
 of Apollo.* Neither did St Paul care to enter into 
 the ship, the badge whereof was Castor and Pollux, 
 Acts xxviii. 11 (which yet were saints of the heathen 
 which they worshipped f), knowing that it was lawful 
 to use that vessel in a civil sort, which was in some 
 sort dedicated to the use of an idol. It is true that 
 by Moses the people of God were commanded not to 
 use the names of the idols of Canaan, or take them in 
 their mouth ; and David, inflamed with a zeal of 
 God's honour, prolesteth that he would not take their 
 names in his mouth, Ps. xvi. But this was that the 
 names should be used not in any honour of them, but 
 detestation ; not to swear by them or any way to 
 reverence them. Howheit when for necessity we must 
 needs use them to open our minds to them that hear 
 us when we cannot otherwise be understood, no doubt 
 we may use them, as the prophets and holy men of God 
 have done, both in the names of times, places, and 
 persons. J The name of Candlemas cometh from a 
 double solemnity: the one of burning candles, a super- 
 stition derived from the heathen ; the other from the 
 mass, the idol of popery. It is no more unlawful for 
 us to use that name, than for the Jews the name of 
 Tammuz. 
 
 And hereby also shall we know how to answer an- 
 other argument of the papists. Look (saith Bristow§) 
 
 * Strab. lib. ii. Opogra. in fino et lib. vii. 
 
 t Alex. Genial. Dier. lib. ii. cap. xii. ; lib. iii. cap. xviii. 
 et xxii. ; Diod. Sic. lib. v. cap iii. 
 
 ; Durand. Kat. lib. vii. cap. vii. Diony. Halycar. lib. i. 
 Annal. Horn. Beat, lilicn. in Annot. in lib. v. Tertiil. con 
 Marcion. § Bristow, Moti. 32, p. 131 b. 
 
 on the names of Shrovetide, Candlemas, Christmas, 
 ka., speak they Lutheranism ? Which argument, if 
 it be good against us, what is it against the prophets? 
 For the names not only of one day, but of whole 
 months, the names of FAul, Shepat, &c., look what 
 religion they speak, whether Judaism or Paganism. Or 
 what if the heathenish Romans should so speak to the 
 popish Romans ? Look on the names of your * own 
 months, do they not speak our religion? January of 
 Janus, the two-faced^god ; Fehriianj of Februo, which 
 signifieth to purge, for that twelve days of this month 
 the people was exercised in kindling tapers and candles, 
 and ofi'ering sacrifices for the rest of the souls de- 
 parted ; March of Mars ; May of Maia, Jupiter's whore; 
 Jiili/ and Aiiyust of Divus Julius and D. Augustus 
 What speak these names ? Christianity or idolatry ? 
 And what can the use of the name oi Candlemas make 
 more against us, than the name of February against 
 them, save that it very well titteth them, agreeing in 
 their ceremonies then used marvellous well with the 
 Gentiles ? For as they use candles and tapers, so did 
 the heathen ; as they offer for the rest and quietness 
 of the dead, so did the heathen ; as they did, indeed, 
 agree with them in many other of their rites, as if you 
 compare the carrying about of their idols, with the 
 papists carrying about their bread or breaden god, on 
 Corpus Christi day, &c. 
 
 Wherefore, let us rather, when we hear or remem- 
 ber any of these names, consider the goodness of God, 
 and his great mercy towards us, which hath delivered 
 us from the superstition which these names signify ; 
 and as the Jews by the name of Nisan, FJul, &c. 
 wdiich they used, having received them from tho 
 Chaldeans, were brought in mind of that slavery and 
 captivity under which they were held, and so occa- 
 sioned the more to praise the mercy of (iod in their 
 deliverance, so likewise should we by these names 
 consider that great captivity wherein we were held, 
 much more greater and grievouser than that of Baby- 
 lon ; and thus much we may mark, considering the 
 circumstances of the time. 
 
 * Macrob. Saturn lib. i. cap. xii. Bacon, in Xotis ad 
 JIartyrol. Itom. Ilospin. de Festis Chr. fol. 40 b. Eckius. 
 torn. iii. horn. iii. dc purif Dnndand. Itat. lib. vii. cap. vii. 
 VaiTO do lingu. lat. lib. v. p. 53. Vide Turneb. in eundcm. 
 Jacob, de Vorag. ser. ixxxii. de Sanctis. Ducand. Kat. lib. 
 vii. cap. vii. Moresin de Ucpravattc Keiigionis Origin. Hos- 
 pinian. de Testis Christ. Mens. Jun. fol. 89, 90. 
 
 SERMON II. Apr. 19. 1580 
 
 THIS p.Trcel opening an entrance to the exhortation 
 to hold on the building of the temple begun, con- 
 taincth manv special points, which being therein com- 
 prised, have been heretofore laid down, and out of 
 the first such necessary lessons delivered as made for 
 our under.'^tanding, concerning the time, year, month, 
 and day of this prophecy. The rest of the points con- 
 
 venient and fit to bo noted concerning this message, 
 as yet remain, and are these : 
 
 i. From whom this message cometh: The Lord of 
 
 IJosts. 
 
 2. By whom it is sent: By the hand or ministry of 
 JJayyai. 
 
 S. To whom : To Zcruhhahel the son of Sheallid, 
 
 398 
 
Ver 1-i.] 
 
 SERMON ir. 
 
 11 
 
 prince of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Josedech, 
 the hii/h priest. 
 
 4.. In wLat sort, by noting the people's fault, and 
 reproving it : lliis people say the time is not yet come 
 that the Lord, &c. 
 
 1. In the lii-st cappearetb the singular favour of God, 
 and his goodness towards his children, who by the 
 ministry of his word calleth them to life, and thereby 
 stirreth up their minds to be careful of it, as he dealt 
 with Abniliam, whom he called out of Ur of the Chal- 
 deans, Gen. xi. 31, and xii. 1-4, with whom after- 
 wards he made his covenant. Gen. xv. 5—7, and even 
 so hath he dealt with the children of Abraham, ac- 
 cording to that promise, ' I will be thy God, and the 
 God of thy seed,' which how he hath performed I need 
 not, by the several examples of the prophets, patri- 
 archs, and apostles, to make manifest unto you ; 
 when Eliphaz and Elihu, Job xxxiii. 14, note even 
 among the Gentiles that God speaketh by dreams and 
 visions, revealing to the ear of man, and sealing his 
 correction, that man may revoke his work, and that 
 he may hide the pride of man, which he also used be- 
 fore the severing of the Jews and Gentiles, as in his 
 dealings with our first parents, to whom by his word 
 he opened his will. Gen. ii. IG, 17 ; so that whoso- 
 ever is, or hath been, of his church, to him hath he 
 revealed his will by one means or other, Heb. i. 1, of 
 what age, state, or condition soever ; for God is. and 
 always hath been, to his people a pastor, Ps. xxiii. 1, 
 master, father, IVIal. i. G, and teacher, Exod. iii. 15, 
 and iv. 12, 15, 22. 
 
 2. In the second, we leam of the heavenly mini- 
 sters, who they are by whom this message is sent. 
 It is sent not to them in elder time, by voice, dream, 
 or sight in trance, but ' by the hand,' that is, the 
 ministry of Haggai ; which manifestation, though it 
 may seem less, in that men are the messengers, yet if 
 we consider the matter, we shall find it far greater ; 
 for whenas their ancestors, at the giving of the law, 
 heard the Lord speak unto them from mount Sinai, 
 they were so dismayed, that they said unto Moses, 
 Deut. V. 24, 25, 28, 81, Talk thou with us, and let 
 not the Lord talk with us, lest we die. Upon which 
 speech God approved their words, and said, they had 
 spoken well ; whereupon he promised them that he 
 would raise up a prophet like unto IMoses, into whose 
 mouth he would put his words, Deut. xviii. 15-18. 
 Wherefore, to relieve our weakness, and deliver us 
 from this fear (wherewith we understand how greatly 
 Daniel and John were stricken and astonished, Dan. 
 vii. 28, Rev. i. 17), it pleased God, of his abundant 
 mercy and favour, to raise up of our own flesh, of 
 our brethren and our sons, men like unto ourselves, 
 as more famihar teachers ; for he hath ordained and 
 given to his church prophets, 2 Chron. xx. 20, and 
 them either ordinary or extraordinary : ordinary, 
 such as were then before the coming of Christ, the 
 priests and Ijevites, since pastors and doctors, Eph. 
 
 399 
 
 iv. 11 ; extraordinary, such as then and since have 
 been sent by special authority from God to teach his 
 church, 2 Chron. xv. 3. Of which sort Haggai was, I 
 cannot certainly pi-ouounoe, for the Scripture telleth 
 us not of what tribe he was ; but we know that 
 God had given him an extraordinary gift to foresee 
 and foretell the coming of Christ. Hence we may 
 learn how much they are bound to God's gracious 
 mercy, who sent unto them his word by so tit a mes- 
 senger; by nature, a man ; by afKnity, their brother; 
 in qualit}', like unto IMoses. 
 
 8. Which benefit, though it be great, yet behold 
 a greater, where it is declared to whom this mes- 
 sage was sent ; namely, ' to Zerubbabel, prince of 
 Judah, and to Joshua the sou of Josedech, the high 
 priest;' where we may see how it pleased God not 
 only to make the prophet Haggai, but the prince and 
 priest also, messengers of this errand which was sent to 
 the people, to the end, that if it should be the less 
 regarded because of the person of the prophet, the 
 authority of the ecclesiastical and civil governor giving 
 it countenance, they might the sooner be moved to 
 hear it more reverently, and obey it more readily. For 
 although it were partly sent to them to stir them up, 
 as the godly are slow enough, yet because the fault is 
 noted especially to be in the people, as their reproof 
 argueth, it seemeth, therefore, that this was sent unto 
 these governors, chiefly for their sakcs, that the 
 power of the prince and priest might the rather move 
 them to go forward in that which they had begun. 
 Wherein, as the Lord dealt graciously with them, so 
 hath he and doth he with us ; his word hath come by 
 the preachers thereof to our governors of all sorts and 
 states, to the end, that this nation would agree to set 
 forward the building and work of his house, the edify- 
 ing of his church, the glory of the word, which, that 
 it may be the better furthered by every one iu this 
 assembly, as God giveth grace, I am heartily to 
 request such amongst us that are set in place of 
 government, as, namely, our heads, that by the 
 example of Zerubbabel and Joshua, tliey would vouch- 
 safe to countenance the message of Haggai by their 
 presence here and in such places. For, indeed, the 
 message is not ours, although it be brought out by our 
 hand, but he is in heaven, from whence he filleth all 
 things with his power and majesty, whose word it is. 
 We are sent by the like authority that Haggai was, 
 though not furnished with the same measure of grace. 
 The treasure that he brought and we bring is the same, 
 though the vessel wherein it is carried be less pre- 
 cious. Neither are you, fathers, equal to those 
 governors to whom this message was sect, for Zerub- 
 babel, son of Shealtiel, was heir-apparent to the crown 
 of Judah ; Joshua high priest and chief governor in 
 matters touching God ; Zerubbabel, lord presidtnt of 
 Jewry under king Darius ; Joshua, high priest by his 
 father's stock, descended of Phinehas, both figures of 
 our Saviour Christ ; Zerubbabel, of his kingdom, of 
 
12 
 
 EAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 whom also be desceiidoil acfonliiig to the flesh, 
 Heb. iv. 8; Joshua, of bis priesthood, whose name 
 also be bore,* both very aged and reverend persons, 
 having held this room and place near a hundred years. 
 Now if such as these men disdained not to hear of one 
 so inferior in dignity, in years and experience also, as 
 may be thought, none of you will, I hope ; sure I am 
 yoii should not disdain to hear what God speak- 
 etb to you by us, how inferior soever, either in dig- 
 nity, in years, or experience, though there were 
 nothing else to be considered in us than that we are 
 stewards of his house, 1 Cor. iv. 1. But chiefly, 
 since the gospel and ministry thereof excelleth the 
 ministry of Haggai so much, as the clear sunlight the 
 light of any of the stars, Isa. ix. 2, so that we may, 
 without pride, for our message sake, prefer ourselves 
 before him. For John Baptist our Saviour testifieth 
 to have been greater than any prophet that was born of 
 woman. Mat. xi. 9, yet he saith, ver. 11, ' The least in 
 the kingdom of heaven should be greater than he.' 
 
 I wot well that you arc better able to 'teach than 
 they who speak unto yon ; neither speak I this for 
 I tliink that 3'ou have such gi-eat need to learn. As 
 Daniel, albeit furnished with marvellous wisdom and 
 knowledge from God, yet exercised himself and took 
 profit by reading the pi-ophecy of Jeremiah, Dan. is. 
 1,2; so the best may gather some commodity by the 
 labours of those that are inferior to them. But I 
 make this exhortation to them that they would vouch- 
 safe us their presence for example's sake ; that they 
 by so doing might seem to say, as the princes did of 
 Jeremiah, ' This man speaketh in the name of the 
 Lord,' Jer. xxvi. 15 ; and that the commandment of 
 Paul might be the bettor observed, ' Let no man de- 
 spise thy youth,' 1 Tim. iv. 12 ; for so I doubt not but 
 their presence would cause, that they who come would 
 hear and mark more carefully, and that some would 
 come who now refrain. The judgment of rulers and 
 governors prevail much with the multitude, but their 
 private and public example more ; in which case tho 
 common proverbs, Isa. xxiv. 2, are often true. Such 
 prince, such people ; such master, such man ; such 
 mother, such daughter.! 
 
 But if this be not sufficient to move them, let them 
 consider further, that although Zerubbabel knew how 
 to build the temple, yet was not his heart, nor the 
 heart of Joshua, so zealous, their hands so ready, their 
 minds so prepared as thoy ought to have been, in. con- 
 sideration whereof they needed to be exhorted, for 
 when they heard this message their hearts were stirred 
 up, Hag. i. 12, 11. Let us not be ashamed to ac- 
 knowledge the want that is in us, or slack the means 
 that may remedy it. The words of the wise, saith 
 Solomon, Keclcs. xii. 11, are like to goads, wherewith 
 
 * Jesus nnd Jelio.shna, as Kzra iii. 2, or Joshua cometh of 
 ono root yty> as may furllifr appear by lleb. iv. 8. 
 
 t Fx nncillanini moribus Domina; jiulicantur. — Ilierom.ad 
 Salvinam de virgin, servanil.i. 
 
 our laziness and sluggishness is pricked forward ; and 
 we stand in need of them ; for howsoever the spirit 
 be willing, the flesh is weak. Mat. \x\\. 41, which is 
 a thing that toucheth all Christians ; so, therefore, 
 desiring God that we may teach faithfully and yoti 
 hear diligently, I will pi-oceed to the next point, which 
 is the message itself. 
 
 4. Thus hath the J Mrd of honts chnnjcdme to say, This 
 })eoplesa>j, that the time is not i/et come, the time tclierein 
 the house of the Lord, &c. AVhen Adam, after he had 
 broken the commandment of the Lord, heard his 
 voice in the garden, be hid himself, and feared ; the 
 cause whereof he says was, for that he was naked. 
 So he said indeed, but falsely ; for the cause was not 
 his nakedness, but his wickedness, in that he had 
 eaten of the forbidden fruit. Since which time it 
 hath been a custom amongst the sons of Adam to 
 cover iniquity with hypocrisy, and cloak their offences 
 with excuses. As in this place, the cause why the 
 people did not build the house of the Lord was, that 
 every man was wholly set to the building of his own 
 house, to the regard of his own profit and ease ; yet 
 laid they the cause on the time : ' The time is not yet 
 come,' the time to build the house of the Lord. 
 Wherefore, as it pleased God to deal mercifully with 
 Adam, and to the end he might bring him to the 
 acknowledgment of his transgression, demanded of 
 him, 'Hast thou eaten of the fruit?' so likewise 
 here he dealeth with his people, when bo saith, ' Is it 
 time for you, sirs, to sit down in your ceiled houses, 
 while this house lieth waste ? ' Where he sheweth 
 the true causes indeed to be, not the time, as they 
 pretended, but worldliness and idleness, in that they 
 took so great care to build and furnish their own 
 houses, and that not only for commodity, hut for 
 pleasure also, for they built their houses and ceiled 
 them also ; idleness, in that they sat down to take 
 their rest and ease, for that doth the Hebrew word in 
 this place properly signify. This fault, therefore, was 
 shewed them, to the end thej' might acknowledge 
 it, and amend it ; that indeed their pretence for want 
 of time was but hypocritical, the true cause being 
 worldliness and idleness, that they might confess their 
 oflence, repent, and in time amend it. Which fruit 
 also, that you may take hereby, it bath been liereto- 
 fore shew'cd .you in the general argument of this pro- 
 phecy, in what points our estate mn^- be compared 
 with theirs : that as it fared with them, so doth it 
 with us ; as they wore delivered from the bodily 
 captivity by Cyrus, so wo have been delivered from 
 the spiritual captivity by King Henry the VIII., 
 another Cyrus : and as they, though having received 
 a grant and commission from Cyrus, &e., yet built not 
 up the material temple in such sort and speed as was 
 given them in commandment, so also we have not 
 been so painful and diligent in building up the 
 spiritual temple and church of God. The foundation 
 of this work was said to bo the beginnings of the 
 
 400 
 
Ver. 1-4.] 
 
 SERMON II. 
 
 13 
 
 doctrine of Clu-istianity, Heb. vi. 1, 2, the which the 
 apostle calleth the laj-ing of the foundation, 1 Peter 
 i. 12. The raising of the walls is the perfect under- 
 standing of those mysteries of Christ, which the 
 angels desire to behold. The roof to be laid upon 
 this building, to keep them that arc within the house 
 from the annoyance of rain and weather, of heat and 
 blasts ; that is, from sins and offences; is ecclesiasti- 
 cal discipline, which, according to the example of the 
 Jews, Christ commanded, his apostles constituted, 
 the primitive church observed, the reformed have 
 restored, to the singular commodity and good gover- 
 nance of the places where it is received, even in the 
 judgment of a papist.* By reason that a learned 
 pastor joined to a sufficient number of grave and 
 sober elders hath the oversight of the congi-egation : 
 first, to admonish privatelj' offenders ; then, if they 
 amend not, to proceed forward, &c. ; so to keep them 
 from such sins as civil laws partly do not, partly 
 cannot punish, and yet are such as shut out the com- 
 mitters from the kingdom of God, into which no 
 unclean, adulterous, or covetous person can enter, 
 Eev. xxi. 27, 1 Cor. vi. 10. 
 
 Wherefore, seeing that in many places of this land 
 the foundation is not yet laid, the congi'egations being 
 not catechised ; in others, if there be catechising, yet 
 no preaching, and so the walls not built ; in others, no 
 discipline exercised, and therefore the roof not laid 
 upon the building ; it is manifest that the temple of 
 the Lord is not built amongst us as it ought, and so 
 that our case and fault is like unto theu-s, whom the 
 Lord by the prophet here reproveth, for so his house 
 lieth waste among us ; somewhere less, somewhere 
 more, but lie waste it doth ; not indeed as the temple, 
 when Daniel prayed, Dan. is. 17, and said, ' Thy 
 sanctuary lies waste,' but as God saith here that it 
 did, when there was an altar built. But is this fault 
 defended by us, with such excuses as it was main- 
 tained by them"? Ezra iii. 2, 8. La some part no 
 doubt it is. For although I cannot say of this people 
 in general as the prophet doth of the Jews, for there 
 are many that confess the time to be come to build 
 the Lord's house (God increase the number of them), 
 yet some there be that sa}' the time is not j'ct come, 
 as hath appeared by the open reproof of that which 
 in this matter I have heretofore spoken unto you. 
 Wherein, first, I would advise you diligently to beware 
 that you stumble not at their oflences, neither con- 
 ceive worse of the church because of the jars that 
 happen in it. Paul and Barnabas disagreed, yet were 
 they of the true chm'ch, as these were of whom the 
 prophet speaketh. He with the prince and high 
 priest dissented from the people, the people thought 
 and held that the time was not yet come to build the 
 house of the Lord ; but the other were of a contrary 
 judgment, yet were they of the true church ; which note 
 also confuteth a foolish motive} of our adversaries con- 
 
 * Bodin. Method Hist. cap. vi. f Qu. 'notion'? — Ed. 
 401 
 
 cerning discord and universality, for here we see that 
 the greater part held the false opinion, and that the 
 true church dissented from itself. Next, let us 
 remember who they were that said, ' The time is not 
 yet come,' namely, the people, for even so they who 
 say among us the time is not yet come, are of this 
 people, of the people of God indeed, yet of the people 
 only ; for they that are in the place of Zerubbabel and 
 Joshua say that it is high time. In the book of ordain- 
 ing bishops and ministers, there is granted unto the 
 minister authority to preach the word, minister the 
 sacraments, exercise discipline, which more at large 
 appeareth in a learned discourse of Bucer's, whence 
 into that book they have translated that point. The 
 thirty-two commissioners in King Edward's days, 
 appointed to set down orders for the redress of ecclesi- 
 astical matters, set down this order, that the minister, 
 with others according to Christ's commandment, Mat. 
 sviii. 15-17, should first deal by brotherly admo- 
 nition, and so to proceed according to Christ's rule in 
 this case. Master Nowel, whose praise is great in the 
 gospel, hath written more fully and largely in his 
 Latin catechism, that eveiy church well gi'ounded 
 ought to have a sufficient number of elders, who, to- 
 gether -n-ith then- pastors, should exercise church dis- 
 cipline,* and to avoid all those ofl'ences and faults 
 which happen in the eongi-egation. This catechism, 
 by authority from the bishops in their convocations, 
 is authorised, as the only Latin catechism to be read 
 in all schools throughout the realm, and appointed 
 also to be translated into the vulgar tongue, to be read 
 and understood of all ; whereby we may perceive that 
 the queen's majesty, her brother of blessed memoiy, 
 Bishop Cranmer, Master Bucer, Peter Martyr, Master 
 Nowel, the thhty-two commissioners, eight bishops, 
 eight divines, eight common lawv-ers, eight counsel- 
 lors, with the parliament, have thought it time fit to 
 build the house of the Lord with doctrine and dis- 
 cipline ; wherefore it is not Zerubbabel nor Joshua, 
 but this people, that say it is not time to build the 
 Lord's house ; though the people of God indeed, yet 
 but of the people, who, if they entered into their own 
 hearts, should find, I doubt not, whatsoever excuse 
 they allege, that it is but a mere pretence hke to this 
 which is here reproved ; the truth is, there is some 
 other fault in them which they would with this excuse 
 cloak, which I will not now deal with, nor enter into 
 a particular confutation of the pretences they allege. 
 I leave it to your particular considerations, wishing, 
 that as the faixlt hath been discovered, it might be 
 amended, so it may be by everj' one of us, so far as it 
 concerneth each particular man's person, 1 Cor. v. 
 
 * In ecclesia si probe instituta fucrit, certus giiberua- 
 tionis ordo, et modus, disciplinsequo ecclesiasticoe ea ratio 
 observabitur, p. 92. 
 
 Deligebantur Seniores, i. e. Magistratus ecdesiastici, qui 
 disciplinam ecclesiasticam tenerent, &c.. Hi adhibito pastore, 
 &c„ p. 155. 
 
 Cc 
 
14 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAT. 
 
 [Chap. T. 
 
 1, 4, 5; Mat. xviii. 15, IG, 17; Acts xiv. 23, and 
 XV. 4, G, 22, 24; Acts xx. 17, 28; 1 Tim. v. 17 ; 
 Titus i. 5. 
 
 Wherein, first, to .you I need not say so mucb for 
 the laying of the foundation, if the good order ah'eady 
 taken for catechising in every house were diligently 
 and carefully looked unto ; but albeit the foundation 
 be laid, yet in building the walls, there would be 
 somewhat added. I have heard, and so have others, 
 of strangers of godly zeal and good credit, who coming 
 into our university, have made complaint that on the 
 Sunday, in the afternoon, there hath not been a 
 sermon in all Oxford, which were a special service for 
 the sanctifying of that day. WTien there were fewer 
 preachers among us than now there are, yet were there 
 more sermons than nowadays there be, so that it 
 might truly be said, the people is increased, but their 
 joy is diminished. Although I nothing doubt but 
 there would now bo found voluntarily to perform this 
 work, yet think I it more convenient, and likelier to 
 conlinue, if the public readers, the heads of the 
 colleges, with the prebends of Christ Church, will take 
 the charge of it, that whereas now they are to preach 
 once, they would vouchsafe to do it twice, which might 
 be done with little increase of their pains, and great 
 profit of the university. This thing I doubt not but 
 it would be established, if it would please God to stir 
 up his spirit that is in the room of the magistrate to 
 propose it in the convocation, by the godly disposition 
 of the doctors in commending it to the house of the 
 proctors to gather the voices, and of the body of the 
 university to agree to it. 
 
 But howsoever the foundation and walls are built 
 among us, in other places certainly they are not, for 
 which such as do it not, but indeed ought to do it, are 
 in gi'eat fault. I mean the mere non-resident, that 
 stayeth here from his charge without any just or neces- 
 sary occasion, whereby it cometh to pass that in many 
 places of this land they are so far from laying on the 
 roof, that the foundation is not laid. This otlcnce is 
 so great, that not the people and the prince, but even 
 their own consciences also (if they be not by God's 
 judgment seared), confess that it is time to amend it, 
 which is laid down more plain in the synod but now 
 alleged, wherein the bishops aflirm this nou-rcsidc^nee 
 to be a thing foul and unhonest in itself, shameful and 
 detestable among the people, pernicious and hurtful 
 to the chiu-ch of God ; I do but English their own 
 words, fnda in se, odiosa in vuh/us, pernitiosa eccJesia: 
 Dei. The thirtj'-two commissioners before mentioned 
 appointed that none having the charge of souls else- 
 where should continue in the university ; and no 
 marvel, because in the liook of ordering of ministers, 
 each one at the time of his ordering solemnly pro- 
 miseth before God and his elect angels, to give all 
 diligence to teach his people with all care, &c. 'Which 
 book being established again, such as arc ordered, 
 being made by this order, yet abide many of them 
 
 among us, breaking this solemn promise and vow to 
 almighty God, and yet are not ashamed to look men 
 in the faces, as though God had not said, perform thy 
 vows, and that he delighteth not in fools, &c., yet we, 
 for all they be such men, honour them, bestow graces 
 on them, give them great commendation of learning 
 and honesty, whereas by this breaking of their vow 
 and promise they declare themselves to be sacrilegious 
 persons. A great fault in us refjentes, if not also in 
 iwu-rctjentes, if we have not learned that this is a 
 sufficient cause to deny grace, but grant them to such 
 persons, to the shame and obloquy of the university. 
 And here I am sorry that I cannot touch this fault, 
 but that I must you also (reverend fathers), who, 
 although you be called to the same office and duty 
 that the others be, yet are not in the same measure 
 of sin that they are ; howbeit these are strengthened 
 in their ofleuce by your example. Let no man think 
 that when we speak of this fault to have it redressed, 
 that we cast daggers into our fathers' bosoms, but 
 let them consider the cause that moveth us thus to 
 do. In the Persian story, written by Herodotus 
 and Trogus, we read that after the death of Cambyses, 
 the Magi got the crown. Seven of the nobility con- 
 spired together to slay the Magi ; and as Darius and 
 Gobrias made at one of them, Darius staying to 
 strike, Gobrias asked what he meant that he slew not 
 his enemy. For fear (saith he) lest in the dark I slay 
 thee. To whom Gobrias answered. Stay not for that, 
 but heartily run us both through. Gobrias was con- 
 tent, if it could no otherwise be done, that himself 
 should be slain, so that the sorcerer, the usurper, 
 might die also. Some think j-ou should be content 
 that we strike you, if no otherwise, tliat these sorcer- 
 ers may be removed. I call them so justly, for God 
 bath said that disobedience is as the sin of sorcery. 
 This sin of non-residence is a sin of disobedience, and 
 a mother of as manj' transgressions as ever was Sodom. 
 Be content, therefore, if to the end to slay them we 
 touch your bodies and credit, seeing, it may be, that 
 as the sorcerer was slain and Gobrias escaped, so you 
 may escape though they bo slain. Would to God we 
 might sec your diligence to cast out these sorcerers, 
 as Saul did out of Israel, and so to cast them out as 
 withal to take heed that you follow not his example, 
 who afterwards went himself to consult with a sorcer- 
 ess, with one that had a familiar spirit, because that 
 God answered him not otherwise. This was a per- 
 suasible reason to flesh and blood, God doth not 
 answer me, therefore whj' may I not ask of a witch ? 
 and shall not yours be like if you thus gather, God 
 doth not otherwise provide for me, therefore will I 
 rob churches, &c. But how far from this mind was 
 St Paul, and how far from his are such men ! He 
 was content rather to betake liimself to a base occu- 
 pation, 1 Thess. ii. G, 8, 0, wherein he had been 
 before trained up, than he would burden the churches, 
 which he might nevertheless have done lawfullv ; and 
 
 402 
 
Ver. 5-11.] 
 
 SERMON HI. 
 
 15 
 
 better were it for you to return again to the teaching 
 of scholars than to provide for yourselves by such means ; 
 though I hope you shall not need to do that neither, 
 God having provided that you may live honestly by 
 other means, if you can be content to bear a lower 
 sail, remembering the heathen man's rule, Ingens rec- 
 tigal parsi)noiiia. Abraham, when God called him, 
 forsook a fruitful and plentiful soil, to go he knew not 
 whither. Moses chose rather to sufler affliction with 
 the childi'eu of God than to enjoy the delights of 
 Egypt. When David was to fight with Goliath, 
 1 Sam. xvii., Saul furnished him with his good armour ; 
 but when he had them on, he saw they were not fit for 
 him, wherefore he said, I cannot go with these, fori 
 am not accustomed. Wherefore he put them ofl', and 
 took his stafl' in his hand, which was fitter for him. 
 Verily, fathers, these livings which j'ou cannot discharge 
 are like the helmet of brass, the brigandine, and sword 
 wherewith David was furnished ; if you will fight, you 
 must be content to forego them. Christ saith he is 
 not worthy to be his disciple who forsaketh not all, 
 even his own life, to follow him ; will you not be con- 
 tent to forego these things for his sake, who for yours 
 did forego his own blood '? No doubt, if we would 
 earnestly regard and reprove these things here, it 
 would move godly patrons to send hither for able and 
 fit men to discharge their room, or God would move 
 her Majesty to procure that better order ma}' be taken 
 in this case, that it may not be lawful for piatrons to 
 prefer such beggarly creatures as often they do, the 
 very filth and rascality of the people, Jeroboam-priests. 
 Concerning the last point, which is the setting up 
 of the roof upon the building, let us remember the 
 commandment of Christ, If our brother trespass 
 against us, tell him his fault between thee and him ; 
 and if he hear thee not, do it before two or three ; if 
 he vouchsafe not to hear them, to tell it unto the 
 church, whom, if he refuse to hear, to count him as a 
 heathen. Let us consider one another, to provoke to 
 love and to good works, and use all means to recall 
 sinners from then- ungodliness ; to which purpose let 
 us join one to another in this work. As Paid to the 
 Galatians joineth himself with all the brethren, and to 
 the Thessalonians with Timotheus and Silvanus, as 
 Barnabas joined himself to Silas, &c., so let us join 
 together our strength, and use one another's help to 
 the foiTvarding of sincerity. In which respect I 
 thought it necessary to speak of this matter at this 
 
 time and in this place ; for though it may seem that it 
 were fitter to be delivered in other places, yet it is not 
 amiss also here, for there are many here that may 
 come to those places, and therefore it is necessary 
 they should know the truth of this doctrine ; there are 
 some here that may stand before the prince, as Nehe- 
 miah did before Artaxerses. 
 
 But where it may be said that the universities are 
 not sufficient to send forth so many as may furnish 
 the land, it is true indeed where it lieth on them that 
 are in authority to set forward another thing ordered 
 by the thirty-two commissioners before mentioned, 
 who mention three seminaries which should serve for 
 this purpose, whereof the one is the university, 
 another bishops' houses, wherein they appoint that 
 men should be trained up in learning, that they may be 
 fit for such charges, to which end they requu'ed that 
 the bishops keep no idle persons in their houses, but 
 that (besides their necessary servants) all about them 
 should be brought up in learning. For this, say 
 they, is another means whereby the church may be 
 furnished with able ministers, concluding, sic instituta 
 fiiit AiKjustini doinus, &o. The third they appoint in 
 cathedral churches, where they ordain to retain a 
 scholar and instructor to train up youth in knowledge, 
 whereunto maketh that which Bucer hath in his 
 treatise de Frfoniiiitvnifi Canonici CoUcf/ii, where he 
 shewcth that the first end of the ordaining of such 
 cathedral churches was this, that therein men might 
 be brought up in good learning. Now, if there were a 
 learned ministry settled in each place of this land, 
 that the people might be catechised and instructed, 
 the rest would soon follow ; wherefore, such whom it 
 hath pleased God to enable in the building of his 
 church I beseech, or rather charge, as Paul did Timo- 
 thy, to be careful of that which they are put in trust 
 withal, and with all their diligence to set forward the 
 building of the Lord's house by procuring the estab- 
 lishing of a learned ministry, and whereby the foun- 
 dation may be laid, its walls built, and the roof laid 
 upon, even as God hath appointed. 
 
 The prophet saith not here without cause that the 
 Lord of hosts charged him to speak, even he who is 
 able to revenge the contempt of the commandment, 
 and to reward the keeping of it, which God grant that 
 we may also earnestly consider, and thereby be moved 
 more eftectually to the doing of our duty and his com- 
 mandment. 
 
 SERMON III. Jime7. 
 
 iV^oic therefore tJnis saith the Lord of hosts, Consider your 
 bring little in : ye eat, bnt ye have not enonyh 
 
 _ ways in your hearts. Ye liare soif)i much, and 
 
 y ...., .- . ^- ----, -.,. J- _. ^,.- , ye drink, but are not filled ; you put on clothes, but ye be 
 
 not warm ; he that yetteth u-ages, getteth wages, and pulteth it into a broken bag. Thus saitli the Lord oj 
 " • '^ ■ ■ ' ' • ' ' .,-....•, ^^^^^^ J ^^,-^Yi ((,](g delight in it, and 
 
 hosts: Go np to the mountains, and bring doivn wood, and build this house ; and 1 intt talte detiglit m it, and 
 I will be glorified, saith the Lord. Ye looked for much, but lo, you got little ; and when you brought it home, 
 1 did blow }tpon it. And ichy ? saith the Lord of hosts. Because of my new liouse that lies waste, and every 
 403 
 
16 
 
 EAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 man runneth to Ids oiin Jtoiisc. Therefore the heaven over you stayed itself from dew, tend lite earth her fruit. 
 And I called for a drouf/ht upon the land, and ujion the mon)itains, and nj:ou the corn, and upon the nine, 
 and upon the oil, upon all that the land should Iring forth, both upon men, and upon cattle, and upon all 
 the labour of the hands. — Haggai I. 5-11. 
 
 AS the good Samaritan (of wlioin our Saviour 
 spcaketb, Luke x.), taking compassion on the 
 man that had fallen amoug&t thieves, bound up his 
 wounds, and poured into them not only sharp vinegar 
 to scour, but also mild oil to supple, even so the 
 prophet, meaning to heal the wounds of his people, 
 who had sufl'cred the temple of the Lord to he waste, 
 hath first sharplj' reproved them in the former verses, 
 la3'ing open their fanlts, and hero mildly exhorting 
 them to that which they had omitted, that by all means 
 they might be brought to do this which God com- 
 maudeth them. And, first, he sheweth his warrant and 
 letter of credence for his message, that the thing he 
 commanded them might be esteemed, not by the 
 worthiness of the man hij whom, but rather of God, 
 from whom it was sent. Wherefore he willeth them to 
 consider with themselves, that is, deeply and thoi'oughly 
 to weigh and mark their own ways, that is, their works 
 and behaviour ; for if they did so, they should per- 
 ceive the greatness of their sins and transgressions, at 
 least if they would endeavour the punishments which 
 God had laid upon them, and consider the scarcity in 
 their goods, and want of natural heat and strength in 
 their bodies, in that they sowed much, and brought 
 in little ; they ate, but were not satisfied ; clothed 
 themselves, but were not warmed, etc.; which punish- 
 ment God had laid upon them, to the end they might 
 perceive their sin and acknowledge it, which he 
 wisheth them to amend by building the house of the 
 Lord, whereuuto he would stir them up the rather, 
 by setting down the promise of grace and favour, by 
 blessing of their labours, and graciousl}' receiving their 
 service. But because the promise of good doth less 
 move than the fear of evil, especially the stubborn and 
 froward sinner, thercfon! the prophet tclleth them 
 again of that rod which God held over them, namely, 
 of the want and scarcity which they suffered ; and lest 
 they might imagine, that albeit they sutl'ered these 
 things, yet haply they might come from some other 
 causes, and not from God, he bringeth in the Lord 
 protesting so much, ' I did blow upon it;' or if they 
 would suppose that, albeit it wore the hand of God, 
 yet that it might come from some other cause than 
 this, it is also added, 'AH this came on them because 
 of his house that was so waste, while every man ran 
 to his own house.' This is the substance of the ex- 
 hortation whereby ho incltoth them to continue the 
 building of tho Lord's house, which they had so long 
 neglected ; wherefore they were punished of God by 
 scarcity and need in their goods, and by want of 
 strength In their bodies. 
 
 Tho first point to be noted, is that tho proiAet salth 
 nothing unto tho people but what the Lord hath given 
 
 him in charge ; for which cause he doth so often put 
 them in mind that ' this is the word of the Lord ' ; for 
 both the exhortation in the fifth and seventh verses 
 have the same annexed, and the reasons adjoined to 
 strengthen them in the eighth and ninth verses, 
 wherein he sheweth himself a vv ise and faithful steward 
 in dispensing the mysteries of God : faithful in that 
 he goeth not beyond his charge ; wise, in that he 
 fasteneth the thing which he would teach them the 
 more deeply in their minds by sundry repetitions. 
 For such is the frowardness of man's perverse nature, 
 that if we be any way crossed, we believe not, at the 
 least seem not to believe, the message therewithal 
 sent us, but persuade ourselves that the ministers 
 rather speak out of affection. Example whereof we 
 have in Johanan and the rest, &e., who, when Jeru- 
 salem was taken by tho Chaldeans, came to the 
 prophet Jeremiah, beseeching him to pray to God for 
 them, to teach them the way in which they should 
 walk, promising very earnestly to do according to all 
 things for which the Lord should send him to them. 
 But when Jeremiah had told them that it was tho 
 commandment of the Lord that they should dwell in 
 the land, and not go up into Egypt, &c., then Johanan 
 and all the proud men said unto Jeremiah, ' Thoa 
 speakest falsely; the Lord our God hath not sent thee 
 to say. Go not into Egypt, to dwell there ; but Baruch 
 provoked thee against us,' &c. A man would h.ave 
 thought that they who made so solemn promise would 
 not have so disobeyed the commandments of God ; but 
 Jeremiah so behaved himself in this message, that 
 they were ashamed to lay the blame (which they pre- 
 tended) on him, but said that he was thereto persuaded 
 by them to cast off the word of the Lord, as it had been a 
 lie devised against them by the malice of man ; and that 
 which increased the mischief, they said it was done to 
 the end that the Chaldeans might destroy them, whereas, 
 indeed, it was only fi)r their good. AVo are, therefore, 
 diligently to beware of these enchanting syrens, flesh 
 and blood, and not to hearken unto them ; and how- 
 belt the message delivered us by God's ministers serve 
 not our humour of pleasure and ease, yet to receive 
 the same not as the words of man, but as they arc 
 indeed, tho words of God ; for although we speak not 
 by revelation, as the prophet did, yet we speak by 
 knowledge ; and the very same which they saw by 
 extraordinary, do we now by ordinary. Tlie godly 
 ministers are called to the same ofilce that were tho 
 piicsts of the law, as JIalachi salth, to be the messen- 
 gers of the Lord of hosts ; and Paul speakcth not only 
 of himself, but of others also, such as Apolios and 
 Sosthenes were, ' Lei a man so think of us, as the 
 ministers of Christ,' &c. Whatsoever, therefore, tho 
 
 404 
 
Ykr. 5-11.] 
 
 SEIiMON III. 
 
 17 
 
 man be, so long as he preacheth the truth, let us 
 account thereof as of the doctrine of God himself; and 
 so oft as the word of God is alleged, so oft let 
 us think that this soundeth in our ears. The Lord 
 of Itosts. 
 
 Upon this riseth another point to bo likewise ob- 
 served, that the preachers and dispensers of God's 
 word in all their office behave themselves faithfully, 
 according to the function wherewith they are put in 
 charge ; and so Paul, having taught the Corinthians 
 their duties towards God's messengers, straightly addeth 
 the duty of the ministers : ' Now,' saith he, ' it is re- 
 quired of the stewards that they be found faithful ;' 
 which faithfulness concerneth not only the matter which 
 they are to handle, but the manner also, that they de- 
 liver the truth of God with all reverence, discretion, 
 and soberness ; which Peter teacheth also when he 
 saith, ' If any speak, let him speak as the words of 
 God;' wherefore he must say nothing but what he may 
 warrant by this which the prophet speaketh, ' Thus 
 saith the Lord.' But if hereunto the commandment 
 of Christ and his apostles move nothing, let the curse 
 threatened against the breakers of this commandment 
 move us. In the prophecy of Ezekiel, chap, xiii., 
 mention is made of two sorts of them that break this 
 commandment, prophesying out of their own hearts, 
 following their own spirit, when they had seen no- 
 thing : the one, of such men as saw lies, saying, The 
 Lord saith it, when the Lord hath not sent them. 
 One (saith the prophet) built up a wall, and the other 
 daubed it up with untempcred mortar ; and because 
 of that, the Lord saith his hand shall be upon them : 
 they shall not bo in the assemblies of his people, &c. 
 The other sort were of the prophets that sewed pillows 
 under all arm-holes, &c., soothing up the wicked with 
 promises of all happiness, telling them of peace, peace, 
 as if all things were well, whenas the Lord had threat- 
 ened heavy plagues against them, for which cause 
 there is a woe threatened them ; which judgment is 
 therefore said to be pronounced against them, because 
 they spake and prophesied when the Lord commanded 
 them not ; whereby we are put in mind to be careful 
 in behaving ourselves faithfully, as Moses did in all 
 his house, not to soothe np men in their sins, nor to 
 flatter the breakers of his commandments. 
 
 In which point I was desirous to satisfy them who 
 have a care how the church may be builded, which 
 causeth me to call to mind a point mistaken by some, 
 wherein I have been thought to have sown cushions 
 under the elbows, and pillows under the arm-holes of 
 some non-residents, when by occasion heretofore I 
 spake against that sin ; whereas I indeed, if my words 
 had been generally of them who multiply living upon 
 living, and have no care to discharge any of them, 
 that I had justified them in comparison of the mere non- 
 residents who stay here having no charge at all or 
 calling in this place, I might have been justly con- 
 demned of this fault ; but speaking in respect of some 
 405 
 
 that were present, who have a good care to build the 
 church of God, though they do it not in every place 
 with that diligence and assiduity they ought, and com- 
 paring them with others that, having no charge in this 
 place, follow only their pleasure, not doing so much 
 on any of their charges, as these do on all, I trust I 
 shall be cleared from this suspicion ; wherefore I would 
 you did consider that when I put a difference in the de- 
 gi-oes of this sin, I meant not to deny that all of it was 
 wicked and to be condemned, and that you would also 
 receive the message with such equity as it was deli- 
 vered. 
 
 I should come to the exhortation, but that some- 
 what is to be first said of the repetition, namely, why 
 so often this is added, Tlim'i saith the Lord; no doubt 
 to give this lesson to teachers, not to be grieved to 
 teach the self-same things oftentimes if they be neces- 
 sary to the hearers, not to think it loathsome to be 
 taught the same matter if it be profitable and expe- 
 dient for them. If Paul said that it grieved not him 
 to write the same things, and that it was for 
 them to whom he wrote a safe thing, how much 
 less ought it to grieve us ! how much more safe is it 
 for you, being a warrant by the example of the pro- 
 phet in this place, who rcpeateth the same words in 
 his exhortation in the 5th and 7th verses, and the 
 reason of his exhortation to the same efl'eot ; and in 
 the Gth and 9th verses, which, considering the pro- 
 phets set down their sermons in fewer words than 
 they preached, confirmeth more that which hath been 
 said, for if the Holy Ghost thought it necessary in so 
 brief a rehearsal to set so oft in the same words the 
 exhortation and reason of it, we may well know that 
 it is also needful for us often to keep the self- same 
 things. How oft is this one speech repeated in the 
 prophets, ' Shew the house of Israel their sins !' 
 How often doth St John reiterate that commandment, 
 'Love one another !' ' This is that old commandment !" 
 &c. ; ' This is that new commandment,' &c., 1 John ii. 
 How often doth our Saviour by divers similitudes 
 teach one and the very same thing. Mat. xiii. The 
 seven epistles in the Apocalypse are all shut up with 
 one court* answer, ' Let him that hath ears hear what 
 the Spirit saith,' &c.. Rev. ii. and iii. ; which point I 
 would they did consider who are grieved that we speak 
 so much of that sin of the negligence of careless pas- 
 tors ; for if skilful chirurgeons, after they have lanced 
 imposthumes, put in now tents day by day, should 
 not we also, whom God hath called to be the physi- 
 cians and chirurgeons of your souls. Mat. ix., after 
 we have lanced your wounds, daily also put in new 
 tents, that at length they may be healed ? The Lord, 
 by Ezekiel, chap, xxii., reproveth such prophets as 
 rose not up in the gaps and stood not in the breaches, 
 where ho useth a metaphor drawn from the manner of 
 warriors, who are wont to join their force together, and 
 to make a head against their enemies in such places 
 Qu. 'curt'?— Ed. 
 
18 
 
 EAINOLDS ON nAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 as tbey had made a breach. This fault of the negli- 
 gent pastor is one of the greatest breaches, whereunto 
 if we run not and stand not up in it, what may our 
 General and Captain think of us ? When Csesar 
 besieged Avaricum in France, his soldiers raised a 
 bulwark against it. The citizens set it on fire, which, 
 when Caisar's soldiers laboured to quench, one stood 
 in the gate, to whom was brought such matter as might 
 be cast into the fort to continue the flame. He that 
 first was there placed was shot through with a scor- 
 pion's bone, and so was slain ; in whose place came the 
 second, who, being so served, there followed the third 
 and the fourth ; neither was that place left without a 
 man while there remained any hope to do good. 
 There hath been a fire kindled to consume this hold 
 of sin. God forbid it should be quenched ; nay, it 
 cannot, indeed, for it is nourished by God's Spirit. 
 The papists themselves, at their Council of Trent, 
 after they had long debated the matter, they were 
 enforced by the clearness of the truth to conclude that 
 the pastor, by the law of God, is bound to be resident 
 on his charge ; what the law of man permits, it is for 
 the hardness of men's hearts, whereunto that may be 
 replied, that from the beginning it was not so ; where- 
 fore, although we be shot through with speeches as 
 sharp as arrows, yet let us shew ourselves no less 
 valiant than did the citizens of Avaricum, chiefly 
 seeing they fought but for a corruptible city, for the 
 safeguard of the body, and that with uncertain hope ; 
 but we fight for an incorruptible crown of glory, for 
 the eternal salvation of the soul, and that under un- 
 doubted hope. But we persuade ourselves better 
 things of you, brethren, whom we desire to remember 
 that the wounds of a friend is better than the kisses 
 of an enemy. Of myself I know, and I conceive the 
 like of others, that I only reprove this sin for the sal- 
 vation of your souls, and of them that are committed 
 to j'our charge ; and why the same is done so often, 
 we have example and warrant of the prophet, using so 
 many iterations of the same thing ; and of the good 
 chirurgeons, who cease not to applj' their medicines 
 till such time as they have cured the wound. 
 
 Now, to proceed, the exhortation is laid down in the 
 8th verse, ' Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, 
 and build this house.' The reasons hereof are be- 
 cause the Lord had already corrected them, ver. C, 9, 
 10, 11 ; where, as he threatcneth them punishment 
 if they do it not, so on the other side he promiseth 
 that he will take pleasure in them, &c., ver. 8, and 
 bestow his blessing on them if they do his command- 
 ment; but for that you have heard sullicicnlly already 
 in the exhortation, I will come to tlie reasons. It is 
 firat set down for them to consider, that because of the 
 neglect of God's commandment be bad chastised them 
 with dearth, famine, scarcity; wherein the first point 
 to le observed is, that the Lord did send these punish- 
 ments on them, for it is said, ' I blowed ou it, I called 
 for a drought.' For as God hath by bis power created 
 
 all things, so doth he continuully by his providence 
 govern and dispose of them. So that it is verified 
 that our Saviour saith, John v. 17, ' My Father work- 
 eth hitherto, and I also work.' For all things are his 
 work, and come from his power, though it be true that 
 he worketh most by secondary causes, even as it is 
 here said that to cause a famine among this people he 
 called for a drought upon the land and upon the moun- 
 tains, &c. ; for the heavens are appointed to water the 
 earth, Heb. vi., to make it fruitful, ' that it may yield 
 seed to the sower.' But neither can the rain make 
 the earth fruitful, nor can the earth bring forth her 
 fruit, without his blessing and providing; which the 
 prophet by occasion of the mention of God's blessing 
 to his church doth lay open: ' In that day I will hear, 
 saith the Lord: I will hear even the heavens, and they 
 shall hear the earth ; and the earth shall hear the corn, 
 and the wine, and the oil; and they shall hear Israel,' 
 Hosea ii. 21. By which is signified that all creatures 
 shall labour with common consent for Israel, for such 
 as fear and serve God ; that as they wish to have 
 necessaries from the earth, so the earth shall look for 
 rain from the heavens, &c. But all this the Lord 
 saith he will hear, that we may learn to lift up our 
 eyes from these second causes to him ; for men that 
 regard not this, would go no further than to say. This 
 dearth came from want of rain, &c., as though it were 
 not the Lord that ruleth these things; which Seneca 
 might teach us when he saith, what thou callest natm'e 
 is God, for God created the heavens, earth, and corn ; 
 ma}' say to us as John and Peter said to the people, 
 Acts iii. 12, 'Why look you on us as though by our 
 power and strength we had done this ? ' ' A sparrow 
 falletb not to the ground without his providence ;' 
 'There is no evil in the city' (i.e. no punishment of 
 evil) ' which the Lord hath not wrought,' Amos iii. G. 
 The want and need in goods, the weakness of the 
 body, the punishments here mentioned, are said to 
 come from him, Deut. iii. 8 ; for sometimes he with- 
 draweth the things themselves from them, sometimes 
 the power and faculty of them, though they remain. 
 For sometimes he worketh by these means and second 
 causes, sometimes without them ; yea, also against 
 them, as he teacheth us when signifying how wonder- 
 fully he preserved them in the wilderness, and fed 
 them, he yieldeth this as the reason, that he might 
 teach them, Deut. viii. 4, ' that men liveth not by 
 bread only, but by every word that proecedelh out of 
 the mouth of the Lord ;' that is, whatsoever he en- 
 forocth or commandeth to feed us. Yea, by the same 
 power he caused their raiment to endure and not to 
 wax old, and kept their feet that they swelled not. 
 Daniel, appointed to be fed with the king's ordinary, 
 Dan. i., fearing lest thereby he should be deliled 
 therewith, besought his governor that ho and his fel- 
 lows might feed on pulse instead thereof; but the 
 governor feared lest so they should be in worse taking 
 than the rest who fared on finer meats, but through 
 
 400 
 
Vek. 5-11.] 
 
 SERMON HI. 
 
 19 
 
 God's blessing they looked better with their diet than 
 the other with the king's ordinar}-. Pulse is but a 
 bomely meat, and by the physician's judgment but of 
 a bad juice, yet with God's blessing it is better than 
 a prince's fare; contrariwise without this, when the 
 people looked for much, it came to little, and when it 
 was brought home the Lord blowed upon it, and it 
 dispersed and vanished as it had been nothing. They 
 drank, but were not filled; they did eat, but were not 
 satisfied ; put on clothes, but were not warmed ; because 
 these creatures wanted that secret blessing by which 
 God giveth force to the clothes to warm, bread to 
 nourish, drink to quench the thirst ; as when he 
 pleaseth lie sometimes taketh away the things them- 
 selves, in both to teach us to cast up our eyes from 
 the earth to heaven, from the creature to the Creator; 
 which lot us do, and when such things befall us, re- 
 member the speech of Job, who when his goods were 
 spoiled, &c., considered not the Sabeaus, but looked 
 directly upon the first cause, which ruled and governed 
 the second, and therefore said, ' The Lord hath given, 
 and the Lord hath taken,' Job i. 15, 21. 
 
 Which that we may so much the more, let us also 
 consider the next point that foUoweth, which is the 
 benefit that ariseth to the church by these punish- 
 ments ; for as the physician ministereth a bitter potion 
 to his patient, and draweth away his meat, to the end 
 to heal and cure his malady, and as the father chas- 
 tises his child, whom he would have reclaimed, Heb. 
 xii. (i, so the Lord correcteth this people, that they 
 might leave their sins, which is taught them when the 
 prophet saith, that this was done because each man 
 ran to his own house, and suffered the Lord's house 
 to lie waste ; and so also would it fare with us when 
 we neglect God ; we would even perish out of the way, 
 if God called us not back by his correction ; which 
 Elihu also noteth to be one means whereby God doth 
 recall men from sin : Job xxxiii. 19, 'He also strikelh 
 him with sorrow on his bed, and the multitude of his 
 bones with a sore grief,' &x. 'If there be with him a 
 messenger and interpreter, one of a thousand, who can 
 shew his equity,' &c. ; and the prophet at large in the 
 psalm openeth the same by sundry examples of such 
 as wander up and down, Ps. cvii,, and them that are 
 in prison or tossed on the sea, and that inhabit barren 
 grounds, &c. : noting this of them all, that when they 
 cry to him out of their distress, he heareth them and 
 helpeth, as he did Jonah out of the whale's belly. 
 This should we consider to be the cause of wars and 
 other chastisements, and not refer them (as some are 
 wont) to the eclipse of the sun or moon, or conjunc- 
 tion of some planets, or to the sextile or quadrate 
 aspect of them. No; plagues, wars, sickness, famine, 
 they are not effects of these causes ; the eclipse is in 
 ns, not in the sun or moon, that causeth these things. 
 It is for that the moon, whereby (in the Apocalypse) 
 are signified all changeable things, is not trod under 
 our feet as it should be. Re v. xii. 1 , 2 ; but is lifted above 
 407 
 
 us, and doth eclipse the light of God's grace that it 
 cannot shine upon us. Men's unchaste and unnatu- 
 ral conjunctions, their greedy and covetous aspects, 
 their cruelty and extortion, these are the planets whose 
 conjunction and aspects cause wars, plagues, and 
 famine, which I do not speak as though the heavenly 
 bodies did not work at all. I know and confess they 
 have their physical effects (though the division of 
 heavens into the houses and parts, which the astrolo- 
 gians set down, be most fantastical and blockish) but 
 to teach us to cast our eyes from the second causes to 
 the first, and that we would have our e3"es fixed on our 
 own sins for which God layeth his chastisement upon 
 us, whereof the Jews had experience, who were then 
 punished by tyrants and oppressors, when they fell 
 from God and renounced his religion ; which the pro- 
 phet sheweth when he saith, that war taught them 
 that which they could not before learn in peace. Judges 
 iii. 2. When Eli's sons, through their wickedness, 
 caused the service of God to be despised, the Lord 
 sent war amongst them, and the ark was taken, 
 &c. ; when the Jews would be by no means reclaimed, 
 the Lord telleth them, by the prophet, that he would 
 do unto them, as he had done unto Shiloh for the 
 wickedness of his people, Jer. vii. 14 ; to the same 
 efl'ect also the same prophet, chap. xxvi. 5, G, &c., 
 threateneth the hke curse to all the cities of Judah, &c. ; 
 whereby we may gather that the Lord calleth his ser- 
 vants by war, dearth, &e., at such time as they are, 
 as .you would say, provender-pricked. 
 
 But, leaving them, let us apply these things to our- 
 selves. Remember the exhortation which the prophet 
 useth to the building of the Lord's house, and you 
 have heard the proportion betwixt their temple and our 
 church. The time admonisheth us, even as it did 
 them, to consider our ways ; for we are visited with 
 scarcity even as were they, but behold, whenas by 
 reason hereof we should be humbled under the mighty 
 hand of God, to call our ways to remembrance, and to 
 mend our naughty manners, we are wanton, and give 
 ourselves to sporting and pastime, the which is by the 
 sound of the trumpet signified, not the sound of a 
 trumpet to proclaim a fast, as the Lord commandeth 
 by the prophet, but to proclaim idle and ungodly 
 plays, as though we were resolved to verify that which 
 the prophet saith, '1 called' (saith the Lord) 'to weep- 
 ing and mourning, and behold eating and drinking,' 
 &c., Isa. xxii. 12-14 ; which is also so much the 
 worse that these plays have been condemned by statute 
 of our university, yea, worst of all, for that at this 
 time there is an order appointed by authority for 
 extraordinary prayers to bo used, whereas we not only 
 take no such order, but rather the quite contrary by 
 this disorder, which is such that the cry thereof is carried 
 from one side of the town to the other, and though 
 that cannot be said of it as of the cry of them that sat 
 them down to eat and drink, and rose up to play; — it 
 is not the sound of them that have the worse, &c., — yet 
 
20 
 
 EAIKOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 not far unlike may it bo said ; it is not the cry of war- 
 riors, but of wantons ; and here the prophet setteth 
 it down that they sowed much, &c., and layeth down 
 the cause, for that the Lord's house did lie waste. 
 Let us also consider, as the prophet commandeth, our 
 own ways. I will not descend to particularpersons, but 
 let every man consider it on his bed, whether there 
 be not some who, having many ecclesiastical livings, 
 and much coming in yearly into their hands thereby, 
 yet may count it so as though it had been put into a 
 bottomless purse ; and whether many that live on 
 pulse be not in as good liking as they that feed on 
 such variety. I leave it to your o'mi consideration. 
 In ancient time, the pastors had good livings allotted 
 them, but they waxed careless, negligent, and sloth- 
 ful in discharging their duties, insomuch that certain 
 hundred of years the fault of non-residency was spoke 
 against and misliked, as Edward III. his epistle to the 
 pope doth testify. What ensued hereupon ? Were 
 not the livings hereupon so abused, taken away by 
 little and little ? And they, who wore put in trust to 
 dispose them, did they not make merchandise of them, 
 that so the church was spoiled on each side ? and of 
 them that should feed others it might be said. You 
 feed yourselves. Now, because pastors cannot feed 
 others unless themselves be also nourished, and that 
 there might be a continual supply when any failed, 
 our ancestors provided nurseries for learning, as 
 abbeys, bishops' houses, cathedral churches, colleges 
 in sundry places of this realm, beside our universities. 
 The abbeys they fell to idleness, pleasure, pampering 
 of their bodies, &c. ; wherefore God hath done unto 
 them as he did unto Shiloh, their dwellings were 
 wasted, &c. Shiloh was destroyed for the wickedness 
 of the priests, from whom iniquity (as the prophet 
 saith) went forth into all the land, and is it not to be 
 feared lest the same also happen to our bishoprics ? 
 Nay, would to God it were not passed fearing ; for 
 are hot bishops impoverished ? Cathedral churches 
 
 also, and but very few colleges, except these in our 
 universities, liut they have been brought to the same 
 decay that abbeys have been; and shall not the like 
 happen to our colleges ? I am sorry to say it, but 
 the Lord hath said it (and not one of his words shall 
 fall to the ground), if we hear not his word to turn 
 from our evil ways, and leave our transgressions, he 
 will do unto us he did to Shiloh, Jer. ssvi. 6. God 
 hath provided a nursery for his church by these means 
 to the establishing of doctrine and discipline amongst 
 us ; but seeing that the means for this end appointed 
 have not been so used, he will no doubt even deal with 
 bishoprics as he hath done with abbeys, for the word 
 of God is gone out of his mouth, and shall be cer- 
 tainly accomplished. He that is neither prophet nor 
 prophet's child may see this. All men know what 
 forwardness the thing was in in King Edward's days, 
 when so many things went to wreck, not through his 
 fault, but theirs who, in his minority, were put in 
 trust with the matters of the realm, whecas the dis- 
 solution of the bishopric of Durham was brought 
 about, which had been so continued, had it not pleased 
 God to send Queen Mary to dissolve that dissolution, 
 as he sent the Philistines to deliver David, else had 
 a bishopric (so necessary for the church) been quite 
 lost, and had come to the same end that Shiloh did. 
 God be praised our prince hath been careful to pre- 
 serve these, and give us grace to use them to his 
 glory, lest that happen to them which the ungodly 
 wish for, who in their minds have devoured them. 
 The only way to turn away these plagues is for us to 
 do our duty in that vocation whereunto we are called. 
 The history of Agrippa and his fable, for the belly 
 and other members.* If they shall see these things 
 so well bestowed and necessarily as he proved to 
 them, and will be as well content as the Komans to 
 maintain the senators. 
 
 • Livi. lib. i. iu orationo Menenii AgrippsD. 
 
 SEEMON IV. June 11. 1584. 
 
 Go up to the mountain, and hring timber, and build this house; and I uill take delight in it, and I uill be glorified 
 
 in it, saith the Lord. — Haggai I. 8. 
 
 THE prophet Haggai, being sent by special com- 
 mandment of the Highest to preach to the Jews 
 that were returned from the captivity of Babylon, and 
 to stir them up to the buikhng of the temple, the 
 foundation whereof was laid before, because they were 
 faulty herein, doth first reprove them for that they 
 were so carefiil to ceil their own houses, but suffer the 
 Lord's house to he waste; and next doth advertise 
 them to call to mind the punishments which tbev suf- 
 fered, ih sowing much, and bringing home little; in 
 eating, and not having enough ; in drinking, but not 
 being filled ; in clothing themselves, but not being 
 ■warm ; in earning of wages, and putting it, as it were, 
 
 into a bottomless bag, shewing that all this did light 
 upon them for this cause, because they left the house 
 of the Lord waste, and everj- man ran to his own 
 house. Thirdly, he exhorteth them that they would 
 go up to the mountain, and bring timber and build 
 the house, and so promiseth he will accept thereof, 
 and be glorified, &c. Of the former parts, and, 
 namely, of the reproof and advertisement, I have 
 spoken heretofore ; it foUowcth that I now speak of the 
 exhortation in this 8th verso, iu the which there are 
 two things to bo observed : /nxt, who it is that es- 
 hortetb ; secondh/, what bo exhorteth unto. First, 
 who exhorteth '? Tho Lord himself, signified in the 
 
 408 
 
Yer. S.J 
 
 sEr,>rox IV. 
 
 21 
 
 last words of the verse, ' saitli the Lord ; ' secondly, 
 to what be exhorteth : that they ' go up to the moun- 
 tain, and bring timber to build the house.' The 
 which exhortation, that it may be more effectual, he 
 addeth thereunto two reasons to stir them up to that: 
 he exhortcth them, fu-st, that he will accept of it ; 
 secondly, that be will be glorified ; so that, in the sub- 
 stance, there are three branches commended to us in 
 these words to be considered : first, who cxhorteth ; 
 secondly, the thing he exhorteth ; thu-dly, the reasons 
 for which he exhorteth them thereunto. 
 
 For the first, it is the Lord ; for though the exhor- 
 tation be delivered by the voice and ministry of the 
 prophet, yet is it indeed the Lord that exhorteth them, 
 even as it is added, ' saith the Lord ; ' and this, as the 
 rest of the prophets are wont often to mention, and 
 that to raise up the hearts of the people to the dutiful 
 consideration of that which is uttered ; for Haggai also 
 mentioneth the same both in the former words, and 
 here again, and likewise afterward, having thought it 
 good to put them still in remembrance thereof, thereby 
 to move them to obey and believe the commandment 
 and promise delivered from the Lord, the which the 
 very name of God which the prophet useth doth 
 therefore recommend more effectually to them, because 
 it layeth before their eyes the majesty of him that 
 speaketh, and the truth of the speech. For whereas 
 in the language which the prophet spake there are 
 divers names attributed to God, some of them betoken- 
 ing his almightiness and all-sufiiciency, some his majesty 
 and power, some his authority and judgment, one, 
 mn^, there is above the rest that most lively express- 
 eth his eternal essence, the constancy also, and the 
 truth of his word, as the which is derived from a word 
 that signifieth to be, betokening not only the eternal 
 essence of the Lord of majesty, as John sheweth in his 
 Eevelation, where be openeth the meaning of that 
 name, when he saith. Rev. i. 8, 'I am Alpha and 
 Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, 
 which is, which was, and which is to come, even the 
 Almighty,' as it were interpreting that which he spake 
 of himself by the prophet. Moses demanded by what 
 name he should call him, if the people of Israel in- 
 quired who sent him; 'I am,' saith he, 'that I am,' 
 Exod. iii. 14. For when our Savioirr said of himself, 
 ' Before Abraham was I am,' John viii. 58, he meant 
 to shew the eternity and everlastingness of his God- 
 head, that was from the beginning, or rather, indeed, 
 without any beginning or end, being ' the same yester- 
 day, and to-day, and for ever,' Heb. xiii. 8. Neither 
 thereby is the eternity only of his majesty noted, but 
 the truth also and certainty of his word and promise, 
 which in the 6th of Exodus is signified so plainly, that 
 the words could not be interpreted unless the name 
 Jehovah were there retained, ' I appeared unto Abra- 
 ham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, by the name of Al- 
 mighty, but by my name Jehovah was I not known 
 nnto them," whereby he signifieth that, as afterwards 
 409 
 
 himself expoundeth it, that nnto them he made the 
 promise of giving them the land of Canaan, but that 
 he had not made his promise to be, as a man would 
 say, therefore afterwards he addeth, to tell the chil- 
 dren of Israel, I am Jehovah, I will bring yon from 
 under the burden of Egypt ; I am Jehovah, I will 
 make that to be which I have promised to your 
 fathers, who relied on my promises, as knowing me 
 by my name Almighty, and believing that I would do 
 it, but not by my name Jehovah that I did it indeed, 
 Exod. vi. 6, 7, 8. But after the four hundred and 
 thirty years were accomplished (which was the time 
 prescribed to Abraham), then performed he, Exod. 
 xii. 41, that which before he had promised. Gen. 
 XV. 13, Gal. iii. 17, Acts vii. 6 ; and this the 
 apostle declareth when ho, speaking of the hope of 
 eternal life, saith that ' God, which cannot lie, hath 
 promised before the world began,' Titus i. 2. As if 
 he would say, that if it be his promise, then must it 
 needs be performed ; for he is not a man that he 
 should lie, nor as the son of man, that he should pro- 
 mise and not perforin. Numb, xxiii. 19. So that by 
 the name of Lord of majestv', which the prophet 
 useth in his language, betokening him that was from 
 everlasting, that is, and is to come, the same for 
 ever, who is most true in his word, most constant in 
 his promises, God which cannot he. The prophet 
 would stir them iip to be careful to receive the mes- 
 sage delivered with faith to his promise adjoined to 
 the precept ; and obedience to the precept established 
 by the promise ; and this is the holj- preparation which 
 we also have need of, that the message delivered from 
 God may with faith and obedience be received of us, 
 as of them. This, though I need not to stand upon 
 here, because it hath been oftentimes handled in your 
 hearing, yet because the prophet again and again 
 repeateth it, I cannot pass it over, chiefly seemg that 
 the prophet, though sent immediately, and instructed 
 of God, useth to warrant his message by these words, 
 the case being not alike in us, who, although we be 
 sent of God, yet are we sent bj- men also ; neither have 
 we our commission from his own mouth immediately, 
 but by writing in the scripture ; but you that have 
 learned that the whole Scripture, given by inspiration 
 of God, is profitable to teach, convince, correct, and 
 iustiTict in righteousness, that the man of God may 
 be absolute, even throughly absolute, and made per- 
 fect unto all good works, 2 Tim. iii. 16, 17 ; I say 
 you have also learned that the message therein deli- 
 vered us, is the same message sent before by the pro- 
 phets and apostles, to whom the Lord himself spake 
 immediately ; neither did he only ordaia in his church 
 apostles and prophets, but gave also pastors and 
 teachers, for gathering together of the saints, for the 
 work of the ministry, and for the edification of the 
 body of Christ, Eph. iv. 11, 12. Therefore, we 
 also have commission from God to deliver his will 
 unto you, and do his message so long as we can 
 
22 
 
 EAIXOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 soundly profess that the corrections, exhortations, 
 &c., which we use, are deduced from the writings of 
 the apostles and prophets, which he hath delivered to 
 his church, and appointed us his servants to cut the 
 word aright, 2 Tim. ii. 15, and thereby to feed your 
 souls. It must be, therefore, our care, that the words we 
 speak be as the words of God, 1 Pet. iv. 11 ; and you, 
 brethren, should be likewise skilful in the Scriptures, 
 to discern the spirits of them that preach unto you, 
 1 John iv. 1 ; but the doctrine we preach being 
 rightly delivered, yon are no otherwise to receive than 
 if the Lord himself, by his prophets and apostles, did 
 speak unto you. And this being the substance of 
 that which I thought to note briefly in this first point, 
 namely, that both we which teach are to learn, that 
 what we teach we must deliver unto you as the word 
 of God, and you that hear are to receive and hear it 
 as it is indeed, not the word of man, but of God, 
 1 Thes. ii. 13. I come to the doctrine comprehended 
 in the second point (with the matter of the exhorta- 
 tion), delivered, first, to the Jews by the prophet; 
 secondly, by consequence to us all. 
 
 ' Go vj],'' saith the prophet, ' to the mountain; hiiiir/ 
 timber, and build this Iioiifse.' Where, first, for the 
 better understanding of these words, that is to be ob- 
 served, that the house of God in Jerusalem was 
 built on a mountain, even on the mountain or hill of 
 Moriah, as it is apparent out of 2 Chron. iii. 1 ; which 
 place being chose by the Lord himself for the seat of 
 his sanctuary, the Jews, reluming out of captivity, 
 came, by direction of Zerubbabel and Joshua, to set 
 the temple on her former seat, that is to say, upon 
 her old foundation, as it is declared in the book of 
 Ezra, chap. ii. ; and as they came to set it on the old 
 foundations, so they began, in the 3d chapter, though 
 hindered by divers devices of the adversaries all the 
 days of Cyrus, and unto the second year of Darius. 
 The prophet therefore, now, in the second year of 
 Darius, stirreth them up to go forward with the work 
 begun, and to build up the whole work upon the foun- 
 dation, exhorting them to go up to the mountain, and 
 bring timber, and build the house ; but because the 
 work was painful and laborious, Ezra iv. 5, 6, 23, 24, 
 and the people of the Jews, as all of us are by nature, 
 had rather to j)lay for nothing than work for nothing, 
 therefore the Lord, by the prophet, stirreth them up 
 hereunto, by adjoining bis promises, 1, of his grace 
 and favour; 2, with liis gracious blessing; 1, I will 
 take delight in it ; 2, I will be glorified. 
 
 Touching the former, it may seem strange that 
 God promiscth to take delight in the temple ; for if 
 he taketh no pleasure in the strength of a horse, 
 neither delight in any man's legs, how much less 
 likely is it that he should take dcliglit in an heap of 
 stones and timber ? But we must consider the temple 
 not nakedly in itself, but in such sort as respecteth 
 the use and signification of it. First, the signification, 
 in that it betokened Christ Jesus, of whom it was a 
 
 figm-e and shadow, Heb. x. 1, Col. ii. 17 ; secondly, 
 the use and end whereunto it was directed, namely, 
 to serve God. For the signification, you know that 
 the apostle, in the epistle to the Hebrews, as also 
 to the Colossians, doth plainly teach that the things 
 under the law were shadows to represent Christ ; 
 they were shadows, but he the body ; even so the 
 whole temple was a figure and shadow of Christ, 
 and that not of himself only, but of his church 
 also : of him as the head ; of it as the body. So 
 the parts thereof shadowed him, as the apostle in the 
 9th and 10th to the Hebrews teacheth, the veil sig- 
 nifying his flesh, whereby he entered into heaven as 
 into the holy of holies ; so the altar of incense, the 
 sacrifices, the blood, which were oflered, the table 
 whereon they were ofiered, &c., all these things ap- 
 pertaining to the Levitieal services, were so many 
 mysteries to represent and shadow out unto us the 
 person of Chi'ist, in whom the light and truth of them 
 all shineth. Neither hereby only was the head figured, 
 but the whole body also, for so saith the apostle to the 
 Corinthians, ' You are the temple of the living God,' 
 1 Cor. iii. 17, 1 Cor. vi. 19. Now the Lord himself 
 saith of our Saviour, Mat. iii. 17, 1 Cor. vi. 16, ' This 
 is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased ;' and 
 we also read in the Ephesians, i. 6, that it hath ' pleased 
 him of his infinite mercy to accept and take delight in 
 us in his Beloved.' Wherefore you see that God might 
 take delight in the temple, in that it signified and 
 shadowed out Christ, in whom only, if we speak abso- 
 lutely and properly, God is delighted ; as also his 
 members whom it hath pleased God to adopt, and so 
 to delight in Lis beloved Sou, whom also he vouch- 
 safeth this grace, that he accepteth not only of their 
 persons, but of their works too : wherein the latter 
 promise is contained (and I will be glorified), which re- 
 gardeth the end whereunto this bouse was built, to be a 
 house of prayer, and to ofi'er up praise and thanksgiving 
 for his mercy, Jer. vii. 10, to hear his word read and 
 expounded ; and so, because these works of Christians 
 are acceptable through Christ, in this respect also it 
 may be said, that ho took great delight in the temple. 
 Not in itself, as pilgrimagers imagine, that God delight- 
 cth in places for themselves, or because that holy men 
 have possessed them. For when these actions I spake 
 of were not practised in this place, but the temple 
 was so polluted thiit it did not represent his dearly 
 beloved Son, God himself shewed (sending his pro- 
 phets to them) that he took no dehght in it, Jer. vii. 
 4, 11, and namely, by the prophet Ezekiel, to whom 
 the Lord shewed the great abominations that the house 
 of Israel had committed, to cause him to depart from 
 his sanctuary, Ezek. viii. C, &c., which, having at 
 large in that chapter shewed, in the 11th chapter he 
 declareth how the cherubims lift up their wings, and 
 mounted from the earth, and went forth and stood 
 upon the mountain ; and so, by degrees, the Lord for- 
 sook them, from the sanctuarv to the threshold of the 
 
 410 
 
Ver. S.] 
 
 SERMON IV. 
 
 23 
 
 temple, then to the cherubims which stood at the 
 right hand of the com-t, verse 8, then to the east gate 
 and entrance of the court, verse 19, to provoke the 
 people of the city to repentance, and openly to shew 
 his departure ; finally, flying from the city into the 
 mountain, chap. xi. 18, declaring thereby that he took 
 no delight, no, not in his temple, when his religion 
 was not therein maintained, and it not applied to those 
 uses whereunto it was erected. And where ever hath 
 there been either any person more holy abiding, or 
 any actions more godly practised, than in the temple 
 at Jerusalem, where Christ Jesus himself jireached 
 and taught the people ? Yet even this place, if ever any, 
 beloved both for the persons and actions, was so 
 detested of him when it ceased to practise these 
 actions, and to present that whereunto it was insti- 
 tuted, that not many years after our Saviour's death, 
 it was, as you know, ruined by the Romans, and made 
 even with the ground ; yea, when Julian the apostate, 
 in despite of Christ, went about to raise it up again, 
 it pleased God, by miracles, to shew his dislike there- 
 of, first by an earthquake, and then by flakes of fii'e 
 issuing out of the earth and plaguing the workmen, 
 which not only RufEnus* and Sozomenet write of, but 
 also Ammianus Marcelliuus, J who lived at that time and 
 served Julian, being a great admu-er of him, witnessing 
 that out of the earth there issued such flames of fire as 
 consumed the workmen sundry times, and so brought 
 to pass that the work could not be accomplished. 
 
 Hereb}' it is manifest, that God delighted not in 
 the temple of itseU", neither yet for the persons that 
 have been conversant therein, and actions performed, 
 when they ceased to be, but because it represented 
 Chi-ist Jesus and his church, in whom, indeed, be 
 delighted ; and as it might be used to the service 
 of the people of God therein to worship him with a 
 holj' worship, yea, in this respect, he saith he will 
 take such delight in it, that this temple should be 
 more accepted than the former. Hag. ii. 7 (though it 
 were for the building nothing so glorious), because in 
 this Christ Jesus himself should bo present in person. 
 And this is the former reason, namely, the favour 
 which he will shew them. Now, out of his favour pro- 
 ceedeth his benefit : and that is it which he addeth, I 
 will be glorified, for we may perceive that this is the 
 meaning of these words, if we match them with those 
 that go before, and those that follow after; for, having 
 before laid down the punishments that were fallen 
 upon them, he adjoineth withal the cause thereof, 
 for that each man ran to his own house, and left the 
 house of the Lord waste. Now, things contraiy have 
 contraiy consequences ; as if he had thus said in efiect. 
 As those chastisements which heretofore you suflered 
 came upon yon because you did not build the house 
 of the Lord, so, on the other side, if you do build the 
 same, you shall be refi-eshed by sundiy blessings ; yet, 
 
 * Kuffinus, lib. i. cap. ult. % Ammi. Mar. lib. xxy. 
 
 t Sozom. lib. v. cap. ult. 
 411 
 
 by the way, when he saith, I will be glorified, he 
 putteth them in mind what they ought to do when 
 they have received these benefits, for so by the conse- 
 quent he betokeneth the antecedent ; by the glorify- 
 ing of him, the holy invocation of his name, whereby 
 he is glorified ; and these be the reasons whereby 
 he stirreth up the Jews to go up and bring timber and 
 build the house. But doth the prophet stir up them 
 only, and not us also ? Yes, my brethren, even us 
 also. For whom, whatsoever beforetime'was written 
 (as the apostle saith to the Romans, chap. xv. 4), for 
 oiu' sakes, I say, was it written, that we, in the assur- 
 ance of God's favours and blessings (which contain 
 the promises of this life and that which is to come, 
 1 Tim. iv. 8), should do the same things that here are 
 mentioned. Therefore up to the mountain, bring 
 wood, and build this house ; for as you have heard 
 that this house was a figure of Christ and Christians, 
 so let us remember, as they were willed to build that 
 material temple, so we likewise are required to edify 
 the church of Christ, which that you may the better 
 do, consider with me the points noted in the things 
 whereunto they are exhorted, and the reasons, although 
 the time will not sufler me indeed to stand on the reasons ; 
 howbeit I must request that iu the meanwhile you have 
 an eye unto the reasons that are drawn from the rewards 
 proposed to them that perform the commandment, that 
 so you may be stirred up with a fervent zeal to per- 
 form that to which so glorious a reward is promised. 
 
 And, first, let us consider who they are that be ex- 
 horted. It is before saiil, Zerubbabel and Joshua, the 
 prince and the priest, as they whose help and endeavour 
 is most necessary to the building of the church, because 
 they were as guides to direct others ; yet, as it is manifest 
 in the 13th and 14th verses, the prophet was sent to the 
 remnant of the people, and the promise as well made 
 unto them, and their hearts likewise stirred up that 
 they came and did the work of the house of the Lord. 
 They, therefore, who are to bidld by God's command- 
 ment are Zerubbabel and Joshua, with all the remnant 
 of the people ; principally Zerubbabel and Joshua, 
 who are best able for special graces and gifts bestowed 
 on them, or because of the ministry of the word and 
 authority committed unto them ; but next all the people 
 likewise, not the prince and high priest only. Now 
 for the princes, how the temple is to be built by 
 them, I shewed you when I spake of the former 
 verse ; at which time I shewed, for the general build- 
 ing, that the foundation hereof is, as the apostle to the 
 Hebrews declareth, the doctrine of the beginning of 
 Christ taught and contained in the catechism, Heb. 
 vi. 1, the building of the wall, the laying of the roof, 
 is the perfection of doctrine and increase of godliness, 
 till it be built in all respects perfect, even such a one 
 as pleaseth God himself to pourtray out in Scripture. 
 Therefore touching the general building I then spake, 
 which must be done bj'them that are in principal place, 
 the queen's highness and the states in parliament, 
 
2t 
 
 r.AIXOLDS ox RAGGAI. 
 
 and declared how it was to be done for the increase of 
 true godliness, by preaching of wholesome doctrine 
 and establishing go(]l_y discipline through all churches 
 in the realm, according to the prescription of the Lord 
 revealed in his word. A thing though hardly hoped 
 for in these days, iu which so small care is had in 
 universities to make sufficient persons to furnish the 
 ministry, and of patrons abroad to call them that are 
 sufficient ; finally, so small will in the people to sub- 
 mit themselves to the yoke of Christ. Yet it is to be 
 prayed for of God's people, according to the example 
 of Daniel, who, when the temple of God lay waste 
 more than ours, did make earnest prayer to God to 
 cause his face to shine on his sanctuary that did lie 
 waste, for the Lord's sake. But leaving this to them 
 that have amongst us the place of Zerubbabel and 
 Joshua, and of whom we are to hope in due time they 
 will have a care that the church of God in all places 
 be perfectly built up in the wj[sdom and spirit of 
 Joshua, let us remember the next branch, namely, 
 that this commandment reacheth also to all the rest 
 of the people ; for that this charge concerneth also all 
 us likewise, St Judo the apostle and brother of James 
 expressly teacheth, ver. 21-23, when he saith, ' But 
 ye, beloved, edify yourselves in your most holy faith, 
 praying in the Holy Ghost, and keeping yourselves in 
 the love of God, looking for the mercy of the Lord 
 Jesus Christ unto eternal life. And have compassion 
 of some, in putting difference : and others save some 
 ■with fear, pulling them out of the fire ; and hate even 
 the garment spotted with the flesh.' For whom are 
 they that Jude giveth this charge ? Even they who 
 are called and sanctified of God the Father, and saved 
 by Jesus Christ, even as the title of the epistle shew- 
 eth, in which respect it is also caWcd i/nicrrtl, as written 
 to all faithful Christians. Now, the foundation that 
 we are to build upon is, as the apostle here saith, ' the 
 most holy faith.' For that Jude signilieth when he 
 saith, ' edify ' or ' build up yourselves on your most 
 holy faith.' The walls and roof of the house are the 
 exercise of the works of faith, namely, the love of God 
 and man breaking out into fruits of righteousness, so 
 that we 'hate even the gannent spotted by flesh.' In 
 which speech there is an allusion to the law of Moses, 
 wherein the clothes and garments that had touched any 
 unclean things were likewise accounted unclean, as if 
 ho would thercliy teach them that they were to grow 
 on continually from faith to faith, in practice of godli- 
 ness, with such a fervent zeal that they detest all con- 
 tagion of sin, and shew themselves perfect, according 
 as the weakness of men will suffer, as their heavenly 
 Father is perfect ; but, alas, may I make this exhor- 
 tation to all that are assembled iu this place ? I make 
 it to all, but would to God there were not in some 
 even a want of the foundation. For what is the foun- 
 dation ? It is, as Jude saith, ' a most holy faith.' 
 Now, St Paul to the Thessalonians writcth ' that all 
 have not faith,' 2 Thes. iii. 2. Doubtless these words 
 
 were true, not only in his days, but in ours, wherein, 
 sure, all men have not faith ; and though all had faith, 
 3'et have they not this faith which Jude nameth, a 
 most hnhj faith, for many have faith which yet have 
 not a most holy faith, which is the essential difference 
 whereby the faith of hypocrites and wicked men is 
 distinguished from the faith of God's true servants. 
 For there is a belief which is without holiness, 
 whereof St James speaketh when he saikk, ' The 
 devils believe and tremble,' James ii. 19. 
 
 Butasforyou, my brethren, who, by the testimonyof 
 your consciences, know that Jude speaketh to you who 
 are called and sanctified, remember you that this ex- 
 hortation is in special sort made to you, namely, that 
 you ' build up yourselves upon your most holy faith, 
 keeping yourselves in the love of God ' and man, &c. 
 The exhortation is made to all, God grant that all may 
 embrace it, but it shall bo embraced of all to whom 
 St Jude wr'tcth. Let us all, then, that make a pro- 
 fession of this faith, ' join virtue with our faith, with 
 virtue, knowledge ; with knowledge, temperance ; with 
 temperance, patience ; with patience, godliness ; with 
 godliness, brotherly kindness ; and with brotherly 
 kindness, love,' 2 Pet. i. 4, &c. ; in which words, as 
 it were, St Peter doth interpret the other, making 
 faith the foundation as it were of all other virtues, 
 willing the rest to be built upon it, not as though 
 these were distinct, but mentioning so oft the same 
 by divers names, as if he would shew he could not 
 satisfy himself with any words when he was earnest 
 to exhort such as called upon the name of the Lord 
 to depart from iniquity, 2 Tim. ii. 19, and to lay the 
 walls of a holy and godly conversation upon the foun- 
 dation of an holy and sound faith. The apostle Paul 
 hkewise to Titus, chap. ii. 11, delivereth the same 
 thing, though in fewer words, ' The grace of God,' 
 saith he, ' that bringeth salvation unto all men, hath 
 appeared, and teacheth us that we should deny un- 
 godliness and worldly lusts, and that we should live 
 soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present evil 
 world";' which words, would God they were so well 
 marked of us, as they are continually rehearsed in our 
 assemblies, mherhj, ruihteomhj, (jodbj, containing the 
 substance of all religion : sobcrhj, in respect of our 
 own vessels ; riiihtcoimli/, in respect of other men ; 
 <]odhi, in respect of God himself. In the duties 
 touching the which three the whole law and the pro- 
 phets consist, neither must we only take care to build 
 up ourselves in this sort, but others also, 1 Thes. v. 
 11. For so St Jude also commandcth, ' And have 
 compassion of some, and others save with fear, pull- 
 ing them out of the fire.' Though if St Judo taught 
 it not, yet we may learn it out of St Paul, when ho 
 willeth us to exhort one another, for every one of us 
 is the temple of God's holy Spirit, and every one of 
 us is exhorted to build up this temple according to 
 the grace which is given him. Not all, indeed, as 
 the ministers, who arc specially given for the gathcr- 
 
 412 
 
Ver. S.] 
 
 SEEMON IV. 
 
 ing of the saints together, for the work of the ministiy, 
 and for edification of the body of Christ, Eph. iv. 
 11, 12, but in some sort by example and woi'd, at 
 due times and seasons, according to the measure of 
 grace given to them ; and this do the godly in the 
 prophecy of Isaiah, where they are brought in, one ex- 
 horting, encom'aging, and calling upon another, Isa. 
 ii. 2, 3, ' Come, let us go up to the house of the Lord, 
 and he will teach us his ways, and we will walk in 
 his paths.' And David rejoiced when he heard them 
 say, ' Come, let us go up to the house of the Lord ; 
 our feet shall stand in thy gates, Jerusalem,' Ps. 
 cxxii. 1, 2. But with us there is so httle care had 
 hereof, that men take scorn to be advertised of their 
 duty, especially by their inferiors, yea, that they who 
 should advertise others, and be advertised themselves 
 too, are most careless of all men, and some there are 
 so reckless and careless in this respect of going up 
 and bringing timber and building the house of the 
 Lord, that they no whit regard it, as though it no 
 whit appertained to them to build others. But let us 
 learn that it was the voice of Cain, ' Am I my 
 brother's keeper ?' Gen. iv. 9. Keuben, though none 
 of the best sons of Jacob, yet when he saw that 
 Joseph was not in the pit, he rent his clothes, and 
 returning to his brethren, said, 'The child is not yon- 
 der; and I, alas, whither shall I go?' Gen. sxxvii. 
 29, 30. This, then, is the first point that we are to 
 mark, that they who are willed to go up and build are 
 not Zerubbabcl and Joshua only, but all the remnant 
 of the people ; and all faithful Christians are bound to 
 build up themselves and others, for both we are the 
 body of Christ and others also, both which are noted 
 by the name of the temple, both in the 1 Cor. vi. 19, 
 and 2 Cor vi. IG. In the former place, he speaking 
 to every one saith, that their bodies are the temples 
 of the Holy Ghost ; and in the latter, he speaking to 
 the congregation, saith they are the temple of God. 
 • The second point to be noted is, that we are not only 
 commanded to build, but that with industry also and 
 pains, for the prophet said, ' Go up to the mountain, 
 bring wood and timber, and build this house ;' wherein, 
 by proposing the particularities of the pains, difficulty, 
 and labours, he telleth them that though indeed it be 
 painful and hard, yet it is the duty which God 
 requireth of them. To go up a hill is not very plea- 
 sant, but to go up having carriage and burden must 
 needs be troublesome ; now the prophet telleth them 
 that they were not only to go up a hill, but to carry 
 up timber thither also, and it seemeth the prophet would 
 mention the hardest thing, for what was it to bring 
 timber? In Ezra iii. 7, it is declared how they gave 
 money to the carpenters and fellers of wood, and meat 
 and drink, and only unto them of Tyrus and Sidon to 
 bring them cedar wood fi-om Lebanon to the sea to 
 Joppa, so that if we consider the difficulties, first, in 
 felling of the ti'ees at Lebanon, then of bringing them 
 to the sea to Joppa, then the carriage of them to 
 413 
 
 Jerusalem, and the bringing of them up the mountain, 
 we shall find that it was a matter of no small weight, 
 nor importance ; and yet all this was but little in com- 
 parison of that which they are lastly commanded, 
 namely, to build the house, especially cousidei'ing that 
 Solomon, having so many workmen and all things ready 
 prepared for the building, was yet, as we read, some 
 seven years in building it, 1 lungs vi. 37, 38. When, 
 therefore, he saith, ' Go up, bring timber and build 
 the house,' he teachoth us that if we moan to build 
 this temple of the Lord, we must not do as they who 
 take their ease and stretch themselves on their beds, 
 and diink wine in bowls, killing oxen and sheep, and 
 eating the fattest of the herd, anointing themselves 
 with oil, and singing of songs to the instruments of 
 music, Amos vi. 1—0, but we are to take pains to 
 fetch timber and to build. He that will not do this is 
 no workman for the house of the Lord. A hard 
 speech for us (my brethren), who are like them that 
 are troubled with the green sickness, that we cannot 
 well travel on plain gi'ound, much less climb up 
 mountains with burdens on our backs, or, like the 
 Eoman gentleman who, when others were busied in 
 military exercises, laid him down and tumbled in the 
 gi'ass saying, I'tinam hoc esse! lahorarel Oh would that 
 this were to take pains, imagining so many difficulties 
 and adversaries to come against us if we should set 
 oiu-selves about it, as though we were the persons de- 
 scribed by Solomon : Prov. xxvi. 13, ' The slothful 
 saith, A Hon is in the way, a lion in the streets ; as the 
 door turnoth upon its hinges, so doth the sluggard on 
 his bed. The slothful man hideth his hand in his 
 bosom, and it grieveth him to put it again to his 
 mouth. The skiggard is wiser in his own conceit 
 then seven men that can render a reason.' But these 
 are slothful men. St Paul is of another mind, of 
 another spirit, who fought with beasts at Ephesus, 
 1 Cor. XV. 32, and was not afraid to meet a lion in the 
 streets of Rome, 2 Tim. iv. 17, from whose mouth he 
 also saith that the Lord delivered him, yea, who was 
 contented that he might do this work, to sutler im- 
 prisonment, stripes, himger, nakedness, even death 
 as it were often, as he sheweth in the 2d to the Corin- 
 thians xi., furnished indeed with a greater measure of 
 gi'ace than all or any of us are to look for ; but, 
 according to the measure which we have received, v e 
 must all learn to take pains in our calling and state, to 
 build this house. It is a general rule of the apostle, 
 that ' he who will not labour, let him not eat,' 2 The?, 
 iii. 10. There are indeed divers and sundry vocatioi s 
 amongst men, but they are all ordained by God to 
 furnish us that we may be better able to travel in this 
 work. So that there are none exempt from labour, no, 
 not gentlemen and princes, for it is not enough for one 
 of them to say, I will not, I need not labour, I can 
 live on my lands ; for so could Adam have said in 
 paradise more truly, when God set him in it to manure 
 and till it, that we might learn that not Adam himself 
 
26 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 (tbongh all things yielded tlicir increase to Lim with- 
 out his labour), yet that be was not by God created 
 to be idle. Now, if that Adam were not then to be 
 idle, when he had need neither to labour for mainte- 
 nance of himself, nor yet was fit to I'all into wickedness 
 through idleness, how much more necessary is it for 
 us to learn that wo bestow ourselves in some profitable 
 and lawful labour, on whom this burden, through the 
 sin of Adam, is laid, that we should ' eat our bread in 
 the sweat of our brows ' ? Gen. iii. 19. And experience 
 suiSciently teacheth us, there is nothing sooner casteth 
 men headlong into the sink of all ungodliness than the 
 foregoing the honest pains and labours ; which yet I 
 speak not as though all were to take bodity labour, 
 for there is also a labour of the mind, which spcudeth 
 the body haply more than the other, neither as if I 
 thought it not lawful to use recreation for the comfort 
 and strengthening of the body and mind, for he that 
 willeth Timothy to drink a little wine for his stomach's 
 sake, 1 Tim. v. 23, by proportion granteth us to use a 
 little recreation also if our bodies stand in need of it ; 
 but this is granted, and must be used in such sort that 
 it may tend to make us more able, each one, in some 
 vocation lawful, to build this house unto the Lord. 
 So then must the minister give attendance to teach- 
 ing, reading, and exhorting, 1 Tim. iv. 13. I need not 
 speak of all singular vocations, seeing we have a general 
 rule, that every one continue in the vocation whcreunto 
 he is called of God, 1 Cor. vii. 30, to serve him with 
 pains and industry carefully and diligently. For we are 
 commanded not only to Imild, but in such sort as wo 
 use all diligence, as also St Peter hath expressed it, 
 2 Pet. i. 10, considering what our Saviour hath told us, 
 namely, that the way is narrow, and the gate strait, 
 whereby men pass to life. Mat. vii. 13, and therefore 
 that it is necessary that we labour and strive to enter 
 therein, and that the kingdom of heaven suffereth 
 violence, and that the violent take it by force. Mat. 
 xi. 12 ; and if it bo required in all vocations that 
 we should be painful, what is required, then, of the 
 minister, of whom in especial it is exacted that he 
 should build this house; and then (alas !) what shall 
 we say of them who not only go not up the mountain, 
 but being in the mountain stay not there, but come 
 down into the valley? or if they stay in the moun- 
 tain, yet preach not there, not caring to bring up 
 timber and to build, 1 Cor. iii. 9, 1 Tim. iii. 13. 
 Nay, I would there were not many of them that behave 
 themselves so wickedly in their conversation, that they 
 may be rightly joined with them of whom it is writtrn 
 in the Psalms, that they break down all the carved work 
 of God's house with axes and hammers, Ps. Ixxiv. G. 
 
 ]jut leaving them to their jnst judgment, seeing 
 exhortations pierce not their hearts, having been 
 so often called upon, lot us (my brethren) remem- 
 ber that this building reqnireth one point further, 
 even for the general commandment, namely, that this 
 labour and diligence bo continual, even till the work 
 
 be fully ended, Eph. iv. 11, xii. 13; and ended it is 
 not so long as we live here, which the prophet seometh 
 to insinuate, in that he maketh mention of timber 
 only, and not of stone ; at least when he maketh 
 mention of timber, which we know was to be brought 
 from Lebanon to accomplish the work, and to serve 
 to make the roof; whereby they are taught that they 
 should not leave till they had brought it to a perfect 
 and absolute work. And so let us think that we are to 
 build up the temple of God, not in part but in whole, 
 understanding that he is accounted but a foolish builder 
 that beginncth to build, and is not able to make an 
 end, Luke xiv. 28-30 ; and he is unworthy of the 
 kingdom of God, who, laying his hand to the plough, 
 looketh back behind him. Let Demas therefore alone, 
 W'ho, having been companion with Paul, left him and 
 followed the present world, 2 Tim. iv. 10 ; but for us 
 who I hope be careful, as we have begun to go for- 
 ward, let us not like dogs return to our vomit, 2 Pet. 
 ii. 22, but let us set before us the exhortation here 
 made, and remember the words of the apostle, Heb. 
 X. 38, 39, ' If anj' man withdraw himself, my soul 
 shall have no pleasure in him. But we are not they 
 that withdraw ourselves unto perdition ; but follow 
 faith unto the conservation of the soul.' It is to 
 destruction if we withdraw ourselves. Let us, then, 
 go forward, knowing that the prize is promised to 
 none but to him that overcometh ; and him, saith 
 Christ, I will make a pillar in the house of God, as it 
 is in the third chapter of the Kevelations; and in the 
 eleventh chapter and second verse, the coward is com- 
 manded to be cast out, but ' he that overcometh and 
 continueth unto the end, he shall be made a pillai' in 
 the house of God, and shall not be cast out.' ' Let 
 us not therefore be weary of well-doing : for we shall 
 reap in due time, if we faint not,' Gal. vi. 9 ; let the 
 words the apostle useth be our encouragement against 
 the manifold impediments and lets set by the wicked 
 to hinder us, as here were by adversaries of Judah and 
 Benjamin to stop the building of the temple, Ezra 
 iv. 1. For all this, those that faint not, neither by 
 reason of persons or things that stand up against them, 
 shall bo sure to reap in due season; and these are the 
 special reasons and things therein to be observed; but 
 besides, there are two or three points to be noted in 
 the several words of the exhortation. 
 
 This house was to bo put upon a mountain : ' Go 
 up to the mountain ; ' and our Saviour in the fifth of 
 i\Iatthew saith of his church, that it is ' a city set on 
 a hill ;' wherefore if it were but only for this reason, 
 that the house we are to build standeth on a hill, and 
 therefore many eyes are cast upon us, because we may 
 be seen afar otT. As David prayed the Lord to guide 
 him, because of them that eyed him, Ps. v. 8, so we, 
 because of the wicked and ungodly that look upon us, 
 ought to be more careful to look unto it, that we build 
 carefully, because the house standeth on a mountain. 
 Let us, therefore, remember that those words of our 
 
 414 
 
Ver. 8.] 
 
 SERMON IV. 
 
 27 
 
 Saviour are spoken to all : ' A city set ou a bill cannot 
 be bid. Neitber do men ligbt a candle, and put it 
 under a busbel, but on a candlestick. You arc tbe salt 
 of tbe eartb ; but if tbe salt bave lost its saltuess, wbcre- 
 witb sball it be seasoned ?' Mat. v. l-i-16. 
 
 Tbe papists on tbis similitude teacb very largely 
 tbat tbe cburcb of God is visible, and ougbt to bo so, 
 as tbougb we denied it ; but tbo gross errors wbicb 
 they deliver in urging tbis place are all of tbcm plainly 
 refuted by St Mattbew in tbe very text. For, first, 
 they imagine tbat if tbe cburcb be visible it may be 
 seen to every place, as tbougb a city built on tbe Alps, 
 because it is a mountain, must needs tberefore be seen 
 to Rome, or a city on tbe Pyrenean mountain of neces- 
 sity must be seen to Toledo. Nay, to come near to tbe 
 particular thing we have in hand, Bethany is but two 
 miles from Jerusalem, and yet they vibo have travelled 
 in those countries say that a man cannot see Jerusalem 
 from tbat place, albeit that Jerusalem were a city built 
 upon a mountain: yea, upon many mountains, as tbo 
 prophet saitb of it, ' Her foundations are among tbo 
 holy mountains ;' but yet cannot men see it, as I said, 
 from Bethany by reason of mount Olivet, tbat lieth 
 betwixt Jerusalem and it; or tbat I may open it to 
 you by a more familiar example, although a man 
 should go to Sbotover, yet should he not sec Harrow- 
 on-tbe-Hill (the very name whereof notwithstanding 
 declares that it standeth on a hill). Nay, it may be 
 that all who have travelled from hence to London have 
 not seen it. Perhaps they were blind, perhaps they 
 cast not their eyes tbat way, perhaps though they did 
 yet were there such mists that by reason of tbem they 
 could not see it, which indeed our Saviour in the simi- 
 litude adjoined, expressly tcacheth: 'You arc,' saitb 
 he, ' the light of the world : neither do men ligbt a 
 candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candle- 
 stick; and it gives ligbt unto all that are in the house,' 
 Mat. V. 14, 15. The candle gives ligbt indeed, yet 
 not to all, but to all in tbe bouse ; but not to them 
 that are without tbe bouse, the walls of tbe house keep 
 it from others. Again, they imagine that because it 
 is a city set on a hill, that therefore it must always 
 continue in the same case, and not sometimes decay, 
 and sometimes have nothing remaining of it but only 
 the foimdation. Old Salisbury was a city built upon 
 a bill, howbeit now there is not much to be seen of it. 
 Rome itself was built on seven bills, yet on tbe chiefest 
 of them, Aventinus, Collatinus, Capitolinus, on which 
 it was first founded, there is no building now to bo 
 found, as they write that know it, unless it be three 
 or four harlotry houses, or haply some monastery or 
 a few gardens. A city therefore on a bill may some- 
 time be decayed, and this our Saviour significth in 
 another similitude : ' Ye are the salt of the earth, but 
 if the salt bave lost its saltness.' Salt may lose his 
 saltness, then, and so a church seated upon a hill may 
 have that happen unto it which is correspondent to 
 that in salt to lose his savour. Finally, they imagine 
 415 
 
 that all houses built upon a bill must be of one sort; 
 nor of one sort only, but of like condition and state ; 
 whereas it may be that some are fallen, some stand- 
 ing, some hidden, some of divers kinds. And this 
 our Saviour also putteth us in mind of; for did they 
 to whom our Saviour speaketh make all one church 
 or city, severed from the Jews that were then of Jeru- 
 salem '? No; for the papists say tbat after Christ's 
 ascension they first began to make a several church 
 from the Jews, therefore then they should have con- 
 sidered tbat there were some of the church who were 
 members of it, disagreeing from them to whom Christ 
 spake; as were in Jerusalem they which frequented 
 tbe public and ordinary service of God, resorted to 
 the temple and beard the law, who yet in opinion and 
 judgment dissented from Christ and those tbat believed 
 in him. Now, in comparison of tbat multitude, tbe 
 disciples of Christ were but few in that city ; and even 
 so in the midst of popery there have been some saints 
 of God scattered among tbe wicked, as were tbo apostles 
 among the unbelieving Jews in Jerusalem to whom this 
 appertained. ' You are tbe light of the world.' And 
 were they hidden ? No, sure, they were not hidden, 
 for tbe papists found them out, and some of tbem alive 
 paid for it, whom they burned, tbat their ligbt might 
 shine and be seen, and some tbcy digged out of their 
 graves when they had lain long dead, and that in them 
 it was easily seen that they were as a city set on a hill, 
 that could not be hid. And so we may see it bath 
 gone with the saints of God even here in England since 
 religion was first planted in it, and with the church 
 which at one time hath been in better case than at 
 anothcr,even as itbapponethtocitiesamongst us, which 
 are not at all times so well built and maintained, and 
 churches also, who at all times are not so well repaired. 
 
 But to return to our purpose; seeing we are built 
 on a mountain, and therefore are sure to have so many 
 eyes looking upon us, let us be more wary to look to 
 ourselves ; and seeing we are to live in the midst of a 
 froward and crooked generation, let us have care to 
 shine forth like lights in the world, as the apostle ex- 
 horteth the Philippians, chap. ii. 8, and bold out the 
 light, as those that wore persecuted in the time of the 
 Arians, who yet were light and salt, who were to give 
 light to them in tbe house, and season tbem tbat re- 
 ceived their words. 
 
 Another thing to be observed is the timber whereof 
 this house was built, which they were commanded to 
 bring, which was cedar, whereby we are to remember 
 tbat there is commended to us tbat stufl' for the build- 
 ing of the church, which is durable and in all respects 
 most fit for it. For they that write of the nature of 
 the cedar tree, some of tbem say tbat it is odoriferous, 
 but all agree that it will not putrefy; insomuch that 
 Pliny seemetb to attribute eternity to it, for that it 
 will continue so long as any wood ; but it is most truo 
 in the word of God, which, as St Peter saitb, lasteth 
 for ever. Therefore the stull' wherewith we are to build 
 
2S 
 
 K Alls OLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. L 
 
 must be proportionable hereunto, even to cedar. So 
 the apostle exhortetli the Epbesians, cbap. iv. 29, ' Let 
 no corrupt communication proceed out of j-our moutbs, 
 but that wbich is good to edify withal,' &c., where he 
 useth the same similitude of building ; and so propor- 
 tionably our talk, wherewith we should edify and build 
 up others, should be sound and durable, not rotten, as 
 the word properly signifieth which the apostle useth, con- 
 trary to the nature and quality of the cedar, which is the 
 timber that this house was to be built with : ' Let no 
 rotten speech proceed out of your mouth, but that which 
 is good to edify and build withal.' There are divers 
 other things besides cedars necessary to this building; 
 but by the name of this one of timber, all other what- 
 soever likewise necessary are understood, and so must 
 we hkewise understand in our buildmg. 
 
 And here, by occasion, I am to commend one thing to 
 you, for seeing they were to bring timber, it was neces- 
 sary that it should be first cut down, whereuuto are 
 necessary instruments, as al.-o workmen. Now tons, 
 for instruments and tools, are indeed our laws and 
 statutes, whereby our work is to bo framed and directed. 
 When the children of the prophets came to Ehsha 
 and craved leave of him that, because the place where 
 they dwelt was too little for them, they might go to 
 Jordan, that every one might take thence a beam and 
 make them more room, and he granting them leave 
 and going himself with them ; as they were about 
 their work, as one was felling a tree, the ase head 
 fell into the water, whereupon they cried out unto 
 Elisha and said, ' Alas, master, it was but borrowed !' 
 The man of God, therefore, considering not only that 
 the instrument was borrowed, but also how necessary 
 it was for their purpose, cutting down a piece of wood 
 and casting it into the water caused the iron to swim. 
 We have, my brethren, amongst us our laws, as it 
 were instruments wherewith to fell our timber. A great 
 part of them is fallen into the water ; indeed, they be 
 in the proctor's book, but there Ihoy be as if they were 
 fallen into the water. The children of the prophets 
 have complained unto Ehsha, Alas, master, they were 
 but borrowed ; and great need have they to know 
 them, for that they are bound in conscience by 
 oath to keep thorn. To which purpose some have 
 taken pains to restore them, notwithstanding it hath 
 [notj yet jdeased God to move them that should see 
 it accomplished, howbeit we may hope to see it when 
 it shall please God to place in that room a man that 
 hath Elisha's spirit. Sure, there is great use of them 
 for the cutting and framing of the cedars wherewith 
 to build, especially if those which bo known already 
 
 were kept, which I must needs also add, because that 
 of those which are known, many have their edges 
 rebated by dispensations. A lamentable thing that 
 we keep yet so much that which was received from the 
 sink of Kome, which I speak not as though our dis- 
 pensations were so detestable as his who taketh upon 
 him to dispense against the commandment of the 
 apostle, however it please him ; to distinguish of the 
 precepts of the apostle which ho commandeth, not 
 God ; but in a place and matter where laws and orders 
 are taken to the contrary, it is no way tolerable. 
 Plato and Aristotle, the princes of the philosphers, 
 have affirmed, that it is most pernicious in a common- 
 wealth to break the laws which are once appointed, 
 which we learn even out of them if we read them to 
 make our profit of them, and not only to talk of them. 
 Which neither yet do I speak as though I would have 
 nothing dispensable, but that when it is so ordered 
 that there shall not in such cases be any dispensations 
 absolutely, yet that we should continually come 
 against this decree. For what can be more absurd, 
 than that men of judgment and discretion should 
 make no more account to break God's laws, than chil- 
 dren would do to break sticks ; but if statutes were only 
 broken by dispensations, the matter were more toler- 
 able, for then should we also have our parts in it ; but 
 statutes have been broken without dispensations, 
 whereof the experience is fresh in your memory, the 
 last week as you know, or if you know it not, I tell 
 what I mean, even the pl.ays kept against the express 
 statute; by the tolerance and connivance of the magis- 
 trate, the statute bath been broken. 
 
 Some there arc who be persuaded that thence may 
 be gathered good timber for this building. 
 
 Haply, indeed, some bushes and brambles or musk 
 roses, and that is the best, and I would to God it were 
 the worst. For many there are who are brought 
 through such corruptions to lewd persuasions ; but 
 doubtless they make evil work for the church of God. 
 They that heard them may say more, but this one of 
 their own prophets hath said of that place, 
 
 Ille locus casti damna pudoris hatet, 
 
 which was spoken of such places as that where these 
 were kept. I need not add as the apostle doth, ' This 
 testimony is true, therefore rebuke them sharply ;' 
 yet will i say to them that be heads of houses, parents 
 of families, "tutors of scholars, one of their own pro- 
 phets have said, and the testimony is true, therefore 
 rebuke them sharply. God be blessed ; and pardon 
 our sns for his Sou's sake. Amen. 
 
 41G 
 
Ver. 8.] 
 
 SERMON V. 
 
 29 
 
 SERMON V. December 25. 1585. 
 
 Go up to the mouiittiin, and hrinfj timber, and build thif house; and I wili taJce delir/ht in it, and I will be glorified 
 
 in it, sailh the Lord — Haggai I. 8. 
 
 THIS sentence of the prophet Haggai, exhorting 
 the Jews that were returned from Babylon, tliat 
 they shoukl build the house of the Lord, containeth, 
 as hath been before declared, when I last spake to 
 you of it out of this place, the reason -why he exhort- 
 eth. 1. He that exhorteth is the Lord ; 2, he exhort- 
 eth them to build the house of the Lord, to go up to 
 the mountains to bring timber. 1. The reasons: 
 I will take deliyht in it, I will be (ilorificd, for the 
 meaning of all which we understand then that (1.) it 
 was the Lord that, by the ministrj' of the prophet, 
 made this exhortation ; (2.) for the thing whereunto 
 they ai'e cxliorted, tliat it was the building of the 
 temple on the mountain Moriah whereon it stood 
 before. What the reasons were, why he ouglit to 
 do this. 1. Because he would take delight in it. 
 2. Because he would be glorified. Of the former two 
 points, namely, the Lord who exhorteth, and the 
 thing whereunto, I spake then as grace was ministered 
 and time served ; there now remaineth the last cir- 
 cumstance at this time to be handled, which contain- 
 eth the reasons why they should go up to the moun- 
 tain and build. And for the meaning of the reasons; 
 I opened that at that present, touching the former, 
 that God will not delight in it for itself, as in the 
 timber and stones, &c., but because of the significa- 
 tion and use thereof, in that it betokeneth Jesus our 
 Saviour, as is plainly declared in the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews. Neither him only as the head of the 
 church, but his body also together with him, both the 
 catholic church, which is partly on earth and partly 
 received into gloi'y, the church militant, and the 
 ch:;rch triumphant and visible churches, not only as 
 bodies considered wholly, but also each member of 
 the same in particular, as by the places then alleged, 
 Eph. ii., 1 Cor. vi., was made manifest. 
 
 Now, concerning the use of the temple, we know it 
 was called the house of prayer, in regard of the holy 
 exercises and rites prescribed by God which were 
 therein performed, which ceasing to be used in such 
 sort as were by God's commandment appointed, it was 
 according to the threatenings of the prophets (as be- 
 fore), destroyed by the Babylonians, so (after it was 
 renewed) was it made desolate by Aiitiochus, and in 
 the end of all (as our Saviour foretold), quite over- 
 thrown by the Komans. Wherefore it was the regard 
 of the mystery thereby figured ; for the veil, as it is 
 shewed by the evangelist, signified Christ, the holy of 
 holies, kc, and the exorcises by God prescribed, for 
 which he saith that he would delight therein. 
 
 From the delight which he promiseth to take in it, 
 to stir them up yet the rather, he proceedoth and 
 417 
 
 addeth the latter reason, he will also be glorified ; 
 whereby is meant that he will also pour his blessings 
 upon them in such sort that they should have occasion 
 hereby to praise and magnify his mercy. For that 
 this is the meaning of the prophet, it is manifest by 
 the antithesis which is here used for setting down how 
 for their negligence they had been afilicted ; eating, 
 and not being satisfied ; putting on clothes, and not 
 being warmed, &c. ; so contrariwise, he promiseth, 
 that doing his commandment, these evils should be 
 removed, and good things bestowed on them, whereby 
 they should have cause to glorify his holy name for 
 his mercy. 
 
 In these reasons proposed to them to move them to 
 the building of the temple, let us first consider how 
 the truth was first performed to the Jews. The Lord 
 promiseth his favour and liking of them, and his 
 blessings proceeding from his favour. How this was 
 to be performed, the prophet expoundeth in the second 
 chapter, in the words of the Lord himself, ver. 16-19, 
 where, willing them to consider how they had been 
 afilicted, he bids them to reckon from that day, signi- 
 fying that from that day forth he would bless them. 
 Neither promiseth he only temporal blessings and cor- 
 poral, for which they should glorify and praise his 
 name, but eternal and spiritual also, which is likewise 
 shewn in the second chapter, in the words of the 
 Lord, ver, 6-9, ' Yet once again, saith' the Lord, and 
 I will shake all nations, and the Desire of all nations 
 shall come : and I will fill this house with glory. 
 Silver is mine, and gold is mine. The glory of this 
 house shall be greater than the former ; I will give 
 peace in it.' 
 
 In which promise, the Lord of hosts, so often re- 
 peated, he noteth the greatness and power of him that 
 maketh this promise ; and this peace and glory signi- 
 fieth not worldly prosperity or earthly peace, in which 
 respect this temple exceeded not that of Solomon, but 
 hereby is signified another peace, even a peace of 
 peaces, ' the peace of God, which passeth all under- 
 standing,' Philip, iv. 7, which the apostle wisheth the 
 faithful, ' gi-ace and peace ; ' peace betwixt God and 
 us in the covenant of grace, of which I say he saith, 
 ' Unto us a Son is given, the Prince of peace,' Eph. ii., 
 ' he is our peace ; ' he came and preached the gospel 
 of peace, a covenant betwixt God and man. That this 
 is the meaning is most evident by Heb. xii. 18, ' A 
 kingdom that cannot be moved,' and Luke ii. 13, 14, 
 ' Peace on earth.' In this second temple the Prince 
 of peace was to sit. Here the Jews have on their 
 hearts the veil. Ask them how this was performed ; 
 seeing the temple was destroyed, how the glory of the 
 
 Dd 
 
30 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAl. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 latter temple was greater than the former. Some of 
 them will s.ay in regard of the building, for that, albeit 
 it were at the first lesser than Solomon's, yet was it 
 after amplified by Herod ; others in respect of the con- 
 tinuance, for that as they account this stood ten years 
 longer than the former, which is laid down by the 
 author of their ordinary gloss, but the promise of glory 
 is made to this temple, which in the third of Ezra was- 
 nothing in comparison of the former, so that although 
 it be tnxe that afterwards it was enlarged by Herod, 
 as Josephus sheweth, yet the promise is of glory, not 
 greatness only, which stretcheth further. Saul had a 
 greater body, yet was he moved with anger, thinking 
 that a greater glory was given to David in the women's 
 song ; and when the Lord saith, ' Silver is mine,' he 
 could (if he had pleased) have made it in that respect 
 more glorious than Solomon's, yet (as the Rabbins 
 confess themselves) in respect of the gold, the latter 
 was nothing to the former, which, as the Scripture 
 sheweth, was all covered with gold : walls, beams, 
 floors, posts, and that with the fine gold of Ophir. 
 Read Josephus, lib. cap. viii., and lib. xv. ult., for the 
 comparison of the two temples; in respect, then, of 
 the glory, by greatness and beauty joined together, 
 especially of the riches of gold and silver, &c., the 
 latter was nothing. As for the continuance, that is 
 nothing ; for what if it stood ten years longer, could 
 it therefore be more glorious? Amongst all the kings 
 of Judah, Solomon excelled in glory, 3'et reigned but 
 forty years, Manasses fifty-five. Did he therefore 
 excel him? for [if] it be said that he was in thraldom 
 part of that time, so may it be said of the dishonour- 
 ing of this temple by Pompey and Cassius ; but Uzziah 
 reigned fifty-two years, as much longer than Solomon 
 as this temple stood longer than the former. Where- 
 fore, if it be repugnant to Scripture to say he excelleth 
 therefore in glory Solomon, so it is for this cause to 
 say that this temple did excel the former. 
 
 Nay, they are convinced of madness by the same 
 rabbin, for on the same word, because the Hebrew 
 word wanteth the letter J^, which in number standeth 
 with them for 5th, he saith it is a note of mystery ; 
 for that this latter temple wanted five things which 
 the former had: 1, Urim and Tluimmim ; 2, the ark 
 of the covenant ; 3, fire from heaven ; 4, the sign of 
 God's glor}' ; 5, presence of the Holy Ghost ; and this 
 is proved, alleging a place of Talnuid, which is among 
 the Jews as the decretal among thc! papists, the author 
 thereof would no more err, than can the pope ; a Tal- 
 mudical fancy ; for althougli n were wanting (as it 
 is not in those copies which are received without 
 points) ; but if it were by tlieir fault that copied out 
 of the book, what reason that there wMuld want five 
 things, because n signifioth five in numbering, which 
 is nothing but a sottish and cal)alistine toy ; for even 
 this temple wanted more tlian these five thiugs. as 
 they also coid'ess, even in the same book, for there 
 was not the cup of manna, and therefore not oidy five, 
 
 but eight or nine more were wanting. But, to take that 
 which they gi-ant, seeing these five things were not in 
 the latter temple, which were in the fonner, unless the 
 things of the latter which were not in the former may 
 match and excel these, it cannot be said that so the 
 glory of the latter should excel the glory of the former. 
 It may be said that Zaccheus, in some one coin or other, 
 had some more money than Herod, as haply a mean 
 goldsmith in London may have in crasadoes, or flo- 
 rins, or ducats, more than the prince ; yet if Herod's 
 treasure far pass the wealth of Zaccheus, and the 
 prince's the substance of the goldsmith, were not he 
 kbsurd that would say the goldsmith were richer than 
 the prince ? In like sort, sith the glory of the latter 
 temple was to excel the glory of the former, and how- 
 soever in continuance and bigness it passed the lat- 
 ter, if in other points of gi-eater glory it were behind 
 it, how shall one truly say that this was performed ? 
 AVherefore, if those things which they confess be want- 
 ing in the latter, nay, if some one of them be more 
 glorious than the continuance wherein they make this 
 excellency, the glory thereof must be placed in some 
 other thing than they fancy. Now, how excellent was 
 the Urim and Thummim, whereof Dent, xxxiii., the 
 mercy-seat, ark, fh'e from heaven, glory of God visible 
 in the cloud that filled the temple, presence of the 
 Holy Ghost, succession of prophets ! \^^lereof seeing 
 some one, — how much more all ! — far exceed the ten 
 years' continuance, it followeth that in this respect 
 the glory of the latter house could not be greater. 
 Therefm-e, since God promised that it should be greater, 
 and that cannot be but in respect that in this Christ 
 taking flesh should personally teach during the same, 
 make atonement between God and man, working our 
 redemption ; which one thing far excelleth all that 
 were in the former temple, he being the truth, and 
 they but shadows. It is most manifest that the 
 Jews were possessed with a spirit of giddiness, as was 
 threatened them ; their ears dulled, their eyes darkened 
 against the e\ident light of God's truth. But for us 
 we are assured that this peace was performed in our 
 Saviour, as all circumstances noted by the prophets 
 agreeing to him, of the time, by Daniel mentioned, 
 chap. ix. ; the place, by Micah, chap. iv. ; his name, 
 his progeny, his mother, Isa. vii. and ix., Luke x. 4 ; 
 so tliat, in respect of us to w'hom God hath made this 
 known, we may use those words, ' For I teU you, that 
 many prophets, and kings, and righteous men, have 
 desired to see those things which you see, and have 
 not seen them ; and to hear those things which you 
 hear, and have not heard them.' To wdiom is this 
 performed, this promise of peace, as the angel said to 
 the shepherds : Luke ii. 9-11, ' For, behold, I bring 
 3'ou glad tidings of gi-eat joy, which shall be to all 
 people. For unto you is born this day, in the city of 
 David, a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.' And 
 this is the first point, by reason of the celebration of 
 the Lord's nativitv, in accomplishing the promise of 
 
 418 
 
Ver. S.J 
 
 SERMON V. 
 
 31 
 
 God by giving peace above all blessings, sending 
 Christ a Sa\'iour to take flesh ui^on him. 
 
 The next point in these words is, that God taketh 
 delight, and will pour a blessing upon it, on the temple, 
 only in respect of Chiist figiu'ed, and holy exercises 
 commanded by him, therein practised. How the temple 
 figured Christ, and the exercises there the duties of 
 Christians in particular set down, else we are not to 
 stand on them ; but note the bloekishness, first of the 
 Jews, then of the papists, for thej in their Talmud 
 thought that God took delight in the temple, that now 
 for sorrow he hath destroyed it, he spendetb many 
 hours in bewailing the same. The papists, though 
 the temple be overthrown, yet think that God took 
 such delight in the place where it stood, that they go 
 on pilgi-images, as though yet that prayer of Solo- 
 mon's were in force for them that praj- more in that 
 place than the other, blind men that consider not 
 rudiments of the law, while the Jews, as children, 
 were thereby to be schooled to Christ, [as] om- Saviour 
 to the Samaritan so expounded it: John iv. 21, ' Wo- 
 man, believe me, the hour cometh, wherein ye shall 
 neither in this mountain, nor yet in Jerusalem, wor- 
 ship the Father. But the hour comelh, and now is, 
 when the true worshippers of the Father shall worship 
 him in spirit and in truth ;' meaning the time had 
 been when the place of true worship appointed was 
 Jerusalem ; but the truth being come, all places are 
 now sanctified as Jerusalem, according to that 1 Tim. 
 ii. 8, ' I will, therefore, that men pray everywhere, lift- 
 ing up pure hands without wrath and doubting.' The 
 Khemish Jesuits, upon Matthew xvii. ver. 9, sa}', the 
 mountain is called holy by St Peter, 2 Pet. i. 18, as 
 that place by Moses, Exod. iii. 5, was called holy 
 ground ; whereby it is evident, say they, that by such 
 a precious place they are sanctified, and thereujjon 
 groweth a rehgion and devotion in the faithful to- 
 wards such places, and that there was great pilgrimage 
 in the primitive church to this mountain, and unto all 
 those places which our Saviour had sanctified with 
 his presence and with his mii-acles, and therefore to 
 the whole land of promise ; also upon John xii. 20, 
 the Gentiles say they came to adore, the Gentiles 
 came of devotion pilgrimage to the temple of Jerusa- 
 lem ; and Acts viii. 27, note that the Ethiopian came 
 to Jerusalem to adoie, that is, on pilgrimage. Out of 
 all these places they would prove that yet we should 
 go to Jerusalem, by virtue of which conclusion they 
 may also prove that we should also ofl'er bulls and 
 calves, which were prescribed by the law, as was this 
 coming to Jerusalem ; for as they were bound to come 
 up to appear before the Lord, so were thej' also com- 
 manded not to come empty. If bound to Jerusalem, 
 because of a special promise made to that place, why 
 not to all the ordinances prescribed by Moses ? 
 
 Besides, Paul's resort to Jerusalem at the feast was 
 for the opportunity of preachiijg to them then assem- 
 bled as on the Sabbath, Acts xiii. 44, and so they 
 419 
 
 may conclude that we are to keep the Jewish Sabbath, 
 which the Jesuits will deny. Therefore of the example 
 of Paul going up to Jerusalem it can no more be 
 proved that we ought to go thither, than that we 
 should also yet ofl'er, for that we read he did so in 
 the temple, Acts xxi. IG, and it maketh as much for 
 his ofl'ering as the other for the going thither. The 
 Rhemists' note on the seventeenth of Slatthew is more 
 forcible in show, but as weak in substance. That the 
 mount was called holy, because it was sanctified by that 
 apparition, we grant; but then was it so sanctified tliat 
 holiness must then needs cleave unto it for ever, and 
 still abide therewith ? Peter called it the holy hill ; so 
 likewise Matthew, chap, xxvii. 33, calleth Jerusalem 
 ' the holy city,' and chap, xxiv., ' the holy place,' 
 namely, as other things are called holy, because con- 
 secrated to holy uses, so the city, because of the holy 
 assemblies to it, because of the church of God it 
 signified, and the temple more especially, because of 
 the glory of God which appeai'ed therein. But those 
 holy actions, when they were omitted, and the con- 
 trary practised, howsoever they were holy in respect 
 of the things they prefigured, yet, doubtless, they 
 were profane and unholy, insomuch that Christ said 
 even of the temple, that it was ' made a den of thieves,' 
 and ' the faithful city was become a harlot,' and the 
 pollutions thereof were such, and the profanations so 
 many, that Christ threatened, and it came to pass, 
 that not a stone therein should be left upon a stone. 
 In the eighty-seventh Psalm, the mountains whereon 
 Jerusalem was founded were called holy ; but were 
 they accounted so any longer than were the holy 
 exercises by God appointed therein practised ? In 
 Ezekiel viii. and ix., their abominations are described, 
 and the punishments of the same in chap. x. and xi., 
 how the Lord for the same left and forsook them, yea, 
 how he departed from the temple first, and then quite 
 from the city ; whereby is taught us, that there is no 
 place never so holy which God detesteth not, when his 
 commandments therein are broken, and his majesty 
 profaned. The Jesuits themselves will confess, that 
 churches, although sanctified by the pope, 3'et that 
 the holiness of them ceaseth if murder be committed 
 in them ; whereby they might see that such things 
 might be committed in places otherwise holy, that the 
 places may become so profiine, that God will not only 
 not delight in them, but detest and abhor them, as it 
 was manifest by Jerusalem ; for else what meant our 
 Saviour by that threat against it ? '0 Jerusalem, 
 Jerusalem, thou that stonest the prophets.' See what 
 Gregory Nazianzen saith in a sermon touching them 
 that run about to such places. Pilgrimages were 
 made to such places, say the Jesuits, not long after 
 Christ's time, but yet they were reproved by that 
 father's judgment, because Jerusalem is called the 
 holy city ; and is it not also called spiritual Sodom 
 and Gomorrah, because of the wickedness therein 
 committed ? And what shall we say of Piome, sith 
 
32 
 
 EAINOLDS ON HAQGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 that it is likewise ciiUed spiritually Babylon in the 
 Revelation ? But such is the blindness of that man 
 of sin, that albeit it be the place where the saints of 
 Christ in the Revelation are said to be slain, as Christ 
 in Jerusalem, yet commend they it as the place wherein 
 above others God will delight most, as the Jews fancy 
 of Jerusalem. Hereupon Boniface VIII. ordained,* 
 that whosoever would come up to Rome, anno 1300 
 (at which time he lived), should have most full remis- 
 sion of all sins (Extravag. com. lib. v. de peuiten. et 
 remissione, cap. i. ct cap. ii. in bulla Clem. VI.). The 
 very circumstances of which places deriving their 
 jubilee from Moses's law, and building it on the 
 merits of Peter and Paul, and binding all the solemnity 
 thereof to their Church of Rome, do sufficiently shew 
 the superstition of it. This same Boniface ordained 
 at the first, that every hundred years they should 
 enjoy the same pardons, which after by another was 
 abridged to fifty, and then to twcnty-fivo, for their 
 year of jubilee. f Now, wo know the year of jubilee 
 (as Joseph, do Antiquitat. liber iii. cap. siv.) was cere- 
 monious ; that every fifty years liberty should bo pro- 
 claimed, to the bond freedom, to their servants lands 
 restored. Now, this was a figure of Christ ; as Isaiah, 
 he sent to proclaim spiritual liberty to the captives, 
 the opening of the prison, the acceptable year of the 
 Lord, which in the forty-ninth chapter, and the eighth 
 and ninth verses, he had called the acceptable time and 
 day of salvation ; and the apostle, 2 Cor. vi. 2, cx- 
 poundeth it of the time whensoever the gospel is 
 preached, ' Behold, now is the acceptable day ;' and 
 the pope, as though Christ were not yet come, or had 
 not put an end to these things, applied this to his 
 year of jubilee. And Bristow in his motives doth 
 exhort all Catholics to prepare themselves against this 
 most acceptable year of grace, Jeroboam's charge to 
 
 ♦ Plat, in Vita lion. VIIl. Osciiliinus in Chri. anno 1294. 
 t The jubilee was retliicod by Clem. VI. t<i fifty years, 
 nbriilped by Martin V.and Paul brouKbt down unto twenty- 
 five years, wliicli was contlrmod by Sextus IV. — Viile Flat. 
 in Clem. VI. et in Nic. V. Oaemp. in Snto I V. et ihtravag. 
 com. lib 5, cap. 1. Glosse in fine; vido BuUam Clem. VI. 
 ibid. cap. ii. Unigcnitus et BuUani Sixti IV. Extra, com. 
 lib. V. cap. iv. 
 
 his calves. But all this must be to Rome, whereby 
 you may note the original of all this superstition, 
 which indeed is the coveteousness of the pope. For 
 it is not Jerusalem that he carcth for, nor the temple 
 of Peter and Paul ; these are only fair pretences, the 
 holy place, the holy land, the temples of the apostles, 
 the year of jubilee, the year 1575. But the thing 
 to which all serveth was the commodity which 
 thereby cometh to the pope's coffer. For that law 
 out of Deuteronomy must be kept inviolable, that 
 none appear here empty, which mystery bewrayeth 
 the knavery ; for in the year 1000, because the otTer- 
 ings came not to such abundance as was looked 
 and hoped for, the pope sent abroad to such as had 
 had not been there his plenary pardons, offering to them 
 that would buy for money the same grace and favour 
 which they should have been partakers of had they 
 come that year, 1517, which he might well and 
 truly promise ; whereby it pleased God to awaken 
 Christians by the ministry of Master Luther to see 
 the sink of that iniquity which appeared manifestly in 
 this abuse, in tituln de clcricis ]^crc)irinaitlilnis, so in 
 effect for the place ; he hath brought it from Jerusalem 
 to Rome, for the year of jubilee, by mincing it in parts 
 for his greater advantages. So the end of their pil- 
 grimage is the pope's commodity, St Peter's church is 
 the pope's court, their ofl'ering to him purchaseth 
 their pardons. But to whom doth this indulgence 
 good ? To all that pa}' ? Nay, they will not say so, 
 but, xrrc peenitcntihiis, they who truly repent shall have 
 forgiveness of all their sins ; most true indeed. There- 
 fore, if Christians know that, they would little trust to 
 themselves for his pardon or the year of jubilee ; for I 
 can assure them, out of the word of God, that whenso- 
 ever they repent, though they never see Rome or Jeru- 
 salem, yet shall they bo forgiven, and their sins done 
 away, though the pope receive not a penny of them, 
 yea, even this d.ay, and in this house, and in this place, 
 freely and without money. I assure all such as un- 
 feignedly repent and turn to God, assurance of the for- 
 giveness and remission of all their sins, though the 
 pope's pardon never come amongst us, nor we once 
 think on this year of jubilee. 
 
 SERMON YI. February 8. 1589. 
 
 Ye looked for much, and it cnme to little ; and when ye himKjhl it home, I did blow upon it. And why? aaith the 
 Lord of hoxts. Became of mine hounn that lay xeaste, and ye ran every man to his own house. Therefore 
 ayainat ynn the heurens stayed itself from den; and the earth stayed from fruit. And I hare called for 
 dronyht upon the land, and ■upoti the mountains, ami upon the corn, and npon the trine, and upon the 
 oil, and upon that which the earth irinyclh fortli, both upon men and upon cattle, and upiin idl the labours of 
 their hanils. — Haggai I. 9-11. 
 
 ri'IHE projihet Ilaggai ha\'ing exhorted the Jews to 
 X go forward with the temple and sanctuary, and 
 having moved them thereunto by laying before them 
 the gracious promises of God, that he would bo favour- 
 
 able and take delight therein, doth further stir them 
 
 up with these words, bj' calling to their remembrance 
 
 that great want and scarcity wherewith God did not* 
 
 * Qu. 'did'?— Ed. 
 
 420 
 
Ver. 9-11. J 
 
 SERMON VI. 
 
 33 
 
 cliastiso tbem, who therefore did not prosper the 
 labours of their hands, nor give success to tlieir endea- 
 vours, for that every one ran to the building of bis 
 own house, and the trimming up thereof. They 
 laboured not to advance the house of the Lord, for as 
 the Lord had threatened iu his law that if they would 
 not hearken to bis voice to do his will, they should be 
 cursed in the town, and in the field, and in the fruit 
 of their body, and the fruit of the earth ; that the hea- 
 vens over them should be brass, and the earth under 
 them iron ; so did they feel by experience that those 
 threats were performed to them from heaven and 
 earth, in themselves and iu theirs, and in the field 
 and in the town. Because that they were commanded 
 bj' the Lord to build this house, they took all oppor- 
 tunity to do it ; and to persuade hereunto to leave 
 their slackness and bestir themselves hereabout, ho 
 sbewctli how God had withdrawn his blessings from 
 those creatures that should have done them good, and 
 bad stretched out his hand against them. Haggai 
 therefore doth advertise them, showing that they wore 
 chastised in the town and in the ileld, forasmuch as 
 they took great pains and got little, and that which 
 they got and brought homo he did as with a whirlwind 
 disperse and scatter. And why ? Because they left 
 the house of the Lord waste, and every man ran to 
 his own house; therefore against you the heavens, &c. 
 Wlierein to affect them with a more livelj' feeling of 
 their misery laid upon them, because they suflered 
 the Lord's Iiouse to lie waste, the prophet doth more 
 particularly specify the means used by God to work 
 thcs3 wants. The things they wanted were the bless- 
 ings of this life ; the hurt themselves and theii's felt, 
 wh.ieby he noteth their sin, and the correspondency 
 of their chastisements which they felt, which appear- 
 e':li by the word wherein their fault was noted, com- 
 pared with their punishment, as it is laid down more 
 evidently in the original ; for the word which is rendered 
 xvasti', verso 8, doth first signify dry. Lev. xxvi., Ps. 
 xviii., and by consequence waste, because places which 
 arc dry and want moisture are likewise waste and 
 desolate, Now, verse 11, it is said he had called for 
 a drought. The word cometh from the same stem in 
 the Hebrew that the other doth, and in the sense of 
 wasteness, doth express more plainly tlio agreement 
 of the punishment with the manner of their sin, as 
 though he should say, Because you have suflered my 
 house and sanctuary to lie waste, therefore have I 
 also, b}' calling for a drought, brought also a waste 
 upon you. You have been most careful to i)rovide for 
 yourselves and yours whatsoever was needful, and 
 might by you anyways be purchased ; but behold I 
 have wasted and consumed that, I have called for a 
 drought. So the Lord hereby doth declare the per- 
 formance of that which ho threatened, that he would 
 deal overthwartly with them that overthwarted him, 
 and that to the froward ho would become froward ; 
 howbeit, let not any that have offended flatter thom- 
 421 
 
 selves as these men, because they feel not such chas- 
 tisement as these did, because they are not plunged,* 
 naj', because they live at such ease and couteutation 
 of heart, that, as the prophet spoaketh, their eyes start 
 out of then- heads, although they bo nothing careful to 
 build God's house, nay, bo careful to build their 
 own, nay, run to it, and that to build them with 
 blood ; for albeit they felt not the experience of this 
 punishment in temporal blessings, yet let tbem re- 
 mcnd.ier the words of the prophet, Ps. l.Kxiii. 13, 
 ' AVhen I went into the sanctuary of God, then under- 
 stood I the end of these men ; surely thou seltest 
 them in slippery places, and easiest them into utter 
 desolation.' 1, Slippery places ; 2, utter desolation, 
 as it is taught in the history of Job : ' The rejoicing of 
 the wicked is but short ; though his excellency mount 
 upon the heavens, and his head reach to the clouds, 
 yet shall ho perish for ever like the dung, and they 
 that have seen him shall say. Where is be '? ' chap. xx. 
 5, 0. But the children of God are dealt withal as 
 children, although ho chasten them, as ' what sou is 
 there that be chastcneth not ?' yet will be not with- 
 draw his mercy from tbem, neither hero nor hereafter, 
 so that everlasting mercj' is surely ascertained ; for 
 wliat is said to Solomon, 2 Sam. vii. 14, ' If he sin, I 
 will chasten him with the rod of men, but my mercy 
 shall not depart fi'om him,' the same is performed to 
 other the children of David, even to all the faithful 
 and elect, Ps. Isxix. 4. And the example of the Co- 
 rinthians may teach us the end of God's chastisements 
 on his servants ; the apostle shewcth for their unrever- 
 ent receiving of the sacrament, some were sick, and 
 some fallen asleep, that is, taken away ; and there- 
 upon, showing that this appertaineth to all, he saith, 
 ' When wo are judged, wo arc chastened of the Lord, 
 because we should not bo condemned of the world, 
 1 Cor. xi. 30, 32. 
 
 Howbeit, if any of the servants of the Lord who 
 have neglected their duty, have not felt his hand, let 
 them not be high-minded, but fear and be humbled, 
 as who kuoweth not what the lat(i evening-tide may 
 bring forth ; remember that which is written to put 
 them in remembrance, the judgment of God is just 
 against the ungodly that do such things : 'And what 
 thinkcst thou, man, that judgest them that do such 
 things, and dost the same, that thou shalt escape the 
 just judgment of God ; or despisest thou the riches of 
 his bountifuluess, and patience, and long-suU'eranco ?' 
 Rom. ii. 2-4 ; for it is most plain that they shall not 
 enter into the holy tabernacle hereafter who persist 
 not to build Christ's tabernacle hero, as the ICtb and 
 21th Psalms plainly shew; wlieroforo as we tender 
 our own salvation, not only the favour of God and the 
 benefits of this life, let us every one be careful for the 
 building of the church and temple of God, according 
 as God hath committed a charge to every one for tho 
 edifying of the same, remembering that commandment 
 * Qu. ' plagued 5' — Ed. 
 
34 
 
 EAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. 1. 
 
 of our Saviour, Mat. vi. 33, ' First seek the kingdom 
 of God, and then all these things shall be given you 
 after ;' if first we will seek the kingdom, then these at 
 leism-e, to be regarded afterwards, and not to follow 
 the example of them whom the Lord here reproveth, 
 which run to the building of their own bouse, and 
 were so slow in the Lord's work. We see David so to 
 have been careful thereabouts, that his purpose was 
 not to take benefit of one night's sleep in his own 
 house which he had built until ho had finished the 
 house of God, 2 Sam. vii. 2, which, although be could 
 not accomplish because of the wars wherewith he was 
 troubled against the enemies of the Lord, yet Solomon 
 his son followed the same course, and built first the 
 Lord's house, and, after he had finished that, his own 
 house, for which God accordingly blessed them ; 
 though neither of them wanted chastisements, because 
 also sometimes they faulted therein, yet were great 
 blessings bestowed on them both in this life, vouch- 
 safed out of the everlasting favour and blessing of God, 
 as by the monuments of them both is manifest. 
 
 By example of whom we are instructed to follow 
 the commandment of God in building his house, in 
 going at leastwise as far as David, in providing those 
 things that were requisite for perfecting thereof; which 
 work was referred to Solomon. Let us be moved with 
 the example of God's mercies on them, to look for the 
 like blessing if we follow them in well doing, remem- 
 bering that which is written by the prophet, how that 
 afterward he had espoused them to himself in kind- 
 ness and mercy, and had made a covenant with him 
 by this, that he promiseth that he will ' hear the 
 heavens, and the heavens shall hear the earth, and 
 the earth shall hear Israel,' Hosea. ii. 21 ; nay, they 
 may assure themselves not only of these blessings, 
 but of such as are inestimably to be preferred before 
 them, whereof mention is made in the Apocalypse, 
 though represented also by such things as manna, 
 the tree of life, to conquerors, to them that go forward 
 in the building of the temple, and of the sanctuary. 
 
 This exhortation pertaineth more specially indeed 
 to the principal builders of it. "But it doth also belong 
 unto all the people of the land, not to the ministry or 
 spirituality, as they term it, but to all Christians, who 
 must all be spiritual. If they will all be Christians, 
 they must as lively stones bo built upon the founda- 
 tions ; they must ofl'er up themselves a living, hoh', 
 and acceptable sacrifice, Rom. xii. 1. None is 
 exempted from this labour ; all must be kings, 
 Eev. i. 6, to conquer their lusts and affections that 
 rebel against God's commandments ; all priests, to 
 otfer up spiritual sacrifice, 1 Pet. ii., yea, they are 
 each one to go further, and not only to build them- 
 selves but others also, 1 Thcs. v. 11., every one one 
 another, remembering that which the apostle exhortoth 
 the Thessalouians, ' Exhort one another, and edify 
 one another.' Therefore all must bo builders, Eph. iv. ; 
 all our speech must bo to edify. Col. iii., powdered 
 
 with salt ; our actions rules of godliness, that we may 
 be patterns for others to behold ; for om- Saviour spake 
 to all his disciples, ' Ye are the salt of the earth, and 
 the light of the world,' Mat. v. Not only the bishops 
 and the deacons at Philippi, Phil. i. 1, but also the 
 rest of them were as lights shining forth holding forth 
 for others, Phil. ii. 15, 16. Salt serveth for many 
 uses to season other things, light to light others also ; 
 therefore all arc to edify, not themselves, but others 
 also. This exhortation made to all we ought to call 
 to remembrance, that so we are for this cause termed 
 salt, light, a princely priesthood, a chosen nation, 
 whom God hath sanctified to shew forth the virtue of 
 him that hath called them, and the care which they 
 are to have one of another. It was Cain's voice, 
 ' Am I the keeper of my brother ?' But we are rather 
 to propose unto ourselves the example of Moses. When 
 he was not yet called to be delivered of his brethren, 
 but prepared thereunto, he laboured to reconcile his 
 brethren that wore at discord. Yet this exhortation 
 concerneth principally Zerubbabel and Joshua, because 
 they be the chiefest of the Lord's servants, and the 
 graces of God are most eminent in them whose hearts 
 God hath so touched that they pity the dust aud the 
 stones, the ruins of Jerusalem, Ps. cii. 14, who, as 
 trees of righteousness moistened by God's Spirit, 
 sanctified by God's grace that was poured upon Christ 
 Jesus, are appointed to build the old waste places, to 
 raise up the f'lrmer desolations, Isa. Ixi. 8, 4, and to 
 repair the cities that were desolate and waste through 
 many desolations ; which words of the prophet must 
 teach us, who are called especially to the charge of 
 building, to take delight in the stones thereof, 
 to be careful for the raising up of them, to repair 
 the desolate cities of Judah and Jerusalem. Whereby I 
 am moved to beseech you (fathers) who are enabled 
 with gifts to perform this duty to the whole house- 
 hold, that you would not only raise up others to do 
 this holy work, but that you with more care and dili- 
 gence would perform the same yourselves ; for though 
 you are content to hear the young sort, and some- 
 times Elihu may speak more wisely than his elders ; 
 the youth of Timothy is not to be despised ; yet many 
 have more regard of the grey head, and aged Paul is 
 able to speak with great gravity, and therefore is wont 
 to be beard with great reverence and profit. Gideon, 
 when he had taken the kings of Midian, Zcba, and 
 Zalmunna, ho spake to Jether his fii-st-born to rise up 
 and slay them ; but the boy drew not his sword, be- 
 cause he feared, because he was yet young. Then 
 the kings said unto Gideon, ' Rise thou, and fall upon 
 us, for as the man is, so is his strength ;' our carnal 
 lusts and carnal concupiscence, whereby wo are led to 
 wickedness, fight against the Spirit of God, and they 
 are the enemies of the Lord ; and therefore we are 
 willed of the apostle to ' mortify our members that 
 are on earth, fornication, uncleanness, the inordinate 
 affection, covotousuess, which is idolatrv.' The wicked 
 
 4i22 
 
Vee. 9-11. J 
 
 SERMON VI. 
 
 35 
 
 affections .ire (as the apostle saith) limbs of one bod}', 
 growing so fast unto us by the depnivatioa of our 
 nature, as our arms or legs do to our bodies ; there- 
 fore these limbs of our body must be slain. The 
 sword wherewith we must do it is the word of God, 
 as the apostle teacheth. 
 
 AVhy these lusts are for the most part so slowly 
 slain, there are many reasons : partly because Gideon 
 speaketh to his first-born to slay them, not boys, in- 
 deed, as he was to whom Gideon spake, but of riper 
 years, yet our sons, though our first-born and flower 
 of our sons, j'et but our sons. Zcba and Zalmunna 
 knew well enough, that .Jether, though Gideon's first- 
 born, yet he could not make so quick despatch in kill- 
 ing of them, because they were to die by his hand, 
 they were to die a lingering death ; wherefore, although 
 your children are loath to say to you, that you your- 
 selves are rather to rise up and perform this duty, as 
 neither Jether did to his father Gideon, give us leave, 
 as Zeba and Zalmunna, to will you to rise up and run 
 upon your lusts and slay them, for as the man is, so 
 is his strength. God forbid j'ou should be justly to 
 be taxed with that reproof which is laid upon the great 
 men and the Tekoites, of whom, when the prophets had 
 shewed the building of the walls of Jerusalem, each 
 sort fortified in their place, but the great with them of 
 the Tekoites put not their necks to the work of the 
 Lord. The phrase here used noteth the kind of 
 labour they should have taken, even to carry stones 
 and mortar, a base work that great men should be 
 labourers in ; yet we see the Holy Ghost toucheth them 
 ■with just reproof of ingratitude, that they submitted 
 not themselves thereunto, considering that it was the 
 work of the Lord to whom they did owe themselves, and 
 all others. The building of Christ's church is a work 
 base and contemptible in the judgment of the world, 
 though before God most excellent and precious. But 
 it is base as we list to account it. If we cannot sub- 
 mit ourselves to the bearing of these burdens, let us 
 remember it is our Lord's work, and let us fear the 
 just reproach which the Tekoites bear for the neglect- 
 ing of it. In the French story we read, that at a 
 dangerous siege of Rochelle, for the fortifying a bul- 
 wark against the enemies, each one so bestirred them- 
 selves, that even the gentlewomen and ladies carried 
 stones and rubbish for the raising thereof, which there- 
 fore was called the ladies' bulwark, because the great 
 women iu the siege of Roehelle were content to submit 
 themselves to bear rubbish. It was the work of the Lord 
 by a consequent ; and shall it not be a shame for men, 
 of how great calling soever they be, or count themselves 
 to be, not to submit themselves to the work of the 
 Lord ? If they be such as have taken in hand to build 
 many places, let them remember that they are bound 
 to build in all places, even as the Tekoites were, of 
 whom it is noted, that they edified in divers places, 
 which in that building might more be done, because 
 that being many, when they had perfected the work 
 423 
 
 in one place, they might after go to another. But how 
 many, or any of us, may ixndertake to build in sundry 
 places, I see not ; for if the building be such as requir- 
 eth continual labour therein, if laying of living stones 
 coutinnall}' requireth residence of the builders, that 
 they should still be present on theu' charge, that as 
 new stones are still brought, so they may still be laid 
 on, still more and more to be won to God. Let them 
 remember that this is the Lord's work ; and if they 
 be not able to build in many places, let them be content 
 to resign their charges, so that there may be a work- 
 man able to furnish the places appointed thereunto. 
 
 Cursed be the man that doth the work of the Lord 
 nei/lii/entli/, and cursed he the man that tvithholdeth his 
 hand from hlood, saith the Lord by his prophet. He 
 speaketh of killing the enemies of the Lord. God for- 
 bid that a curse should fall upon us, amongst those 
 that have faulted therein ; and that it may not fall, the 
 Lord hold still up their hearts to perform that with 
 all care which the Spirit of God teacheth to be their 
 duty, viz., to advance the glory of God iu building 
 the temple and sanctuary of God. 
 
 For the rest which are not such as the Tekoites, and 
 yet are comprised in the number of them that are said 
 to build the sanctuary and set to fight the Lord's 
 battles, let them remember that they were cursed that 
 withheld theu' swords from blood. Although they have 
 not the strength of Gideon, yet let them remember 
 that ' the word of God is sharper than any two-edged 
 sword, and pierceth through the dividing of the joints 
 and marrow.' Wherefore, if we build in that measure 
 which God hath given us, God will yield his blessing 
 and put strength unto it ; and though we be not able 
 with David to kill our ten thousand, yet let us be con- 
 tent with Saul to slay our thousands ; yea, there were 
 of Da^vid's worthies that slew but their hundreds. Let 
 us remember the promise made to them that do their 
 duty herein. 
 
 And that this sword m.ay the better strike and wound, 
 we must remember that it must be applied to the limbs 
 and members ; we must take heed that we content not 
 ourselves to run on the generahties, and to stand upon 
 flourishes, but apply this sword to the special faults of 
 oiu- hearers, for so it is like to pierce the better. There 
 are some also, which, although they use this sword, 
 3'et they cover it with such a scabbard, that by reason 
 thereof it is not able to wound in such sort as it should ; 
 as either with intermingling of strange language with- 
 out any necessity, or heaping up of many testimonies, 
 or other things not so fruitful ; so that, although they 
 come near with the sword, yet, because of the scab- 
 bards, they perform not that duty which they ought 
 to do. Wherefore we may remember that the builders 
 which the apostle sjieaketh of, the Corinthians, are 
 reproved, not only for the matter which they built, as 
 for raising hay and stubble upon the foundation, but 
 also for the form and manner they used. Let these men 
 set before their eyes the examples of the prophets and 
 
36 
 
 EAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 Chap. I. 
 
 apostles in their preaching, yea, of the fathers them- 
 selves, whom they Uke so well, and mark in what sort 
 they apply this sword to the mortifying and slaying of 
 the old man. 
 
 A gi'eat help hereunto might have been the ex- 
 ample, if it had continued, of many, who heretofore 
 out of other places, and lastly out of this, have broken 
 the bread of life amongst us. But what shall I com- 
 plain of the mass of fi'ee-will offerings, when even those 
 that were necessarily appointed, either the morning or 
 the evening offerings, are oftentimes wanting, so that 
 often that which should be offered in the evening is 
 offered in the morning, as at this present. Howbeit, 
 that the free-will offerings so long continued should 
 be intermitted the next year after God had delivered 
 us from the Spaniard, I cannot but lament, when such 
 offerings should rather be increased, to the glory of 
 God, and testimony of our thankfulness for so wonder- 
 ful a deliverance. 
 
 The fault hereof I cannot lay on them that before 
 took pains herein, or on the chief magistrate, for that 
 of them many are otherwise emploj^ed. And the 
 magistrate, I think, was ignorant, that it hath been 
 the use for them Ln that place to solicit others, for 
 this, thing was at the beginning of the entrance into 
 his office. But I beseech you that are the Lord's re- 
 membrancers, that you would use all means to pro- 
 cure that these free-will offerings may be continued 
 again. When there had been long want of rain in 
 Israel, Elias promised Ahab, at length, that there 
 should be rain ; and going to the top of a mountain, 
 sent his servant to look, who at the ffi-st saw nothing, 
 and he still sent him down, till at the seventh time, 
 when at length he saw a little cloud arising like a 
 hand at the first, whereof afterwards ensued gi-eat 
 rain. It may be you shall not have your del^u■e at 
 the fijst nor at the second time, yet I beseech you not 
 to omit this thing ; for at length, doubt not after seven 
 times you shall see, though it be but a cloud, where- 
 of may ensue great store of rain. A cause of the in- 
 termitting hereof may be the dishke which, by some 
 division amongst us, by preaching might be bred, 
 because that all of us are not of one mind ; for though 
 all agree that the foundations and walls of the build- 
 ing of the Lord's temple be laid and raised amongst 
 us, yet some think the covering of the same is not so 
 good as it ought to bo. Others are of opiuion that it 
 is good and sufficient. Some think that there wanteth 
 a fence about it for the keeping out of beasts, as we 
 read Nehemiali required him timber of king Artaxcrxes, 
 for building of the inclosnre that appertained to the 
 house of the Lord, though we know that in the days 
 of Darius the temple was perfected, Howbeit, what- 
 soever dissension there be among us about circum- 
 stances, yet we are brethren, and God forbid we 
 should come any more to such distempered speeches, 
 as some on both sides have done. If they had had to 
 have dealt with the Samaritan, that had been enough, 
 
 yea, haply too much, some of it, seeing it faUeth 
 wdthin that which the apostle hath forbidden, as not 
 fit to be amongst saints. 
 
 Let us remember that which the apostle writeth to 
 the Philippians : ' In that whoreunto we are come, let 
 us proceed by one rule, that we may mind one thing.' 
 Now unto this we are all come, that we acknowledge 
 that there is necessary in the church an able and 
 sufficient ministry, and that in this seminary such 
 might be trained up in learning and godliness here 
 amongst us, that being thoroughly seasoned there- 
 withal, they may be made fit to build up the church of 
 God, not as deceitful workmen, but as wise and faith- 
 ful builders. One of the wisest amongst the philoso- 
 phers, giving' precepts for the good^ government of a 
 commonwealth, shewing of what sort governors, assis- 
 tants, and others should bo, saith, that God, in framing 
 men for government, in those which are to be chief, 
 hath mixed gold in those which are fit to assist, 
 silver in husbandmen, and such as are to obey, brass 
 and iron. Now these are of one kindred that beget 
 their like, yet sometimes it falleth out that a golden 
 father begetteth a brazen child, and a brazen father 
 begetteth a golden child, that the son shall not be 
 permitted to take the office of his father, but that he 
 should be set among the husbandmen. And if a brazen 
 father should have a golden son, that the governors 
 should take him from amongst the brass and iron, and 
 place him among the golden children, receiving this 
 as an oracle, that the commonwealth must then go to 
 wreck, when they shall be contented to prefer brass 
 and iron to the place appointed for gold and silver. 
 This is but a fable, I know, and like to that of Jotham's, 
 but the moral of it is agi'eoable to our purpose. There 
 are amongst us certain dispositions as it were of gold 
 and silver, tit to be placed among ecclesiastical and 
 civil charges of government ; some of another temper, 
 not fit for government. Great care is to be had by 
 those that are in place of goveriiment, that brass sons 
 are not preferred to places appointed for golden chil- 
 dren, that if they be not fm-nished for such places, 
 they may be applied for that to which the}' are fit. 
 Therefore you that govern, considering, according to 
 the rule of the holy Scriptm-es, that all must go to 
 wTcck when brass and iron are placed in charge, are 
 to be requested to have care, that when j-ou are to 
 make choice of such as are to bo in i)lace of govern- 
 ment, that you make choice of such as are of gold, at 
 least of silver, dispositions ; but if you meet with such 
 as are of brass and iron, then play the part of Apol- 
 lonians, and siguil'y to their friends that they are not 
 fit for such places, but that they may be set to that 
 wherewith they may do most good. Especially care 
 would bo had of statutes which godly founders have 
 provided for maintenance, of such as being fit for 
 such places, their parents being not able to train them 
 up ; a lamentable case that golden i)urses should bo 
 preferred before golden wits. It is pitiful, though wo 
 
 424 
 
Ver. 9-11.] 
 
 SERMON VI. 
 
 37 
 
 ought also to be tliftukful for it, that the parliament 
 hath taken such order therein, which we ourselves 
 would not ; j'et pitiful it is that a law should bo made 
 for the restraint of corruption in those matters. How- 
 beit, if this law do not restrain them that buy and sell 
 for gold, let them, moreover, take heed lest favour 
 some time compass that corruption which money did 
 before ; nay, if your own children and friends be 
 brass, beware j"ou prefer them not, when gold should 
 be preferred; prefer your own you may, but then when 
 they be fit. Moses made not any of his childi-eu 
 rulers after him, but Joshua ; yet made he his brethren 
 priests and his children, because they were fit for 
 those places ; [for] his own they were not. AVe have 
 laws to shew whom they be that be so qualified that 
 they may bo chosen ; our founders have such care 
 therein, that they would not so much as have their 
 own kinsmen preferred unless they be so qualified. 
 The candlesticks of the sanctuary were of gold, which 
 were to hold out the lights ; some parts of the sanc- 
 tuary were covered with silver ; there was also about 
 the sanctuarj' use for brass ; but for government they 
 only are to be chosen whom God in their creating had 
 intemiingled gold with their metal. And as they 
 should have special care hereof in election, so after- 
 wards [that] they are made fit, let that which is 
 degenerate and become copper, for many things shew 
 to be gold which afterwai'ds prove otherwise, so are 
 they not to be taken for gold until that by constancy 
 in going forward they make perfection of the same. 
 They are by then- towardness before to be esteemed, 
 but their trial comes after. This might be performed 
 if orders ahead}' provided heretofore w^re performed, 
 and where they want they were supplied, that such 
 exercises were maintained in all colleges and halls, to 
 make these instruments indeed of gold fit for these 
 purposes. I am loath to enter into discourse of our 
 particular fault herein, of the negligence, and somewhat 
 more than negligence, of many, neither of the faction 
 maintained in sundiy places, by such as love to fish 
 in troubled waters ; only in general. 
 
 I would have such to remember as are to be made 
 stones of this spiritual building, chief stones and 
 corner stones, to be trimmed up to serve either in 
 church or commonwealth, that they ought willingly 
 to submit themselves to good orders, whereby they 
 may be fit for the building. The stones must be 
 squared, carved, polished, and gi-aven, which, had they 
 reason and sense, they would not have neglected ; how 
 much more wiUing should you be to submit yourselves 
 hereunto, especially for that so wonderful use. The 
 philosophers said that the stones appointed for altars 
 were happy. Instruction, reproof, correction, may 
 seem unpleasant, but if j-ou have that care which 
 living stones should have, that religious feeling which 
 you ought, you will be content to submit yourselves to 
 such things, without which you cannot be made fit, 
 and be content though you be restrained of such 
 425 
 
 things as elsewhere haply be held tolerable, and may 
 not be permitted, as your Christmas lords, an use 
 taken from the heathen, as Polidorus Virgil sheweth, 
 which in no place are tolerable; but among the pro- 
 phets and their children such discords are most of all 
 to be condemned. The very name thereof sheweth the 
 inconvenience of the thing, as also the rest unprofit- 
 able and unfruitful delights, as plays, to say no more 
 of them. It is observed that corruption entered first 
 amongst the Jews by those means whereby, through 
 the policy of Antiochus and the enemies, their minds 
 were so much etitsminated. In this also we all agree, 
 that as there ought also to be godly and learned minis- 
 ters, so there should be a sutficient maintenance for 
 them : which in some places being sutficient, they only 
 are to be requested who are in authority to dispose of 
 such livings as patrons, that they have a care that 
 the candlesticks which are to hold out the Ught may 
 be of gold ; but such are a great deal worse which take 
 gold to prefer brazen-nose men. But let them take heed 
 lest they fall into that mischief which the example of 
 Ananias and Sapphira teachcth against them that go 
 about to intervert any part of those livings, which 
 either themselves or their predecessors have applied 
 to the maintenance of the house of God. 
 
 It may be there are not many in this place that 
 have to deal in this matter, but some there are that 
 hereafter may, to whom this latter exhortation may 
 appertain, namely, that where there is not a sufficient 
 maintenance appointed for the minister, there them- 
 selves would be careful to increase it, following the 
 example of the pruices of Judah, who, with willing 
 hearts (as Moses noteth), ofiered to the Lord, as also 
 1 Chronicles, last chapter, yea, all the people are said to 
 have been so ready that they were content to have 
 given more than was sufficient, because they ofiered 
 with an entire and willing heart. But that others 
 also may be more willing to provide for the mainte- 
 nance of the ministry', by providing that which is want- 
 ing, we in this place, so much as lieth in us, are to 
 give example hereof in those things which are in our 
 hand, bestowing that on a fit person which amounteth 
 out of the commodity of such living, without decaying 
 that which is to be applied also to the service of the 
 ministry. You know my meaning is, it were to be 
 wished that you should shew that especial care in 
 bestowing impropriations, which are in your gifts, upon 
 men able to do good in the church, that your example 
 may provoke others to do also the like, at least that 
 the surplusage may thus be bestowed ; and if we would 
 in this place begin, it were to be hoped that others 
 would follow. The priests begin to ofl'er, though 
 indeed it be too late for us to begin, for others whom 
 God hath filled with the zeal of his house herein some 
 go before us. Josiah, king of Judah, is said to have 
 commanded the priests to cause the ruins of the 
 temple to be repaired, and it appeareth that the king 
 was more forwai'd than the priests. I mention it to 
 
33 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I' 
 
 our shame, tliat our princes and rulers slaoulJ, in 
 building and repairing the house of God, be still found 
 more ready than we. Can we not find one man fit on 
 ■whom such things as we have may be bestowed, and 
 will not there one of oui- governors be found that will 
 have care to turn that which riseth out of the com- 
 modity of these livings to the benefit of him that may 
 serve in that place, to bring men unto God, rather than 
 a Tobiah and Ammonite ? Shall we still sufler his 
 majesty's laws to go before us ? Shall we be careful of 
 the establishment and foundation of oui' foimdatious, 
 which we before should have been careful of, and shall 
 we not be careful to use the benefit thereof so as may 
 be most for God's glory ? If we expect also till bj' 
 law she drive us to this, whereas it is presently in our 
 own power, let us take heed it be not laid to our 
 charge. God grant it be not in that day. 
 
 I know it will be said that regard is to be had of 
 such as live upon those livings ; and it is true, so far as 
 may be done without prejudice to that gi-eat matter, 
 in regard whereof that is but small. When Tobias 
 was placed in a chamber which belonged to the house 
 of God, Nehemiah passed but a little to thrust him 
 out of it, although Tobias was authorised to keep the 
 same by the priest ; but he thrust him out, and cast 
 his stuff and garment out of doors after him. If the 
 mind of Jonah were in these rather cast into the sea, 
 when the mariners see thej' cannot be safe whilst he 
 being in, seeing that God is able to preserve them if 
 they were so cast out as Jonah, and that money which 
 is otTered for the compassing of voices (I speak what I 
 know), though I wish no man to say to them, as Peter 
 did to Simon Magus, ' Th}- money perish with thee,' 
 I would rather wish they would be persuaded to be- 
 stow it on somewhat that they may better hold. As 
 for the gain which is said may arise to the university 
 
 by the fine, alas! do we not see how cursed such fines 
 and such monej' is ! How manj' hundred pounds have 
 in a few years been brought to nothing, as though all 
 had been put into a broken bag ! But if we grant it 
 not, it \»ill be feared that our posterity will ; yet we 
 herein shall shew the mind of David, who, though he 
 himself could not build the house of God, yet he pre- 
 pared whatsoever was fit and convenient for the same; 
 and who knoweth but the Lord may send a Solomon 
 to turn it to that end we mean it? It is not sufficient 
 for us to say we wish these things were done, thua 
 and thus ordered as were best ; but we must be con- 
 tent to put to our helping hand, and labour to the 
 uttermost to bring it to pass, else we shall do as the 
 man St James speaketh of, that saith to the needy 
 person. Go in peace and warm thee, but gives him 
 not to relieve his poverty. 
 
 If these things move us not, let the last reason move 
 us, that among the sacrileges committed by the abbeys 
 and monasteries, which drew down God's wrath upon 
 them, this was one, that they spoiled their churches 
 for their provision of able ministers ; and, having 
 commodities in their hands, set only such hedge- 
 priests to be over them, feeding themselves of the 
 rest. Neither doubt I but God will raise up others, 
 if you be loath to move the chancellor and others to be 
 content to sutl'er us to bestow these livings as we have 
 intended, and for which cause we have withstood and 
 satisfied the request of other honourable personages in 
 this suit ; and it may be said, as Mordecai said to 
 Esther, ' If thou neglect it, God will send help from 
 some other place, but then thou and thy father's 
 house shall surely be destroyed.' I would have stood 
 longer upon other things, but I speak to men of under- 
 standing. 
 
 SEEMON VII. 
 
 Then Zeruhhahcl the son of Shealtid, and Joshua the son of Josedech the hii/h priest, ivith all the remnant of the 
 jieople, obeyed the voice of the T,ord their God, and the words of Ilaijijai the prophet [as the Lord their God 
 had sent him), and the people did Jear liefore the Lord. Then spake Haijijai the Lord's messenger in the 
 Lord's message unto tlie jieople, sayin//, I am with you, saith the Lord. — Haggai I. 12-13. 
 
 WHEN the prophet Haggai had delivered his mes- 
 sage from the Lord of hosts unto Zerubbabel, 
 Joshua, and the remnant of the people, the fruit of 
 this message from the Lord is here set down. AVhat 
 effect it wrought in the hearts of the hearers, not only 
 of Zerubbabel and Joshua, but even of the people 
 also ! The principal ell'ects that followed upon the 
 prophet's sermon arc here noted to be two, one of 
 obedience : ' They all obeyed the voice of the Lord ;' 
 another of reverence : ' And the people did fear before 
 the Lord.' 
 
 The word of the Lord by the messenger of the Lord 
 Lad brought some fear and reverence upon them, to 
 
 cause them to sloop unto tlio will of Gol, and this 
 fear had wrought some desire in their hearts to j-ield 
 themselves in obedience to do the work of the Lord in 
 the building of the temple also. It is said of Christ, 
 Isa. xi., that ' the fear of the Lord should rest upon 
 him!' and so it may bo likewise of all true Christians, 
 that the fear of the Lord is before them ; not that fear 
 which John speaks of, 1 John iv. 18, which is a fear 
 that hath painl'uhioss, wherewith the wicked are vexed, 
 dreading punishment, that being a slavish and a ser- 
 vile fear, but such a fear as Abraham had, Gen. xxii., 
 when he would have ofl'ered his dear son for a sacrifice 
 to the Lord, fear arising from faith and love, and 
 
 420 
 
V^ER. 12, 13.] 
 
 SERMON VII. 
 
 39 
 
 drawing us on to obedience ; that fear of the Lord, 
 which John saith continueth with love for ever, 
 ' Herein is love perfect, that wo should have boldness 
 in the day of judgment.' This fear is a token of grace 
 in the children of God, that they tremble and fear at 
 the word of the Lord ; so saith the Lord by the pro- 
 phet Isaiah, chap. Ixvi. ver. 2, ' To this man I looked, 
 even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and 
 trembleth at my word ;' and again, ver. 5, ' Hear the 
 word of the Lord, ye that tremble at his word.' Such 
 a fear did the Lord himself approve and commend in 
 the heart of good Josiah : 2 Kings ssii. 19, ' Because 
 thine heart was tender, and thou hast humbled thy- 
 self before the Lord, when thou heardest what I spake 
 against this place and against the inhabitants thereof, 
 that they should become a desolation and a curse, and 
 hast rent thy clothes and wept before me, I also have 
 heard thee, saith the Lord.' And such a fear, joined 
 with obedience, the Lord requireth in all his servants. 
 ' Who is among j-ou that feareth the Lord, that 
 obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in dark- 
 ness and hath no light. Let him trust in the name of 
 the Lord, and stay upon his God,' Isa. 1. 10. Thus 
 did Zenibbabel, Joshua, with the remnant of the 
 people ; they obeyed the voice of the Lord their God, 
 and the words of Haggai the prophet, as the Lord 
 their God had sent him, and the people did fear bo- 
 fore the Lord. 
 
 A lesson of no small importance, both to us that 
 preach the word aild to you that hear it also. 
 
 For us that preach : that we do the work, and preach 
 the word of the Lord, not only faithfully but plainly 
 also, that the people that hear us may be effectually 
 moved to reverence and obedience therewithal. 
 
 To you that hear : that you ' receive the message, 
 not as from men but as from God,' as did the Thes- 
 salonians, to whom the apostle gives testimony, 
 1 Thes. ii. 13, with thanksgiving, and that ' without 
 ceasing, for that when they received the word which 
 they heard of him,' and others of God's ministers, 
 ' they received it not as the word of men, but as it is 
 in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh 
 in them that believe.' And let us here consider what 
 the apostle saith, ' Follow after charity, and desire 
 spiritual gifts, but rather that ye may prophesy.' 
 
 All preachers of the word after a sort are prophets, 
 not because they foretell things to come, but because 
 they open and reveal the word of the Lord, and appty 
 it also unto God's people : ' For he that prophesieth 
 speaketh from God unto men, to edification, exhorta- 
 tion, and comfort,' and so is he said to edify the 
 church of God, according to that of the apostle, 1 Cor. 
 xiv. 6, ' He that speaketh a strange language edifieth 
 himself, but he that prophesieth edifieth the church.' 
 
 The church is said to be edified by a metaphor, 
 
 when they that are believers are laid as living stones 
 
 one upon another, being edified, that is, built as a 
 
 spiritual house is by God's ministers, who are there- 
 
 427 ' 
 
 fore called God's builders, 1 Pet. ii. 5, as the people 
 are God's building, 1 Cor. iii. 9, and so it is said, 
 Acts ix. 31, that ' the chnrch had rest throughout all 
 Judea and Galilee, and Samaria, and were edited ; and 
 walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of 
 the Holy Ghost, were multiplied.' To preach or pro- 
 phesy, therefore, is not to speak strange language, if 
 we will ever have the people edified ; but we must pro- 
 phesy as the prophets and apostles did, in plain evi- 
 dence of spirit and speech, rather to profit than to 
 please either oarselvus or those whom we speak unto ; 
 which, if either we would follow the apostle's judgment, 
 or did mind so much the people's profit as he did, we 
 would be much more willing to do so ourselves also. For 
 though he ' could speak as many and more languages 
 than any of them all, yet had he rather (said he) speak 
 five words plainly and profitably to instruct others, than 
 ten thousand in a strange tongue,' 1 Cor. xiv. 19. And 
 it is well worth the observing that which the apostle 
 hath noted already, that when God spake in a strange 
 language, he did it because of the people's infidelity, 
 1 Cor. xiv. 22 ; and it was no mercy but a judgment 
 that the Lord would speak with other tongues to that 
 people, Isa. xxviii. 11. 'For all that will they not 
 hear me, saith the Lord.' 
 
 The fathers of the Greek church never preached in 
 the learned Hebrew, but in their vulgar tongue, neither 
 any chm-ch till papistry came in. 'The apostles them- 
 selves. Acts ii. 4, 8, ' being filled with the Holy 
 Ghost, began to speak with other tongues, as the 
 Spirit gave them utterance ;' and although the multitude 
 which heard them were of divers languages, yet did 
 they hear what the apostles spake, ' every man in 
 their own tongue wherein they were born.' They 
 spake not in Greek to the Arabians, nor in Latin to 
 the Egyptians, nor in the Parthian tongue to the 
 Phrygians, nor in the Hebrew tongue to the Grecians, 
 but ' the people heard them speaking in their own 
 tongues the wonderful things of God,' ver. 11. What 
 the true language and learning is, which preachers 
 should labour for, and so present unto God's jjeople, 
 we may understand and find by the prophet Isaiah, 
 speaking in the person of Christ, the chief preacher of 
 the gospel, chap. 1.4:' The Lord God hath given mo 
 the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to 
 speak a word in season to him that is weary,' which 
 also we may take from his own blessed mouth in his 
 own person to the same purpose, Mat. xi. 28, when 
 that of the prophet was accomplished, ' Come unto 
 me,' saith he, ' all ye that are weary and laden, and I 
 will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn 
 of me, for I am meek and lowdy in heart : and you shall 
 find rest unto your souls ;' and yet more eflectually, 
 when that scripture, Isa. Ixi. 1, 2, by his own testimony 
 was fulfilled in him and by him : Luke iv. 18, ' The 
 Spirit of the Lord is upon me ; because the Lord hath 
 anointed mo to preach good tidings to the meek ; he 
 hath sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to pro- 
 
40 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 claim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the 
 prison to them that are bound,' &c. ; and began to 
 say unto them. This day is the Scripture fulfilled 
 in your ears,' and in the opening and applj'ing of 
 which ^Yords, he did so wonderfully afiect the minds 
 and hearts of his hearers, that as the evangelist saith, 
 ' they all bare him witness, and wondered at the 
 gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth.' 
 Here then may we see indeed what true learning is, and 
 who hath the tongue of the learned, who he is that is 
 best able to preach the gospel with most power and 
 best fruits ; even he that hath the Spuit of God upon 
 him in some measiu'e, as Christ had above measm-e, 
 and so delivering the word of grace causeth those that 
 hear it to wonder at the gracious words that proceed 
 out of his mouth. That preaching, then, is most 
 warrantable, which is most profitable, and that most 
 profitable which is most powerful, and that most 
 powerful which best informeth the mind, enlighteneth 
 the judgment, affecteth the soul aright, and vvarmeth 
 the heart with the comforts and contentments of it. 
 As it fell out with the two discijsles going to Emmaus, 
 'Did not our hearts,' say they, ' burn within us while 
 he talked w ith us by the way, and while he opened to 
 us the Scriptures? ' Which no doubt he did, not in 
 any strange languuge, to procm'e the credit of a learned 
 tongue, but in plain evidence of speech and spirit, for 
 the help of their understandings and aflectious, in then- 
 vulgar language well known unto them. Saint Paul 
 exhorteth to prophesy iu words of understanding, and 
 not to use a strange language. Learning, doubtless, is 
 fallen to a low ebb, if men cannot understand us, uor 
 will acknowledge any learning iu us, except we con- 
 strue Greek or Hebrew-, and stufl' our sermons with 
 allegations of divers languages, which maj' indeed 
 please ourselves and humour others, but tendeth no- 
 thing to the profit and edification of them that hear 
 us; and albeit the Scripture seemeth sometimes to use 
 some words of a strange language, yet must wo wisely 
 consider upon what just occasion such words were so 
 uttered, and then so recorded by the penmen of the 
 Holy Ghost. It was not for any vain ostentation, nor 
 pm'posely for our imitation, but cither for the explica- 
 tion of some mystei-j-, or exposition of some prophecj'. 
 When Christ raised up the daughter of Jairus, ruler 
 of the synagogue, from the death to life, he said, using 
 these words of the Syrian language, TuVdha-cwni, to 
 put them in mind of the Scripture, that was now per- 
 formed, which Isaiah projihesied, Isa. xvi. 1, ' Send 
 ye the lamb to the ruler of the land, from the rock of 
 the desert to the mount of the daughter of Zion.' 
 ' When the ears of the deaf were opened,' Mark vii. 34, 
 he said Kjihiiltatha, a word of the Syrian tongue, which 
 the evangelist presently expounded, lie opened; that 
 go that might be known to be performed which was 
 spoken by the proiihct, Isa. xxxv. 5, ' Then shall the 
 eyes of the blind Ije enlightened, and the ears of the 
 deaf be opened.' When ho was crucified, in his 
 
 grievous agony upon the cross, he cried out with a 
 loud voice in these w'ords, Eli, Eli, lama sahadithanil 
 Mat. xxvii. 40, Mark xv. 34, the former of which 
 words being Hebrew, and the latter being words of the 
 Syrian language, which Christ uttered, and the evan- 
 gelist interpreted, 'Mij God, my God, xeluj hast thou 
 forsaken me' And this was done to shew both the 
 accomplishing of the prophecy of David, Ps. xxii., 
 concerning his person and bitter passion, whence 
 these words were taken, and also the bitter mocking 
 of the Jews, who hearing him call Eli, Eli, said, in 
 a scotfing manner, ' He calleth upon Elias, and let him 
 alone ; let us see whether Elias will come to take him 
 down.' And so we find that both Christ and his 
 apostles did divers times in the New Testament use 
 the Syrian word Abba, Father, when they called upon 
 God, or spake of the voice of the Spirit of adoption in 
 our hearts, whereby we cry unto God as unto our 
 Father ; a probable argument, as some do conceive, 
 that usually they did both preach and pray, in a known 
 language, even in the vulgar tongue ; all which being 
 duly weighed and considered, we may easily perceive 
 that it is much safer and better both for preachers and 
 hearers, that the word be delivered, not in words and 
 sentences of a strange language, but to the best capa- 
 city of the hearers in a known tongue ; for as we must 
 not so preach that we may seem to be learned, so neither 
 may the hearers desire to hear otherwise or other 
 things than such as whereby they may go away better 
 instructed and edified in the faith and fear of God. 
 And then, if thus we speak and thus we hear, and if 
 thus we deliver and thus we receive the Lord's mes- 
 sage from the Lord's messengers, as the poople of 
 God did in this place, wo shall receive the pattern of 
 wholesome words, and be better acquainted with the 
 form of true godliness, we shall speak as the words of 
 God, and receive the word that is brought us, ' not 
 as the w'ord of man, but as indeed it is, the w-ord and 
 oracles of the living God.' Such was the efl'ect and 
 fruit of Peter's sermon. Acts ii., when he spake not 
 only so plainly to their cars and understanding, but 
 also powerfully and piercingly to their very hearts 
 and afl'ectious concerning Christ the Son of God, 
 whom with their wicked hands they had crucified ; for 
 upon the hearing thereof they wero pricked iu their 
 hearts, perplexed iu their spirits, they repented of 
 their sins, believed the apostles, were baptized, and 
 received the Holy Ghost, and the same day there were 
 added unto them about three hundred * souls. And 
 albeit the word of God, though powerfully and plainly 
 jireached, have not always the same or the like gra- 
 cious etl'ect and fruit, yet shall it alwaj's more or less 
 accomplish the work and will of him that sends it. It 
 shall not only shake and move the weak and slender 
 reed, but cause also the stoutest and strongest cedar 
 to quake and tremble. So did it prevail with Felix, 
 when ho heard Paul preaching and ' disputing of 
 -'•■ Qu. ' thousand"? — En. 
 428 
 
Ver 12, 13.] 
 
 SEEMON VII. 
 
 41 
 
 righteousness, and temperance, and of the judgment 
 to come;' for the test saithhe trembled, and answered, 
 ' Go thy way for this time ; when I have a convenient 
 season, I will call for thee.' 
 
 It hath been ever, and is j'et still, the use and cus- 
 tom of froward and profane people, when cither their 
 ministers or their friends did rebuke and reprove 
 them, not so much to be grieved that they had 
 ofl'ended, as to be angry and moved that their faults 
 were told them. It was an afl'ection of an haughty 
 tyrant to cast John Baptist into prison for reproving 
 his incest in retaining and maintaining his brother 
 Philip's wife. 
 
 When AHppius, a young man of great hope, and of 
 Austin's acquaintance, was too much transported with 
 an inordinate desire and delight in and after the 
 games and spectacles at Carthage, especially those 
 which they called the Circeiiccs liidi, Austin much de- 
 sired and endeavoured, out of the love ho bare unto 
 him, by the best means he could to reclaim him, but 
 could not for the time prevail with him. Not long 
 after the same, Alippius hearing Austin, in his 
 rhetoric lecture at Carthage, drawing a similitude from 
 the same plays to make the matter he had in hand 
 more plain and pleasing, with a kind of biting deri- 
 sion of those who where captivated too much with 
 the madness of those sports, Alippius took the whole 
 matter unto himself, and was persuaded, saith Austin, 
 that I had not spoken so much but even for his sake, 
 and that which another would have taken as an occa- 
 sion to bo angry with me, the honest young man 
 made an occasion to be angry with himself, and to 
 love me more fervently. For thou hast said it, 
 Lord, and set down in thy writings, ' Rebuke the 
 wise man and he will love thee.' Thus was Alippius 
 both healed of his error and reclaimed from his vain 
 sports by the good providence and power of God in 
 the band of Austin, never thinking of Alippius nor 
 intending his curing or healing, as he himself saith at 
 that time. For after those words, the filthiness of all 
 those sports and delights did so recoil and vanish 
 from his mind and heart, that he never after came 
 amongst them any more. Now, let us well consider, 
 my brethren, that if Alippius profited so well in hear- 
 ing a rhetoric lecture, both for the informing of his 
 judgment and reformation of his life, and all by the 
 blessing of God, as Austin himself doth acknowledge 
 in that place, why may not, why ought not, we to 
 look for the like good fruit and effect of our desires 
 and labours in hearing of divine lectures and godly 
 sermons, such as may bo more able, having a better 
 promise, to convince the judgment, convert a sinner," 
 save a soul, and cover a multitude of sins ? And this 
 we shall yet the more efiectually find and feel if we 
 reverently and obediently, as it now followeth in this 
 scripture, hearken to the messenger of the Lord in 
 the Lord's message : ' Then spake Haggai, the Lord's 
 messenger in the Lord's message unto the people, 
 429 
 
 saying, I am with you, saith the Lord.' These words 
 comprehend another sermon of the prophet Hacgai, 
 and do signify this much in efi'ect unto us, that after 
 the people were moved a little at the first sermon, to 
 reverence and obey the word of the Lord sent unto 
 them, yet, notwithstanding, they stayed a little, and 
 then the prophet came again unto them, both to take 
 some fear out of their hearts which was upon them, 
 and also to make them a promise of God's gracious 
 presence and assistance in this great business. ' Fear 
 not, I am with you, saith the Lord of hosts.' 
 
 By the words of the prophet, it doth evidently appear 
 that in this work of the building of the temple, they 
 much feared the Persian king, lest he should molest or 
 hinder them in the same ; therefore the Lord sendeth 
 this word, that they should not fear, for he would be 
 with them to encourage and strengthen them, and cause 
 the work to prosper in their hands ; and lest they should 
 think ho spake this of himself, and not from the Lord, 
 the prophet addeth thus, ' Then spake Haggai the 
 Lord's messenger in the Lord's message unto the 
 people, saying, I am with j'ou, saith the Lord,' shew- 
 ing thereby that he camo unto them not only as the 
 messenger of the Lord, but that the thing which he 
 brought was the Lord's message also. When David, 
 being troubled in his mind that he should dwell in a 
 house of cedar trees, and the ark of God remain under 
 curtains, he purposed in his thoughts to build a house 
 unto the Lord. Nathan the prophet spake unto him, 
 saying, ' Go, do all that is in thy heart, for the Lord 
 is with thee.' Nathan that spake this was the mes- 
 senger of the Lord, because he was a holy prophet of 
 the Lord, but that which he spake was his own, and 
 not any message from tho Lord ; for the same night 
 the word of tho Lord came unto Nathan to let David 
 underst.and that not he, but his son, should proceed 
 out of his loins, should bnild a house unto the Lord. 
 A good lesson for such as preach or prophesy unto 
 God's people, to hold nothing back from them which 
 the Lord by them hath sent unto them, but to open 
 unto them the whole counsel of God, as St Paul did, 
 that they may say with more comfort, even as he said, 
 ' That which we have received, deliver wo unto you,' 
 as the message of tho Lord, and tho Lord's messenger. 
 Which also justly condcmneth such of our prophets 
 and preachers as refusing to stand in the counsel of 
 the Lord, and to deliver his word unto his people, do 
 utter the dreams and deceit of their onii hearts, and 
 put upon them the fancies and visions of their own 
 heads, of whom tho Lord may justly say now, as ho 
 said of some such prophets in Jeremiah's time, ' I 
 have not sent these prophets, yet they ran ; I have 
 not spoken unto them, yet they prophesied.' And 
 this may well serve also for a Christian admonition 
 unto all such as are hearers of the Lord's prophets, 
 to look as carefully to the message as to the messenger, 
 to tho matter as to the man, and to try the spirits, and 
 proving all things, take hold of that which is good, Hke 
 
42 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 tte men of Berea, who are said to be ' more noble than 
 tbey of Thessalonica, in that they received the word 
 with all readiness of mind, and searched the Scriptures 
 daily whether those things which Paul had taught them 
 ■were so.' 
 
 We may here also well and worthily observe how 
 necessary often preaching is to God's people, if ever 
 we will draw them to walk in his fear. ' The spirit 
 may be willing, but the flesh is weak,' as our Saviour 
 saith ; and when we are at the best, our best duties 
 are full of many wants, and mingled with much imper- 
 fection, insomuch that we have need continually to be 
 stirred up, quickened and strengthened unto e\evy good 
 work by the preaching of the word. It is not enough 
 for Paul to plant unless Apollos doth water also ; there 
 must be ' precept upon precept, line upon line, here a 
 little and there a little,' Isa. xxviii. ; neither must the 
 Philijipians be weary of hearing the same things often, 
 seeing it is not grievous unto Paul to write them, and 
 for them it is a safe thing. Whtn Moses and the pro- 
 phets spake of preaching, they called it a dropping : 
 Dcut. xxxii. 1,2,' My doctrine shall drop as the rain, 
 and my speech shall distil as the dew ;' Ezek. xx. 4G, 
 ' Son of man, set thy face toward the south, and drop 
 thy word toward the south, and prophesy against the 
 forest of the south field.' For as the rain by often 
 dropping and falling upon the earth doth soften it and 
 make it fruitful, so doth the word by often preaching 
 make the hearts of men like good ground to bring forth 
 their good fruit in due season. It was the counsel and 
 charge of Paul to Timothy, to 'preach the word in 
 season and out of season,' 1 Tim. iv. 1, 2; not only 
 
 ordinarily in a constant course, but extraordinarily also, 
 if any just occasion should so require. And if we well 
 consider the good success which Haggai's often preach- 
 ing found with this people, it may be an encourage- 
 ment unto us to take the like course to procure the 
 like blessing. His first sermon was delivered in the 
 first day of the sixth month, and therein their sins 
 discovered and reproved, God's judgments opened and 
 applied, for their neglect iu building the Lord's house, 
 and themselves exhorted to go up to the mountain to 
 bring timber to undertake the work, and to build the 
 house. Had not this been thus spoken, the work had 
 not been so thought upon, nor taken into due considera- 
 tion. His second sermon was preached unto them in 
 the four-and-tweutieth daj- of the same month, some- 
 what about three weeks afterwards ; and had not this 
 been added unto the former, the work in all likelihood 
 had been neglected still. This made the prophet to 
 strike once and again, while the iron was hot, lest the 
 sparks which were kindled by the first sermon should 
 have been either quenched or cooled for want of an- 
 other to second and abet the same. Unto this the 
 Lord himself giveth testimony, when he telleth us, 
 Ezra vi. 14, that the elders of the Jews having now 
 taken the work in hand, ' builded the house of the 
 Lord, and piospered through the prophesying of 
 Haggai the prophet, and of Zechariah the son of Iddo.' 
 Arid thus doth the Lord make his own word, by faithful 
 and frequent preaching, cither as a hammer to bruise 
 us or a fire to melt us, that so he ma_y accomplish his 
 own work which he requireth at our hands. 
 
 SEEMON VIII. 
 
 And the Lord aliired up the fpirit of Zeiuhhahel the son of Shealtiel, a prince of Jiidiili, and the spirit of Joshua 
 
 the son of Josedcch the hiyh priest. — Haggai I. 14. 
 
 IT hath been heretofore declared in the explication 
 of the former part of this chapter, how the Jews, 
 having begnn to lay the foundation of the temple of 
 the Lord, did afterward surcease from proceeding in 
 the Lord's work ; wherefore they were, first, sharply 
 reprehended and reproved by the prophet of the Lord 
 for their sin, and afterwards he did encourage them to 
 go on forward in the building of the temple. 
 
 In these words he sheweth how the Lord unto the 
 words of the pi'ophet did add the inward operation of 
 his Spirit. 1, The Lord did stir up the spirit, &c. ; 
 2, the obedience of the prince and people thereunto, 
 in the words following ; and they came and did the 
 work. 
 
 The first needeth no exposition, saving that whereas 
 it is said, that the Lord did stir them up, we may 
 conceive their drowsy sluggishness was liko unto a 
 sleep, and sleep is nothing but a similitude of death ; 
 wherefore the apostle saith, Ejib. v. 14, ' Awake, thou 
 
 that sleepest, and stand up from the dead, and Christ 
 shall give thee light.' The same admonition the Jews 
 did receive by God at the time when, by stirring them 
 up, he awoke them out of sleep. 
 
 The next point is the circumstance of time : ver. 
 15, ' In the twenty-fuurth day of the sixth month, in 
 the second year of Darius the king ;' which doth shew 
 that the part doth not belong to the second chapter, 
 but to th^ first, for the Scriptures were delivered into 
 cha]jters a little before our ago ; but the Scripture 
 itself sheweth this division is more probable, seeing 
 that the second verse of the next chapter should begin 
 with another circumstance of time. So Jerome and 
 others have divided the same,* a matter wherein I 
 would not have spent so many words, but that the 
 Council of Trent, and some of the ancient fathers, have 
 joined the same to the second chapter, according to 
 the translation of the old Latins. Sextus the 5th doth 
 * Ilieron. in Haggai, cap. ii. Vulgiit. edit. Haggai, cap. ii. 
 
 430 
 
Ver. 14.] 
 
 SERMON VIII. 
 
 43 
 
 not join this to the former, but to the latter circum- 
 stance in the second chapter. 
 
 Paulius do Palatio, one of the popish writers, would 
 have this part, aeeordiug to the Hebrews, to be joined 
 to the circumstance of time ; and Rebeira, also a man 
 of the papists, and of gi'eater judgment, affirmcth that 
 this circumstance of time, in the first verse of the second 
 chapter, appertaineth to the first chapter. So clear 
 and undoubted it is that the circumstance of time, and 
 the course of the Scripture, doth shew that as soon as 
 the Spirit of the Lord did stir them up, thoy made no 
 delay, but went and built the house of the Lord, so 
 that they did not then defer so many days as before they 
 had done years, but went and did work in the Lord's 
 house. We may also further here observe, that this 
 house is called ' the house of the Lord of hosts,' to 
 shew his power over all creatures, a thing which might 
 stand much for their encouragement ; for whcnas 
 they had begun to build the house of the Lord, Ezra 
 i. 2, bj' the permission of C}tus, then their adver- 
 saries procured a commission from Artaxcrses to 
 hiuiler and molest them in the building of the roof, 
 and afterwards thej- obtained liberty to re-edify the 
 same in the days of Darius, as appeareth, Ezra iv. 24, 
 so that they might have been discouraged if they had 
 not considered that the hearts of princes are in the 
 hands of God, as the rivers of waters, Prov. xxi. 1. 
 2. As his power, so his fatherly goodness is shewed in 
 this, in that he is called their God. As he made pro- 
 mise to Abraham to be a God unto him, and to his 
 seed for ever, Gen. xii. 2, 3, xv. 1, 5, and xvii. 7, 
 so now he sheweth himself to be their God, being 
 Abraham's seed. The consideration whereof must 
 needs breed a child-like affection in them to obey so 
 good a Father, for when he might have justly punished 
 them for their daily sins, j'et, as a loving Father, he 
 raised them out of the same, which must needs 
 encourage them and make them thankful for it (' and 
 the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel'). The 
 Spirit of God teacheth us that ' whatsoever is written 
 aforetime is written for our instruction,' Eom. xv. 4, 
 so that in this place we may learn divers lessons for 
 our learning. First, where the Lord is said to have 
 stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel with this connec- 
 tion (And the Lord, &c.). The connection sheweth 
 that it dependeth on the words which went before ; 
 whence we may observe, that the ordinary means 
 which the Lord useth to stir us up, and to convert us 
 unto himself, is the ministry of the word, so that it 
 pleaseth him to send his messengers, not only to the 
 meaner sort of men, but to kings and princes also for 
 the same purpose : a thing the more to be marked, 
 because there are some, as tradesmen, scholars, and 
 divines, which may haply think themselves not to be 
 charged with these things, or else not to have need 
 thereof, whereby they may seem to be exempted from 
 tlicm; but let such men consider that this is the means 
 whereby thev must be stirred up. Lydia, a seller of 
 "431 
 
 purple, Acts xvi. 14, bad her heart opened thereby, 
 even at the preaching of Saint Paul. And as for 
 others, although they have never so much learning, 
 yet I hope they neither may nor will prefer themselves 
 before David, a man after God's own heart. Acts 
 xiii. 22, and endued with a principal and singular 
 spirit, who did not arise out of the dead sleep of sin, 
 until the prophet Nathan came unto him to stir him 
 up, 2 Sam. xii. 7, and then he cried, as it is Ps. li., 
 ' Have mercy upon me, God. Cast me not away from 
 thy presence ; nor take thy Holy Spirit from me ; ' 
 and this the same Spirit of God doth manifest unto 
 us, that which our Saviour Christ said to Nicodemus, 
 John iii. 8, that we must be born anew : ' Except a man 
 be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God ;' and 
 born again we cannot be, unless we be first begotten by 
 the word. And, though it be true that God begets us by 
 the inward operation of his Holy Spirit, James i. IS, 
 yet he useth the outward means of the ministry to the 
 perfecting and accomplishing of the same, 1 Pet. i. 23; 
 and therefore Paul is said to beget the Corinthians, 
 1 Cor. iv. 15, and Onesimus, Philem. 10, by the word. 
 So unless we receive the messengers which bring this 
 word unto us, and apply the same unto our hearts, we 
 can have no regeneration of the spirit. God, the 
 creator of all things, might have begotten us without 
 fathers or mothers, or any other means, as he did in 
 Adam and Eve, Gen. i. 27, 28, and he might of 
 stones have raised up children unto Abraham, Mat. 
 iii. 9, but he ordained and used the moans of natural 
 generation ; and so must we in our new birth, that so 
 we may be begotten, not of mortal seed, but of 
 immortal, by the word of God, which hveth and en- 
 dureth for ever. Kachel said, 'Give me childi-en, or 
 else I die," Gen. xsx. 1, unto whom Jacob answered, 
 'Am I in God's stead, who hath withholdeu from thee 
 the fruit of thy womb? ' So that, as in natural genera- 
 lion, the fruit of the body cometh by the blessing of 
 God, so is it in our spiritual regeneration also. If 
 Rachel had not asked of God, God had not remem- 
 bered her; and if sbc had not used the means, she had 
 not been the mother of Joseph and Benjamin ; which 
 teacheth us that we must use the means of the minis- 
 try, that we may be begotten and born again, James 
 i. 18, 21. As many as will be the children of God, 
 they must receive the word which is brought unto 
 them by the Lord's messengers, 1 Thes. ii. 18, that 
 they be begotten anew by the same, 1 Cor. iv. 15 ; and 
 being thus begotten and born anew, we must not stay 
 here, but be nursed up further, and brought up with 
 the pure milk of the word, that as new born babes we 
 may grow thereby, 1 Pet. ii. 1 , 2 ; and when we be grown 
 to be of riper age in Christ, then this word will aflbrd 
 us strong meat also, for this is not only the sincere 
 milk of the soul, which as new born babes we must 
 desire, that we may grow thereby, as 1 Pet. ii. 2, but 
 it is also strong meat for strong men, and belongeth 
 also to them of riper age, 1 Cor. iii. 1, 2, which 
 
44 
 
 EAINOLDS ON IIAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 through long custom havo tboir wits exercised to dis- 
 cern both good and evil; as Hcb. v. 14, Let us not 
 therefore ' neglect the means of our so great salvation, 
 for if ho which despiseth Moses' law died without 
 mercy, under two or three witnesses, how much more 
 gore punishment shiill lus bo worthy of,' that neglecteth 
 the work of reconciliation, 2 Cor. v. IH, 1!), whereby 
 wo grow up in Christ Ji^sus, Hub. ii. 8, x. 28, 29. 
 Ecmembcr the word of the Tjord, spoken by the pro- 
 phet, Amos viii. 11, ' Behold the days come, saitli the 
 Lord, that I will send a famine in the land, not a 
 famine of bread nor a thvist for water, liut for bearing 
 of the word of the Lord ; and they shall wander from 
 sea to sea, and from the north even unto the cast 
 shall they run, and seek the word of the Lord aiul 
 shall not find it !' And this plague shall not only be 
 upon the ancient and ciders of Israel, but he addclli 
 further, that even the fair virgins and young men 
 shall perish for thirst ; a most evident proof that as 
 our bodies would quickly perish, unless they should 
 be strennthcned with material food and nourishment,* 
 2 Kiugslii. 1), 10, 1 Kings xvii. 22, even so our souls, 
 unless they bo fed and nourislied with the heavenly 
 food of the word, brought unto us by the ministers 
 and preachers thereof, would ijuickiy die and p(;rish, 
 whereby wo are to acknowledge the singular goodness 
 of God, and his great mercy shewed mito us above tbo 
 Jews in sending us so great plenty of this food ; and 
 therefore the more wretched and ungrateful are wo, if 
 wo contemn so great a graco and mercy when it is 
 offered nnto us. It is said, Jor. xxix., that the Lord 
 had sent them prophets, rising up early and instructing 
 them yet they were not obedient to receive doctrine. 
 The word of rising early should put tbo ministers in 
 mind of their industry and diligence in their vocation, 
 and delivering tbo message of the Lord ; and if this 
 i^arly rising do seem to bo too early to some, lot them 
 remember the saying of the wise man in the Proverbs, 
 which may help to awake them, Prov. vi. !), ' How 
 long wilt thou sleep, sluggard? when wilt thou 
 aris'o out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little 
 slumber, a littlo" folding of tho hands to sloop : thero- 
 fiiro thy poverty cometh as one that travclleth by tho 
 way, and thy necessity as an armed man ; ' where-fore 
 lot" every one awaken and strengthen tho things that 
 remain,' llev. iii. 2, lest, if we do not watch, he come 
 upon us as a thief in tho night, at unawares, 2 Pet. 
 iii. 10, 11, 1 Thes. v. 2. If wo say with the church 
 of thoLaodiceans, Rev. iii. 17, that wo are | rich and 
 increased with goods, and have need of nothing,' then 
 it is to bo feared lest indeed we lie ' wretched, and 
 miserable, and poor, blind, and naked ;' or if we think 
 it enough for us to be lu-esent only where tho word is 
 preached, though wo take it not homo to our own 
 hearts, lot us consider that tho high priests did 
 fi-uquent those places where the messengers of tho 
 Lord did dilivcr their message ; but it was not suffi- 
 * Galon do Baiiitato, lib. i. ciqi. ii. 
 
 cient unless they did apply the message to themselves 
 which was brought unto them unto that end. More- 
 over, where it is said, that tho Lord did stir up tho 
 spirit of Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, wo are 
 taught that neither the chastisements of tho Lord, nor 
 yet tho preaching of tho word, can bring us out of tho 
 sleep of sin, unless it pleaso God to add thereunto tho 
 inward operation of tho Spirit to awake ns ; for though 
 allliction do cause us to cry and call unto the Ijord, 
 as Isaiah saith, chap. xxvi. 10, ' Lord, in trouble they 
 havo visited thee, they poured out a prayer when thy 
 chastisements was upon them,' 3'ot oftentimes afUic- 
 tions do work no such elTect in the hearts of men, clso 
 would not tho Lord have said, Whj' do I correct you 
 in vain ? Hos. vii. 11, Isa. i. 5. Nay, many times, 
 tho very grief of aflliction doth estrange men from 
 God, Lxod. vi. 9, cause them to blaspheme tho name 
 of tho Lord, llev. xvi. 11, 21, and breed hardness of 
 heart in many of the wicked, Jer. v. 8, as is manifest, 
 Rev. xvi. 9, 11, 21, when the angel did plaguo the 
 wicked, ' thoy boiled in great beat, and then they 
 blasphemed tbo name of God, which had power 
 over plagues : and they repented not to give him 
 glory;' and if thoy break not out to these extremities, 
 yet they will continue still in their wickedness, and not 
 turn unto the Ijord that he may have mercy upon them, 
 Amos iv. 0, H-11, so that neither afflictions, nor yet 
 the preaching of tho word, can stir us up, unless God 
 do add tho secret operation of his Holy Spirit there- 
 unto. A ri'semblanco hereof tho Romans do afl'ord 
 us by the fact of Camillus, who, when he had besieged 
 tho city of Phalisci with ten years' war, and attempted 
 by the sword and famine to cause them to yield unto 
 bim, yet all was in vain, till at length by his clemency 
 and lenity ho prevailed with them ; for when tho 
 schoolmaster of the city, who had the charge of the 
 noblemen's sons, did bring them and betray them to 
 Camillus,* that thereby thoy might bo enforced to 
 yield u]) tlKuuselvcs, and the city, for the ransoming 
 and redeeming of their children, Camillus, considering 
 that the falsehood and treachery of the schoolmaster 
 could bring him neither comfort nor credit, com- 
 manded his ollicors to strip him naked, and bind his 
 hands behinil his back ; and to cause tho children, his 
 scholars, each of them having a rod in his band, to 
 whip him back into the city again. At which noblo 
 action the citizens were so moved, that they presently 
 delivered up their city unto him, acknowledging 
 Camillas as their saviour, and god, and father, Ctimil- 
 lion xnrtilorrni kiiiiih (Inniiijtn' I't paniitiin invocantes, 
 I'lven so oftentimes the Lord doth ]ilaguo us with 
 famine and sword, but yi't wo will not turn unto him, 
 until by bis Holy Spirit be gently move our hearts to 
 yield unto bini : and then wo begin to acknowledge 
 him our Saviour, our Father, our God in Christ 
 Jesus. Wo indeed are oftentimes overcome w-ith such 
 a dead sleep of secnrity, that affliction doth not awake 
 * Plu. in vita Cam. 
 
 432 
 
Ver. 14.] 
 
 SERMON VIII. 
 
 43 
 
 us, nor work our ameiulmont that wo niii;lil turn unto 
 God ; nay, rather the f^riof of a son, as hath b(!on said, 
 doth many limes more withdraw and estrange our 
 hearts from the Lord. It is reported that the men of 
 (Janas, after they were ovcrcomo hy the Carthagi- 
 nians, alleged that they prospered better so long as 
 thoy burnt their children unto their idols ; but what 
 should I speak of the heathen, seeing the people of 
 God, the Jews, blush not to toll the prophet Jere- 
 miah, that ' whilst they liurnt incense to the ijuoeu of 
 heaven, and poured out drink-oH'oringH unto her, they 
 had pknity of victuals, and saw no evil ; but since 
 they li^ft oil",' say they, ' to burn inccMiso to tlio queen 
 of heaven, and to pour out drink-oll'erings unto her, 
 we have wanted all things, and have been consumed 
 by the sword and by famine,' Jor. xliv. 17. The 
 word of God, I confess, is a very forcible means to 
 stir them up, Heb. iv. 12, and to prevail for obe- 
 dience, but yet of itself insufficient, unless by the 
 power of God's Spirit it be put upon our minds, and 
 written upon our hearts ; and therefore our Saviour 
 Christ, and his apostles, doiding with the unbelieving 
 and still'- nockeil Jews, said unto them, as was pro- 
 phesied of them, Isa. vi. 9, 'Hearing ye shall hear, 
 and shall not understand ; and seeing ye shall sec, 
 and shall not perceive ; for the heart of this people is 
 waxed fat, and their ears are dull of hearing ; they 
 Lave eyes and see not, ears and hoar not,' John 
 xii. 40, Acts XX. 20, Rom. xi. 8, and all because, as 
 the prophet speakoth, thoy are a rebellious house, 
 Ezek. iii. 7, 9. Wherefore, we may say with Ehhu, 
 Job. xxxii. 8, ' Surely there is a spirit in man, but 
 tho inspiration of the Almighty giveth understanding;' 
 and this is not true only in the first o|)oration of tho 
 Spirit, but in going on forward in tho grace begun, 
 and not therein only, but in the perfecting of the 
 same. So that wo may well acknowledge tluxt of our 
 Saviour, John vi. 44, that ' no man cometh unto tho 
 Father, except the Father draw him ;' and tho spouse 
 in tho Canticles, i. 4, saith wisely, ' Draw mo, and f 
 will run after thee;' and the ai)ostle to tins Philipiiians, 
 ii. 18, showeth, that it is God that worketh in us both 
 to will and to do.' And when the apostle had proaehcid 
 the gospel from Jerusalem, and round about to Illy- 
 ricum, Horn. xv. 19, he ascribeth nothing unto him- 
 self, but all to tho power of tho Spirit and grace of 
 Goil which was with him. But some may object that 
 if God do only work in us all good motives and actions, 
 by the secret and inward operation of his Holy Spirit, 
 and that wo can do nothing of ourselves, 2 Cor. iii. 5., 
 why, then, doth God punish us for not doing these 
 things, seeing that he himscilf is the cause why we do 
 them not? To this I answer, that God doth justly 
 punish us for that we have lost that kn<jwledge that 
 was given us in our first creation, and then we had 
 free will to do good ourselves ; but now we aro igno- 
 rant thereof, and therefore are justly punished. 
 , For as Laertius reporloth of Piltacus, who made 
 433 
 
 laws, whosoever were drunk should be doublo i)unishod 
 if he committed any oll'ence, according as Aristotle 
 also witnessoth, 'I'fiiii) I'Ulurornin, cap. v. ; llrst, for 
 his druukonuess ; and, secondly, for his fault com- 
 mitted in his drink ; so wo aro justly punisheil, not 
 only for the fault or sin itself, but because of our ori- 
 ginal corruption and ignorance, which is incident into 
 us by reason of that general curse which foil upon all 
 mankind at the beginning ; but as for us that have 
 better learned Christ, J'lph. iv. 20, and can cut olf all 
 objections with the word, llom. ix. 10, wo know that 
 ' it is not in him that willeth, nor in him that runneth, 
 but in God that showeth mercy;' and therefore we may 
 say with the apostle, ' O man, who art thou that 
 ])leadest with God? shidl^ the thing formed say unto 
 him that formed it. Why hast thou made me thus ?' 
 It may theroforo sullice us to know that our corrup- 
 tion is such, that we, falling into tho sloop of sin, 
 cannot of ourselves arise, unless God's Spirit awako 
 us ; for although the jirophet Zechariah, chap. i. B, 
 saith, ' Turn unto mo, saith the Tjord, and 1 will turn 
 unto you,' yet it may not so bo umlorstood as though 
 man had power as in himself to turn unto the Lord, 
 but it must be God that must I'a'st convert ; and 
 theroforo we must say with tho prophet Jeremiah, 
 chap. xxxi. 18, ' Convert thou me, and T shall bo con- 
 verted, for thouju't my Jjord and my God ;' and as it is 
 in the liamentations, chap. v. 21, ' Turn thou unto us, 
 
 Lord, and we shall bo turned ; renew our days as of 
 old.' So that it appoaroth manifestly, that the grace 
 of God must work in our hearts before wo can do any 
 thing ; it is of his graco both to will and to do, Phil. 
 ii. 13. ' Awake, therefore, thou that sleepest, and 
 stand up from the dead, and Christ shall give thoo 
 light,' l'j|)h. V. 14. Lot us remember, that although wo 
 be exhorted often to renew and repair our building, 
 
 1 Thos. V. 11, and to return unto the Lord, llos. 
 xiv. 3, Jor. iv. 1, yet it must bo by gracii, and this 
 graco must bo wrought in us by tlio secret operation 
 of the Spirit of God, /ech. xii. 10. But if any man 
 will say that ho can awako of himself, lot him consider 
 tho saying of tho Jjord by tho prophet Zechariah, 
 chap. iv. 0, to Zerubbabol, that tho Lord doth pro- 
 servo his chosen church and chosen people, ' neither 
 by an army nor by strength, but by his Holy Spirit;' 
 and ' ho shall bring forth the head-stone thereof 
 with shouting and with crying, Grace, grace, unto it,' 
 ver. 7. 
 
 .//((/ Ilifi/ {■mm: mill did tin: wnik iij the Lord in the 
 hoiinc of tin: Lord of ho«ts, tlwir (Jud, in tin; Jnnr and 
 tivenlieth diiij of tin; month, in. the necond year of Pari ns 
 the Idnij. Tho next ]ioint is, their example of obedi- 
 ence, whereby we are taught that wo must work in 
 God's house, that is, in God's church, whose house 
 we are, Heb. iii. 0, if we hold fast the conlidcuco and 
 rejoicing of tho hope unto the end ; whereby ho showeth 
 that tho mystical members of Christ are his church, 
 as also he saith, 2 Cor. vi. 10, ' Yo aro tho temple of 
 
 E 
 
46 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. I Ver. 14. 
 
 tlie living God ;' yet all this is but oiio bouse. And as 
 the saints of God are but one spouse of Christ in 
 general, so are they but one house also, 1 Pet. ii. 5, 
 the building whereof, although it depend upon the 
 ministry chief!}', 1 Cor. iii. 8, 9, who are by an ex- 
 cellency termed builders, yet all must work and build 
 his house. And this duty l)elougeth to all, as St Jude 
 speakelh, ver. 20, ' Edify yourselves in your most 
 holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost ;' for as in the 
 material building of the tabernacle or temple, Exod. 
 xxsv. 4, C, 7, 9, they did not [all] bring gold, silver, or 
 brass, blue, silk, purple, scarlet, and fine linen, but 
 those which were less able brought goats' hair, and 
 rams' skins dyed red, and badgers' skins with shittim 
 wood, so, in the spii-itual building, all must build, but 
 not all in like manner: the ministers, they must be the 
 chief, they must build with silver, and with gold, and 
 precious stones ; and the inferiors, they must build 
 with goats' hair and rams' skins ; and so all must be 
 workmen in the building. As many as are of Christ 
 they must be Christians ; not Cretians, not idle, slow 
 bellies, Titus i. 12. Even in paradise Adam itust 
 work and dress the garden. Gen. ii. 15. Therefore, how 
 more must we, and ought we, to labour in this estate 
 of earthly coiTuption. Paul must plant and Apollos 
 must water, 1 Cor. iii. G, and not they only as the 
 chief, but every man in his several estate must labour, 
 every man's faith must work by love. Gal. v. 6. The 
 noble example of these principal joersons who did them- 
 selves work in this building, may put us in mind that 
 we should not post off this building unto others, but 
 put to our own hands, and be builders ourselves of the 
 Lord's house. Cjtus, as Xenophon rcporteth of him,* 
 was so greatly delighted with the works of husbandry, 
 that amidst bis royalty, his goodly apparel, his golden 
 chains, his rings, and his precious stones, he would 
 neither eat nor drink until he bad been planting, or 
 some other painful action procured sweat. If Cyrus, 
 being a noble prince, thought it no disgrace to his 
 majesty to labour in husbandry, much less ought the 
 ministers of the King of kings, and Lord of lords, 
 either because of this great calling, or at least because 
 of this small ability and wcaltness, abstain from doing 
 of the Lord's husbandry. Paul must plant, and Apollos 
 must water, that, God giving the increase, his church 
 may be cJilied, and his name be glorified. IVIacrobius 
 reportcth that a captain of Augustus, having sustained 
 many dangers,]- and suffered many wounds in his 
 defence, in the end being accused wrongfully and much 
 distressed, desired Augustus himself to work his liberty. 
 The captain then, seeing be went not himself, but 
 would have sent one of his servants about it, presently 
 baring his breast and body, shewed the wounds he 
 had received for bis sake, and told Augustus very 
 boldly, that bo had not sustained these wounds by 
 any vicar, but by bis own person for him, and there- 
 fore had well deserved that not bis servant, but he 
 * Xenophou iu Cyrop. t Macrob. Satur. lib. ii. p. 288. 
 
 himself, should deliver him, At iion ei/o, Ciesar, pericli- 
 tante te Actiacn hello, vicarium qiucsivi, sed pro te ipse 
 puf/navl. Augustus blushed, and being moved thereat, 
 became his advocate himself, ut (jiii fei-cn'tur 7w>i, super- 
 bus tiiiitum, sed et iur/ratus videri, as one fearing lest 
 he should be thought to be both proud and unthankful. 
 Our Saviour Christ, as our good captain, hath 
 suffered many things for our sakes, Heb. ii. 10, 
 xii. 2, Isa. liii. 7 ; he hath trodden the wine-press of 
 the wrath of God, and therefore ought we not to send 
 others as our deputies or vicars, but w-ith our o\vn 
 hands, and in our own hands, and in our own persons, 
 to do this work, and to build his holy temple, espe- 
 cially if we have the blush that Augustus had, and bear 
 the like mind toward Christ that he bore toward the 
 captain, even to fear the suspicion of pride or unthank- 
 fulness, seeing he hath wi-ought so great things for us. 
 
 1 confess that weakness and sickness may hinder 
 some, and also old age, which is a kind of sickness 
 — si'uectus quidam morbus est — may hinder and let 
 others fi'om building ; yet such as cannot themselves, 
 they must assist and also encourage others, by all 
 means, to the building of the temple. Plutarch, in the 
 life of Cato the elder, reports, that in the building of 
 Minerva's temple, when one of the old mules could not 
 carry such things as were necessary, he would not- 
 withstanding, according to his former custom, go with 
 the rest empty, whereby the rest were drawn to work and 
 labour more cheerfully. If any of our elders be, by 
 reason of old age and weakness of body, unable themselves 
 to build, yet let them accompany those that are young, 
 and by all good moans provoke them to the building 
 of the temple ; but if, being able to do little or nothing 
 themselves, they will not favour nor cherish others, 
 then it is to be feared they be but deceitful workmen, 
 
 2 Cor. xi. 13, pretending to build the house of the Lord, 
 when, indeed, they do but build a temple for idols. 
 
 The two reasons follow, drawn from the two cir- 
 cumstances : one of person, whose house they were to 
 build, viz. the house of the Lord of hosts, their God ; 
 and the other of the time, without delay: ' In the four 
 and twentieth day of the sixth mouth,' so soon as the 
 Lord had stirred up their spirits, they began to build 
 the house of the Lord. The former circumstance of 
 the person containeth a double reason to move them 
 to all speedy and due regard of building of the temple ; 
 one saw the power and all-suHiciency of him whoso 
 work it is, viz. the Lord of hosts, Zech. i. 3, so called 
 because he is the chief commander, Joel ii. 11, 2.5, and 
 ' possessor of heaven and earth,' Gen. xiv. 22, and 
 useth all creatures as his armies and soldiers, to exe- 
 cute his will, both for his friends and against his 
 enemies, the due consideration whereof might 
 greatly encourage them against all the power of tho 
 Persian kings, and all other their adversaries that 
 should attempt to hinder their work ; and the other, 
 from his goodness and mercy, in that he was by cove- 
 nant the Lord their God, Gen. svii. 7 ; and therefore, 
 
 431 
 
Chap. II. Vee. 1-4] 
 
 SERMON IX. 
 
 47 
 
 considering that the building of the temple was the 
 ■work of God their Father, they might and ought to 
 encoiii'age themselves in going forward with it, being 
 well assured that he would both bless them in their 
 labour, and take it in good part at their hands. In 
 regard whereof it were no less than their bounden duty 
 to bestow, not only their laboiu', but their lives also in 
 the building of their Father's house, the temple of the 
 Lord their God. The sum and siibstance of both 
 which reasons, drawn from God's power, that he was 
 able, and, from his mercy, that he was willing to bless 
 and prosper them in theii' work, I do further com- 
 mend unto you in the example of the three children 
 mentioned, Daniel iii., who, being in danger of the 
 fiery furnace, resolved to cast and repose themselves 
 upon God's mercy, and so to be constant in their pro- 
 fession, both in doing and suffering his good pleasure, 
 whatsoever should befall them. Our God is able to 
 deliver us: Dan. iii. 17, 18, ' If it be so, say they, our 
 God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning 
 fierj' fui'nace, and he will deliver us out of thy hands, 
 king ; but if not, be it known to thee that we will 
 not serve thy gods, nor worship thy golden image 
 which thou hast set up.' As also in that example of 
 St Paul, Acts xxi. 13, ' What do you weeping and 
 breaking my heart ? for I am ready not only to be 
 bound, but also to die at Jerusalem, for the name of 
 the Lord Jesus.' If this were so engraven in our 
 heai'ts, that the Lord of hosts is our God, able and 
 willing to defend us, it would teach us to have a good 
 conscience, and to shew forth a good profession, 
 knowing that in all this the Lord of hosts both can 
 and will be our guide unto death. ' He that regardeth 
 the wind,' as the wise man saith, Eccles xi. 4, ' shall 
 never sow,' therefore let us, casting fi'om us all things 
 which might press dowTi, Heb. xii. 10, go forth in the 
 strength of the Lord only, and so build in his temple, 
 assuring ourselves with the prophet David, Ps. xviii. 
 1, 2, that ' the Lord is our strength and stony rock, 
 and defence and Saviour, and our God and our might, 
 
 in whom we will trust, our buckler, the horn of our 
 salvation, and our refuge.' 
 
 The last reason to move us hereunto, is the short- 
 ness of time wherein we are to build. We must apply 
 ourselves to that which is in band, we must remember 
 that this is our day, and it may be but a day ; let U8 
 therefore, as children of the day, walk in the light, 
 and work in the day, 1 Thes. v. 4, 5, 7. The night of 
 death may come, we know not how soon, whereof we 
 may be put in mind every night when we lie down to 
 rest, our sleep being an image of death, our beds a 
 resemblance of our graves, om- sheets of our winding 
 sheets, the putting oft' our clothes the putting oft" our 
 mortality wherewith we are clothed, soinnus mortis 
 iiiuKjo, 2 Cor. v. 4, the putting them on and our rising 
 up a figure of our resurrection from our graves and 
 the putting on of immortality, 1 Cor. sv. 53. Let us 
 therefore remember that the Lord may say unto us, 
 as he said to the rich man in the Gospel, Luke xii. 20, 
 ' This night shall they take thy soul from thee,' the 
 consideration whereof might cause us to go forward in 
 the building of our temple. Another reason is effec- 
 tual, might move us hereunto, the unreasonableness of 
 the weather, whereby the judgment of the Lord do 
 light jipon us; therefore, if now we will begin to build 
 this house, then he will be merciful unto us, and we 
 shall see great plenty ; and if he will not deliver us 
 from these plagues, yet let us assure ourselves, with 
 the three children, that he is able if he will to take 
 these plagues from us, but if he will not, let us re- 
 solve to worship none but him, and confess with Saint 
 Paul, that we are not only ready to suffer these 
 punishments, but even to die at Jerusalem, being 
 always prepared to build his temple, seeing he is the 
 Lord of hosts, and therefore able mightily to defend 
 us ; and our God, therefore kind and loving unto us 
 his children that call upon him. 
 
 Therefore, to this our God, together with the Son 
 and Holy Ghost, be rendered all praise, power, might, 
 and dominion, both now and for evermore. Amen. 
 
 SE.EMON IX. 
 
 In the seventh month, and in the one and twentieth day of the month, came the word of the Lord hi/ the prophet 
 Hagrjai, saijinr/. Speak now to Zeruhhahel the son of Shealtiel, r/oivrnor of Judah, and to Joshua the son. of 
 Josedech, the hiijh priest, dv. — Haggai II. 1-4. 
 
 WHENAS the Jews had eftsoons been exhorted 
 by the word, and after stirred up by the 
 quickening power of the Spirit, to build the temple of 
 the Lord, whose foundation long before was laid, the 
 Lord here, lest they should be hindered in their work, 
 stirs them up with a new message, enjoining them 
 to go forward. Ezra iii., we read that when the 
 foundation of this house was laid in the days of 
 Cyrus, many of the ancient men, which had seen the 
 former temple built by Solomon, wept with a loud 
 435 
 
 voice, conjecturing by these beginnings (as well they 
 might), that this latter temple would be nothing so 
 beautiful and magnificent as the former was. The 
 cause whereof, some interpreters think, was the decree 
 of Cyrus, Ezra vi., who commanded that the height 
 should be sixty cubits, and the breadth sixty cubits, 
 and that it should be made ex lapidihiis impolitis, as 
 the vulgar Latin hath it, of rough and uuhewed stones; 
 whereas the former, as we may rather gather from 
 1 liings v. 17 and vi. 2, and 2 Chron. iii. 3, 5, was in 
 
48 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 breadth twenty cubits, in height an hundred and 
 twenty cubits, and in length sixty cubits, after the 
 cubit of the sanctuary, which was as long again as the 
 common cubit, and all made of broad and fair hewed 
 stones. Others, not persuaded that Cyrus herein dif- 
 fered so much from the former, attributed this to their 
 poverty and mean estate that built it, who, coming far 
 short of Solomon in riches and magnificence, were not 
 able to bestow so much on this as he did on the other. 
 Aad indeed it agreeth with that Chaldee word used in 
 that place, that it was not rough stones, as the vulgar 
 Latin hath it, but fair and great stones, as the Septua- 
 gint agree, whereof this house was built. Wherefore, 
 though Ribeira, a papist, upon this place in his com- 
 mentaries give this decree of Cyrus as a reason there- 
 of, yet in his second book, de templo et its qua ad 
 temphou pcitinent, he denieth the same, adding for the 
 credit of their Latin text, that where it is WTitten, ex 
 inipolilln, it should be ex politis lapidihiis. Whatsoever 
 was the cause, the thing is clear, that the ancient men 
 had marked that this temple was no way comparable 
 to the magnificence of the former temple. Now, seeing 
 hope deferred maketh the heart faint, as it is in the 
 proverb, tn fail in our desire in anything hindereth 
 our resolution to go forward with it. The Jews, whose 
 chief honour was in the glory of their temple, and 
 therefore they would fain have seen it as fair aS' ever 
 it was before, could not but be thereat dismayed and 
 discouraged ; and therefore the Lord here, by his 
 prophet, with this thought laid before them, en- 
 couragcth them to go forward in the building of the 
 temple, adding, to stir them up hereunto, three most 
 gracious promises : first, of his assistance with his 
 word and Spirit in the building of the temple, ver. 
 4, 5, ' Be strong, and work, and I am with you ; ' 
 secondly, of honouring it with Christ's presence in it, 
 ver. G, 7 ; thirdly, of enriching it more than the 
 former, settling in it peace and all felicity, ver. 8, 9. 
 
 This message he commands his servants to carry : 
 ver. 1, 2, 'In the seventh month, in the one and 
 twentieth day,' &c. 
 
 The thought and cogitation that hindered them he 
 lays before them : ver. 3, ' Who might be left,' kc. 
 And then he exhorts them with courage to go forward : 
 ver. 5, ' Yet now be of good courage.' 
 
 After which he addeth the promises : ver. 4-9, ' I 
 will be with you ;' ' Mj- Spirit shall be with you ;' ' I 
 will fill this house with glory,' &c. 
 
 Concerning the charge given to the prophet, we 
 must call to mind, that in the first day of the sixth 
 month, ho was sent unto them from the Lord to exhort 
 them to build; and after, in the four and twentieth day 
 of the same month, ho was Frnt with a new message 
 to cause them to go forward in iinilding, with one of 
 these j)roniiscs concerning the Lord's assistance, when 
 they, stirred up with things being considered and com- 
 pared with that which followeth, that notwithstanding 
 both the former sermons of the prophet and the work- 
 
 ing grace of the Spirit, to meet with this temptation 
 hindering them, thoy were to be stirred up yet with a 
 new message, and to be encouraged with more promises, 
 as they instruct us on tiio one side that God's grace 
 must be both prevenient to go before, and subsequent to 
 follow after us in all things ; first to w^ork in us, and then 
 together with us ; first to stir us up and after to help us, 
 forward ; so do they on the one side teach us that the 
 good graces of God, even in the best of us, will be quickly 
 extinguished and put out, if so be tliey be not quickened 
 and repaired in us by hearing the word of life. Where- 
 upon it is that Christ Jesus, when he ascended into hea- 
 ven, gave gifts unto men, Eph. iv. 7, 8, 9, besides 
 those which were to remain for a time, even which 
 should continue for ever, ' for the repairing of the saints, 
 for the work of the ministr}', for the edifying of the 
 body,' i.e. the church, whereon was built this temple, 
 a type of those pastors which he hath given. Paul, 
 writing to Timothy, commands that they ' preach the 
 word, and bo instant in season and out of season,' 
 which, though they seem, yet it is not disagreeing 
 with that of Christ, Luke xii., where he commendeth 
 the faithful steward which giveth to each servant his 
 portion of meat in due season ; for men are so back- 
 ward to come where this meat is to be received, and 
 so many excuses they make, as trying of oxen, seeing 
 a farm, marrying a wife, that the importunity which 
 may seem to them, and perhaps also some time to the 
 minister, to be unseasonable, is here by the apostle 
 commanded to be practised ; so that the ministers are 
 to teach instantly, and, as some think, unseasonably. 
 And common sense will teach us this, if we will con- 
 sider the parable of our Saviour Christ, whereas he 
 compareth the minister to the steward, the people to 
 the servants, the word to the food ; so that, as food 
 sustains the body, so doth this word maintain the 
 soul spiritually, for the word he useth in the Greek, 
 Luke xii. 42, eiTO/juirPiov, signifieth a measure of com, 
 diiiiemuin, so many pecks as was wont to be given 
 unto servants for their monthly allowance, which, if 
 they should not receive, having no more to live on, 
 common sense would teach us that they could not but 
 be pined. And what may we look for if we regard not 
 to receive this our allowance when it is to be distri- 
 buted, but to be pined with that famine threatened : 
 Amos viii., ' Not a famine of bread, nor thirst for water, 
 but of hearing of the word of God, when men shall 
 wander even from sea to sea, and from the north to 
 the east, and shall run to and fro, and shall seek the 
 word of the Lord, and shall not find it ;' which I would 
 to God they would consider better of, and [not] for 
 small causes ab.sent themselves from ecclesiastical 
 exercises, where the servants of the Lord distribute 
 these portions. Light of nature should (as I think) 
 so much teach them that herein they so much injure 
 themselves as he did his servants, of whom the poet 
 Juvenal speaks — 
 
 Sorvorum vuutros medio casligat iniquo. 
 
 430 
 
Vek. 1-4.] 
 
 SERMON IX. 
 
 49 
 
 And this should make tbein herein more carofuh 
 Socrates, hb. iv. cap. x., writes of an unlearned monk, 
 who, living in the wilderness of Egypt, called Pambo, 
 who, coming to one and requesting to be taught, he 
 reading that in the psalm, ' I said that I will take 
 heed to my ways, that I oflend not in the tongue,' 
 Pambo would hear no more, but requested him to 
 stay there till he had learned that, and so departed 
 from the man, who, meeting him sis months after, 
 and asked him why he had not come unto him again. 
 Why ? saith Pambo ; because I have not as yet learned 
 that lesson perfectly. Socrates might well note that 
 he was an unlearned man, or else he might have known 
 that this was not sufficient, and have gone no further 
 than the 34th Psalm, where it is said, 'If any desire life, 
 let him keep his tongue from evil' : but not that only : but 
 ' lot him eschew evil, and do good, seek peace, and ensue 
 it.' And admit that nothing else were needful, but the 
 bridling of the tongue were sufficient, yet here we learn 
 that to learn such a lesson thoroughly we must hear 
 more of the word of God. Zerubbabel and Joshua, who 
 had been taught this lesson with more words than was 
 Pambo, yet had need to be taught the same often, viz., 
 in the sixth month more than once, as in the former 
 chapter, and here in the seventh month, as also in the 
 eighth month, as we find in Zechariah; and again, lastly, 
 in the ninth month, as in the words after this text, 
 ver. 10 ; and if they had stayed so long after the first 
 lesson in the sixth month as Pambo did, they had still 
 Iain frozen in |their dregs. Far, therefore, bo from 
 us such monkish fashion ; and though some in regard of 
 their afi'ections commend them, yet let us remember that 
 le-sson of the apostle, Heb. s. 15, ' Let us consider one 
 another, to provoke one another to love and to good 
 works, not forsaking the fellowship that we have among 
 np.rselves, as the manner of some is,' meaning mcL-ting 
 in ecclesiastical services ; and thus much doth this mes- 
 sage, with relation to that which went before, commend 
 unto us. 
 
 Now, the message itself followeth, verse 3, 'Who is 
 left among you ?' and laying before them their con- 
 ceit and cogitation, which containeth an ingenuous 
 and modest confession of some things wanting which 
 might seem somewhat to touch their credit, the more 
 by us to be observed because commonly we are prone 
 to flatter ourselves, like the church of Laodicea, who 
 said, Eevel. iii., ' I am rich, and increase with good, 
 and have need of nothing, and knew not that she was 
 wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and 
 naked.' Seneca saith, mulli ad aapientiam pervenire 
 jiotuisscnt, nisi se jam. pervoiisse p^itassent, many might 
 have obtained unto wisdom if they had not thought 
 they had not obtained to it already ; from which their 
 ingenuous acknowledgment we may learn to examine 
 what is wanting, and if the Spirit gives us those eyes 
 which they had, we may see, if we look on that sanc- 
 tuary built by the apostle in the Acts, that that which 
 is built since our return from Babylon wants much of 
 437 
 
 the former. Acts iv., wo read there how the multi- 
 tude of believers were of one heart and one mind, and 
 had all things common, and what care they had for 
 the poor. With us (God be thanked) the poor are 
 cared for by good statutes, if the godly magistrates 
 would put them in execution. But for that unity of 
 heart which was among them, alas, where is it in one 
 towards another among us ? Tertullian writes in the 
 38th of his Apology, that the heathen in his time gave 
 it for a mark to Christians, Sfo how they love one 
 another. Well noted, saith Tertullian, for thetj hato 
 one another ; and that theij uill die one for another, 
 well marked, for they kill one another. But is it not 
 amongst us now rather as among the heathen ? Ter- 
 tullian noted it to be in his time, as the heathen noted 
 it to be among the Christians. In our factious do we 
 not hate one another rather than love one another ? 
 and be we not more ready to kill one another than to 
 die one for another ? Again, Acts xiv., we read that 
 the apostles ordained by election elders in every 
 church. Acts xiv. 23. First, pastors such as Paul 
 describes, writing to Titus, Titus i. 9, that they ought 
 so to be qualified that they might exhort with whole- 
 some doctrine, and convince those that gainsay it. 
 Which continuance of a learned ministry is commended 
 by Justin Jlartyr in his Apology, where he writeth 
 that the faithful in the primitive church used on the 
 Sunday to assemble themselves together, both they 
 that dwelt within and those that dwelt without tho 
 the town ; and after certain parts of Scriplure read, 
 the pastor stood up, and taught and expounded 
 some piece of the Scripture to the people. But now, 
 alas ! abroad in our land many of our churches are 
 destitute of pastors, and have only readers, wherein, 
 lest we deceive ourselves, though it be a great grace 
 and blessing of God to have the Scriptures read in a 
 vulgar tongue, yet our Saviour Christ Jesus, though 
 the Jews had Moses' law read in their synagogues, 
 Acts XV. 21, and the prophets also, as may be gathered, 
 grieved. Mat. ix. 35, to see the multitude wandering 
 as sheep without a shepherd, thereby implying that 
 the readers were no pastors ; for else the Jews, having 
 readers, had not been without pastors, as he grieved 
 that they were, when he considered what was requisite 
 for a minister, namely, to bring back that which was 
 gone astray, to preserve from danger, to heal the 
 sore, to bind up the wounded, and all the other pro- 
 perties which the word requireth of a good pastor ; 
 and therefore he sent the apostles by preaching to per- 
 form that which by reading they could not. And if 
 that to hear the law and the prophets [had] been 
 enough, then had the Jews known Christ, for Moses 
 wrote of him, John v. 46, 47, and so likewise did the 
 prophets. Acts iii. 24, xiii. 27, and amongst them 
 the prophet Isaiah so plainly, that St Jerome sticks 
 not to call him an evangelist ; and yet the nobleman, 
 when he read Isaiah the prophet, could not under- 
 stand him, but had need of Philip to come and teach 
 
50 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [(JHAP. II. 
 
 him and preach nnto him, Acts viii. 30, 31 ; anj if this 
 instruction did not need, but by reading the ignorant 
 people might understand the meaning of the \yord, 
 yet those of greatest Icnowledge may, and often be, so 
 surprised with passions of infirmity, that they had 
 not need * of the help of others, by applying of the 
 word, to heal their diseases. Whether Moses were 
 read in David's time, we cannot certainly affirm ; yet 
 certain it is that David, whose whole delight and 
 study was in the law of God, as may appear, Ps. 
 cxix., was well skilled therein, so that this knowledge 
 could serve him to conclude that he who had com- 
 mitted murder and adultery, as sure as God liveth, 
 was the child of death; and yet he had need to have 
 Nathan to apply this unto him, and to tell him he was 
 the man. So that we see how nccdlal the pastor is to 
 the people (as Ai-istotle in his politics, that they were 
 wont to bring in strange physicians into the sick, and 
 yet thought them not fit to heal themselves), lest they 
 be accounted in Christ's judgment as sheep without a 
 shepherd. And of this modest acknowledgment of 
 what was wanting, we have Paul for an example, who, 
 Titus i., gives a reason why he set Titus in Crete, be- 
 cause there were many disobedient whose mouths 
 must be stopped, where the apostle acknowledgeth 
 that his pains had not profited all ; but until that were 
 brought to pass, that they were convinced, reproved, or 
 converted, there must needs be something acknow- 
 ledged to be wanting ; and so must we ingeniously, 
 until this be brought to pass, something to be wanting. 
 
 I may not go further herein, and from the general 
 come to the particular temple of each man's soul, 
 whereof this temple, as Paul to the Corinthians 
 sheweth, was a type, 1 Cor. iii. 10 ; but I leave it to 
 the godly in particular to consider of. Howbeit I do 
 not doubt but if we examine ourselves upon our beds, 
 the best of us, and those who were long since called and 
 built as temples of the Lord, may soon find some 
 want if we compare the present building with the 
 former. It was said to the church of Ephesus, that 
 she had lost her first love; and would it not appear, if 
 we were well tried, that some of us bad lost our first 
 love, our first sincerity, our first sobriety, our first 
 zeal and godly virtues? Acknowledge, therefore, your 
 first buildings not to be comparable to that before, 
 but consider that all this acknowledgment must be to 
 this end, that notwithstanding these defects, which 
 we must modestly acknowledge, we must still go for- 
 ward and strive to repair our ruins, as followeth in 
 the third place : ' Yet now be strong, Zerubbabel, 
 saith the Lord.' 
 
 It was a saying amongst the heathen, testified by 
 Tully in an epistle to Marius, that when a man's 
 estate begun any way to bo impoverished, there 
 was no cause why ho^should desire to live any longer,t 
 
 * Qu. ' liad need "?— En. 
 
 t Veins est eniin, nbi non sis qui fueris, lion esse cur 
 volis vivere.— Cic gi. /a. lib. vii. ad Murium, ('ji. iii. 
 
 but that he might make himself away ; which saying 
 was so approved amongst the people, that"m,iny, when 
 their honours or riches are impaired, or de-ires frus- 
 trate, did not stick to dispatch themselves, as wo 
 read of Atheniensis, and Cato Uticensis, and divers 
 others ; and Tully himself so far approveth it, that 
 although he laid not violent hands on himself, yet he 
 said he knew not why [when] a man's estate was decayed 
 he should wish to live any longer.* But here we are 
 taught another lesson, that though we find ourselves 
 in particular, or our church in general, any whit im- 
 paired, yet we must not despair, but take example by 
 this exhortation to strive to amend what we find amiss : 
 ' Yet now, be of good courage, Zerubbabel ; and be 
 of good courage, Joshua,' &c. 
 
 Thus we see it hath pleased the Lord, in great 
 mercy, to prevent a temptation which might else have 
 been taken up. Wherefore the prophet Isaiah, as Christ 
 expoundeth it. Mat. xii., telleth us, that ' he will not 
 quench the smoking flax, nor break the bruised reed ;' 
 where, by flax, he understandeth the wick of a candle; 
 and by smoking, burning darkly ; signifying, that so 
 long as there is any light in us, he will not put it out, 
 but cherish and maintain it in us. Tbis must we in 
 particular mark, when we consider any defect in our- 
 selves, for to him to whom it is said, 'Thou hast lost 
 thy first love,' to him also it was said, ' Remember, 
 therefore, from whence thou art fallen, and repent, 
 and do the first works.' Whosoever, therefore, feels, 
 or shall feel, any decay in himself or his charge, let 
 him strive to stir up the good graces of God in him- 
 self, and in the place where he is set ; let him help to 
 strengthen the weak hands. Beloved, let there be no 
 factious among you, except it be a spiritual and Chris- 
 tian faction, for so it comes to pass uow-a-days, as it 
 did in Tortullian's time, that the rehgious consent of 
 the godly in the best causes is maliciously traduced 
 by the name of a faction, so that now we are driven 
 with TertuUian to distinguish betwixt a godly and 
 an ungodly faction ; f bnt rather let us [strive] as 
 much as may be to have peace with all men, Heb. 
 xii. 14, without which no man shall see God ; and in 
 this peace and love let us seek to edify one another, 
 1 Thes. v. 11, and save one another, and so build up 
 the ruins of this temple of the Lord, Jude 20. 
 I'jspecially tutors are to labour herein, for that they 
 may hope that the temple of the Lord may be repaired 
 by them which arc now under them ; as we read it 
 was by Joash, being well brought up under good 
 Jehoiada ; and though perhaps they that be in your 
 charge, some of tliem, be not of that ability to prefer 
 worthy men to the building of the temple, yet may 
 they bo so brought up by you as they be fitted to be 
 preferred by others, and move the hearts of patrons 
 to prefer them tbat are worthy to the building of this 
 house. But those which especially are to be builders 
 
 * riu. in ejus vita. 
 
 t Tcrtul. Ajiol. cap. xxxviii. aJvcrsus Gentiles. 
 
 438 
 
Ver. i, 5.] 
 
 SERMON- S. 
 
 of this Louse, I voean tlie ministers, though as yet 
 they are not called to any particular charge, yet I 
 heartily beseech you in our Saviour Jesus Christ, to 
 consider that your colleges wherein you live are places 
 to furnish and prepare you against you go abroad, and 
 therefore that you labour here to fit yourselves for 
 employment wheresoever God shall call you, remem- 
 bering in the meau time to relieve them by your preach- 
 ing which have only reading, as the prophet in the old 
 time did where the priest could not ; do not stand 
 idle all the day, though no man have hii'cd you ; indeed, 
 the labourer is worthy of his hire, yet the same grace 
 and providence which brought Joseph, by telling of 
 the butler's dream, afterwards to honour in Egypt, 
 may after also b}- this means bring you to a convenient 
 charge, wherein you may employ your labours. As 
 for those who alreadj' are called to a particular charge, 
 let me only commend unto them the exhortation of 
 the Lord by the prophet, Ezek. iii. 17, ' Son of man, 
 I have made thee a watchman over the house of Israel, 
 therefore hear the word of my mouth, and give them 
 warning from me. When I shall say unto the wicked, 
 Thou shalt surely die, and thou givest him not warn- 
 ing, nor speak to admonish the wicked of his wicked- 
 ness, that he may live ; the same wicked man shall 
 die in his wickedness, but his blood will I i-equire at 
 thy hand.' The}' that are so called to any charge may 
 think themselves spoken to in Ezekiel. The ancient 
 council of Melde, in the 23d chapter, reproving the 
 piractice of pastors as damnable who do not by them- 
 selves but by others feed their flock, saith that they 
 are bound necessarily hereunto by the prophet. The 
 name of watchman here used is drawn from the time 
 of war, where the watchman was set in a high tower 
 to descry the enemies coming, whereof, if he did not 
 tell the people, but the enemies came and assaulted 
 the people unprepared, his blood is to answer it, but 
 if he give warning he was safe. I am loath to men- 
 tion that heavy threat of the Lord, His blood that 
 
 perisheth will I require at the watchmen's hands ; but 
 it were to bo wished that we did consider, that if wo 
 would reap temporal things we must sow spiritual 
 things, and if anj' of us cannot perform this bj- reason 
 of other charges which we must attend, and for look- 
 ing to the profits and fruits which may arise from 
 them, how much better were it for them to have that 
 cogitation that David had, 1 Chron. xi., who when he 
 had desired to drink of the water of the well of Beth- 
 lehem, and three of his valiant men had broken through 
 the host of the Philistines, and had drawn of the water 
 and brought it to him, would not drink of it, but 
 poui'ed it out for an oblation unto the Lord, and said, 
 Let not my God suffer me to do this ; should I drink 
 the blood of these men's lives. And is not this the 
 blood of these men's lives which we drink, when we 
 are clothed and fed with that which they allow us, and 
 yet leave them in that case, that they pine away for 
 want of feeding, and as the prophet saith, they die in 
 this blindness and ignorance for want of teaching. 
 Therefore I beseech you in Jesus Christ, though per- 
 haps you have had a longing desire to drink of this 
 water, yet think better on it, and take David's aflection 
 and resolution, and say. Let not my God suffer me to 
 do this, and rather abate of that you spend of your 
 raiment and fare than take such dead pay, and keep 
 back other faithful watchmen which else they might 
 have. 
 
 The Lord for his mercy'so sanctify our hearts that 
 by the often hearing of his holy word, we may consider 
 and acknowledge our wants and imperfections, and 
 hereby be stirred up to redress what wo find amiss in 
 ourselves, to the building of his church, to the com- 
 fort of our own souls, to the glory of his blessed name, 
 through the grace of his Holy Spirit in Christ Jesus 
 our Lord and Saviour, to whom, with the Father and 
 with the same Holy Spirit, be all praise for evermore. 
 Amen, amen. 
 
 SEEMON X. 1599. 
 
 For I am with you, saith the Lord of hosts. Accurding to the word that I corcnanted with you irhen ye came forth 
 of Eyypl, so my Spirit shall remain among you ; fear not. — Haggai IL 4, 5. 
 
 HOW the Lord, by the ministry of the prophet 
 Haggai, did often and carnestlj' exhort and stir 
 forward the Jews after their return from the captivity 
 of Babylon to the building up of the temple, hath been 
 hitherto declared unto you ; now of the promises or 
 causes of encouragement, whereby it pleased God to 
 hearten them, lest the conceit which they had that 
 this house should not be so famous and so excellent as 
 the former, should discourage them and hinder them from 
 that business, this is the first which I have read unto 
 you, which conlaineth in it a most gracious promise 
 of his aid and assistance by his Spirit, because that 
 flesh and blood is ready to suggest into the mind of a 
 43U 
 
 man that which is in the proverb, ' It is better to be 
 idle than to be occupied in vain,' and to make folk 
 measure things hy the event, so that unless they see 
 present means to efi'ect that which they undertake, 
 they cast off all hope of accomphshing their purpose, 
 and so cease from meddling anj' fm-ther; whereon it 
 was that Moses, Exod. iv. 10, when he should be sent 
 to Pharaoh, excused himself that he was not eloquent, 
 that he had a stammering tongue ; but the Lord 
 raised him up from that thought, tolling him that he 
 should trust in the grace of the Almighty, saying, 
 ' Who hath given the mouth to man, or who maketh the 
 dumb to speak, &c. '? do not I the Lord ? Now, there- 
 
52 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 ["Chap. II. 
 
 fore, go, and I will teach thee what to say.' To the 
 like eflect is the message sent to Haggai, because that 
 Zerubbabel, and Joshua, and the rest, ■which should 
 have been the chief in the work, having laid the foun- 
 dation of the temple, despaired of finishing it, and so 
 despaired before ho began it. The Lord, therefore, 
 stirred them up to go forward by these words which I 
 have now read unto you, a reason very forcible, and 
 motive very pregnant to move them forward. ' I am 
 with you, saith the Lord of hosts,' which words the 
 prophet often useth there, by putting them in mind 
 both of his power that sets them forward, whose wOl 
 all creatures, as soldiers, are ready to perform, and 
 meaning thereby also that by his favourable assistance 
 he will bless them, and that by his Spirit he will give 
 them grace to accomplish that which they had under- 
 taken. 
 
 In the second place, the doubtful understanding of 
 the word u-ord, hath caused interpreters diversely to 
 expound it, for by word in Scripture is sometimes 
 signified the second person in the Trinity, the Saviour 
 of the world, the essential and eternal Word of God, of 
 which John speaketh, John i. ' In the beginning 
 was the Word,' by whom all things were made, and 
 through whom all things are now preserved ; and so 
 here should be three things which the Lord should 
 now promise: 1, His own presence; 2, The presence 
 of his Son ; 3, The presence of the Holy Ghost, 
 which sense the Hebrew would bear as may be trans- 
 lated, and then it should be translated thus, ' I am 
 with you by my Word that I covenanted with you,' &c., 
 whereto the argument agrecth, because he was the 
 angel mentioned, Exod. xxiii. 20, that spake unto 
 Moses in mount Sinai, that gave the law unto the 
 Israelites, and'promised them his favour if they kept 
 his covenant, as Stephen shcweth,Acts vii.38. Some- 
 times it signifieth a promise made unto any, insomuch 
 that David, Ps. cv. ver. 8, mentioning the covenant 
 that the Lord made with Abraham, saith thus, 'He hath 
 always remembered his covenant,' and presently add- 
 eth, ' this word of promise made to a thousand gene- 
 rations,' and thus other some do think it to be taken in 
 this place, and this indeed the text will best bear ; and 
 so much the more, sith the Lord, on the like occasion, 
 saith, Deut. xxxi. verse 8, that he himself would go 
 before them, and therefore encourageth them not to 
 fear or be discouraged, for himself would be with 
 them, and would not fail them nor forsake them. And 
 this the ordinary constniction of the Hebrew doth 
 include, as they know that are skilled that way, espe- 
 cially, I say, if these words be compared with the 8th 
 and 9th verses of the 105th Psalm before mentioned ; 
 besides, there is a more pregnant motive to induce me 
 hereunto, even the authority of the apostle himself, 
 who, Heb. xii. 27, declareth that those words which 
 are in the next place set down by Haggai were spoken 
 by Christ himself, ' Yet once more, / vill nhahe the 
 heavens ;' so by the word in this place cannot be 
 
 meant Christ, seeing Christ is said to have spoken 
 this. It followeth that this word was not the essential 
 Word of God, but some external word ; not the eternal 
 Word of God, but some word that had a beginning, 
 namely when this promise and covenant was made. 
 When the Lord brought the Israehtes out of Egypt, 
 and delivered them by his angel, God the Father 
 by his Son promised his favour and assistance. If we 
 follow this interpretation, the sense will well agree 
 with the fomier, namely, this word, this promise, was 
 made by Christ, considering that in him all ' promises 
 are yea and amen,' 2 Cor.^ i. 20; and considering 
 that Christ saith, John xiv. 15, 16, that if we ' love 
 him and keep his commandments, he will pray the 
 Father, and he will give us another comforter, that he 
 maj' abide with us forever;' whence the latter place 
 in the text of the Holy Ghost receiveth also light, our 
 Saviour there calling him the Comforter, and promising 
 his abiding with us, not for a season, but for ever. 
 
 And this for the meaning of the words, whereby the 
 Lord encouraged Zerubbabel and the rest to go about 
 the building of the temple, assuring them that he will 
 be with them, and that he will be merciful unto them, 
 and prosper them in their endeavours ; that he will send 
 them his Spirit to guide and direct them, and to 
 relieve them in all wants. And doth not the Lord here 
 likewise stir up and exhort us to go forward with the 
 building of the spiritual house, not only such as have 
 the place of Zerulibabcl, or the ofiice of Joshua, but 
 all the faithful also, that every one in his vocation 
 should do what in him lieth to the building up of the 
 body of Christ ? No doubt as we have the like com- 
 mand, so to us likewise is given the like encourage- 
 ment, according to the rule of the apostle : Rom. 
 XV. 4, ' Whatsoever is written, is written for our 
 learning.' For why, have not we temples to build as 
 well as they ? Are not our bodies called temples of 
 the Holy Ghost, Eph. ii. 20-22, 1 Cor. iii., 1 Cor. 
 vi. 19, and therefore not only the church, that is, 
 the church universal, assembly of the faithful, is to 
 do this, but also every man and woman in particular. 
 And albeit the ministers of the word and sacraments, 
 pastors and teachers, are to be principal labourers 
 herein, because they were chieily given to this end, 
 Eph. iv. 12, yet all the faithful are appointed as 
 under workmen, for as much as the Lord cxhorteth 
 them that they exhort and edify one another, 1 Thes. 
 V. 11 ; and Judo conimandefh them to have care to 
 edify one another in their most holy faith, verse 20. 
 The commandment, therefore, that was given to them, 
 is given to us, which is so much the more to bo 
 regarded of us, how much more near to God, and 
 more precious the spiritual house that is built on 
 Christ, and is to last for ever, is above the material 
 temple built on earth, which was not to continue, bat 
 to be laid waste, insomuch that one stone should not 
 be left one upon another ; so that thus you see, that 
 in respect of the like commandment, we also arc to 
 
 410 
 
Vek. i, 5.] 
 
 SEItJION X. 
 
 build up our spiritual tabernacle and temple to the 
 Lord, which also we must do in respect of the like 
 promises that they had, which the Lord most gra- 
 ciously hath made unto us, as he did unto them, to the 
 end that we should east away all fear and distrustful- 
 uess ; nay, rather we have greater promises made 
 unto us than ever they had to them, at least in mea- 
 sure greater, howsoever in substance they be the 
 same ; for what saith Christ? Mat. sxviii. 20, ' Behold, 
 I am with you to the end of the world.' What promise 
 can be more gracious ? what more comfortable, which 
 cannot be understood of the disciples and apostles 
 only, because of that circumstance, till the end of the 
 u-orld ; and though they did belong chiefly to the mi- 
 nisters, who were to observe and teach all that the 
 Lord had commanded them, yet in command they also 
 respect all other, as many as believe in the Lord by 
 their ministry, as Christ well sheweth in Lis praise,* 
 John xvii. 20, where he addeth the one also, ' that they 
 might be all one, they in him, and he in them, as the 
 Father is in him ;' yea, the promise is more graciously 
 given to us than to them, insomuch that, Heb. viii. 8, 
 the words of Jeremiah, that the Lord spake unto the 
 Jews, are cited, ' I will be their God, and they shall 
 be my people, saith,' &c., are appointed unto us, 
 promising us that he will prosper us, he will not leave 
 nor forsake us, that he will bless us not onlj- with 
 heavenly blessings, but also with temporal and with 
 earthly treasures, according to the meaning of the 
 very same promise made to Abraham, Gen. xv. 1, ' I 
 will be thy God,' and renewed to us, Jer. sxxi. ; and 
 yet with more kind words, 2 Cor. vi. 18, ' I will be a 
 Father unto you, and you shall be my sons and 
 daughters.' 2dly, In respect of like or greater pro- 
 mises, we must build up our spiritual temple. 3. We 
 must do it in respect of the like continuance of the 
 Spirit, which we have amongst us as they had, for 
 Christ promiseth us, JoLu xiv. 10, that he ' will pray 
 the Father, and he will give us a Comforter, and he 
 shall abide with us for ever ;' which, lest any should 
 think to be spoken in respect of the disciples only, 
 the apostle, 1 Cor. xvi., telleth us that the Spirit of 
 God dwelleth in us also ; thereby the metaphor of 
 abiding in us, as it may be explained by that which 
 Cato in Tully saith of the soul, namely, that nature 
 hath given it an abiding place in the bodj-, not a 
 dwelling place, therefore it must go out of the body, 
 as out of an inn, and not nut of a dwelling-house; yea, 
 this is 60 to be understood of all Christians, that the 
 apostle saith, Rom. viii., after he had used the same 
 phrase of the soul dwelling in us, that he that hath 
 not the Spirit of God dwelling in him, is none of 
 God's, avouching that there is no Christian to whom 
 this promise is not made good or verified. It is true, 
 indeed, that the Spirit being God lilleth full all places, 
 taking in it that generality; but when we shall talk of 
 this dwelling among the faithful, we take it after a 
 * Qu. ' prayer ' ? — Ed. 
 441 
 
 more particular manner, that he dwelleth in them by 
 his gifts and graces, as the apostle signifieth, Eph. 
 iii. 17, when he saith, that he would pray that Christ 
 might dwell in their hearts by faith, for so Christ 
 dwelleth in us by communicating his Spirit. 
 
 The Spirit, I say, shedding in our hearts faith and 
 love, and then Christ cometh and dwelleth in them, 
 which Augustine impheth when he applied those 
 words to the widow that wept for her husband : Why, 
 saith he, dost thou weep for thy husband ? thou hast 
 by faith a better husband in thy heart, for thou hast 
 Christ himself for thy husband. A sentence, beloved, 
 most comfortable to the faithful, and w^hich may serve 
 weU to assure them of their salvation by Christ ; and 
 therefore the papists desiring to impair it, where 
 Cyril useth the same words, they willed them to be 
 put out, lest any of their scliolars reading them in 
 Cyril, not so corrected, should conceive that Christ 
 dwelleth in our hearts by faith. But blessed be God 
 that our students may read it not only in C3Til, but 
 also in God's own truth, and the unlearned may hear 
 it preached by others. Thus, thirdly, in respect of 
 the continuance of the Spirit, we are likewise to build 
 up ourselves as well as others. Lastly, we have the 
 same promises that they had from the same Lord of 
 hosts, Jesus Christ, as he is described Piev. xix. 14, 
 where it is said that the warriors or amiies which were 
 in heaven follow him ; and if they, so excellent creatures, 
 then much more we who are far inferior. Nay, he 
 more kindly promiseth it to us, promising that he will 
 be with us by his Spirit for ever to guide and comfort 
 us in all our calamities ; and therefore it is our duty 
 as well as theirs to set aside all fear, distrustfulness, 
 and with all courage go forward, and with all en- 
 couragement to strengthen our weak kuees and lift up 
 our feeble hands, that we may be able in some measure 
 to accomphsh the work the Lord hath enjoined every 
 one. For we have the like commandment that Zerub- 
 babcl had, the like promises, yea, the same promises, 
 and the assistance of the same Spirit; and he that 
 promiseth to be with us is the Lord of hosts, most 
 mighty and able to do whatsoever he will; which 
 name, lest haply it should somewhat afl'right us, 
 let us remember that he is mighty and powerful 
 against his enemies, and towards his sons and servants 
 merciful and full of compassion ; j'ea, he is the bishop 
 and shepherd of our souls, 1 Peter ii. And therefore 
 it ought more to embolden us than discourage us, as 
 it did David, Ps. xxiii., ' 3Iy shepherd (saith he) is 
 the living Lord, thtreforo w ill I fear no ill ;' and in- 
 deed he himself shewed it to bo true in his own 
 particular, by his godly example in all his life, and 
 fii'st, when there was but a step between him and 
 death, as he had told his friend Jonathan, 1 Sam. xx. 
 He went forward with some circumspection indeed and 
 care, to prevent danger, but yet never a whit discour- 
 aged, because he knew that the Almighty was his shep- 
 herd, and that he was able to keep and defend him, yea, 
 
54 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 that lie would defeud bim, because that be bad pro- 
 mised to defend all such as put tbeir trust in bim. 
 And why ? ' For tbe king's heart is in the band of the 
 Lord, and ho turneth it whithersoever be will,' and 
 that as easily as a husbandman can turn the streams 
 of water. And so tbe Lord did the heart of Saul to 
 David, as appeareth by the sequel of that story ; and 
 when the Lord did not deliver him by bis power, yet 
 he preserved him by bis goodness. Elias might have 
 feared Ahab, and Elisba might have been dismaj'ed 
 with the taunts that were cast on him by Jeroboam ; 
 but they went boldly forward, shewing indeed that 
 they bad no cause to fear ■or be discouraged, for they 
 knew well enough that the Lord was with them. Tbe 
 memorable example of the three children sheweth tbe 
 like courage to have been in them, when they said, 
 ' Our God is able to deliver us ; and if be do it not, 
 yet know, king, that we will not worship,' &c. ; where- 
 by they shewed that they were fully persuaded that the 
 Lord is present with his servants, either by his power 
 or by his goodness ; by his power to deliver them, or 
 by his goodness to comfort and strengthen them. If 
 to endure tonnents were most for God's glory, yea, the 
 very example of these three sheweth how true that in 
 the Proverbs is, ' When a man's ways please the Lord, 
 he maketh even bis enemies to be at peace with him,' 
 Prov. xvi., so that not only the fury of kings shall be 
 turned away, but if need be they shall become ever 
 friends; and if the hearts of princes bo so subject to tbe 
 Lord's ordination and government, which seem to have 
 some freedom, how much more are the hearts of inferior 
 creatures. The slothful man saith that a lion is in the 
 street, but the Lord bath lions at command, so that they 
 shall not hurt his saints, Dan. vi. ' He that obsorveth 
 the winds shall not sow, and he that marketh the 
 clouds shall not reap,' Eccles. xi. 4. So that the lion 
 feareth'^ tbe slothful man on the one side, and tbe wind 
 on tbe other side keepotb bim back, that he cannot go 
 forward ; but for the true children of God, who know 
 that both wind and weather, sea and air, are at God's 
 command, they fear neither the heat of summer nor tbe 
 cold of winter, nor the storm of persecution, but go 
 boldly on in their calling, following the precept of their 
 God, and committing all others things to his providence, 
 for they know that he is with them even in affliction, 
 as David witncsseth : Psa. xxiii., ' Thy rod and thy 
 staft' comfort me;' where wc arc to consider, that the 
 rod and the staflt are terms used in respect of the former 
 word shepherd. The word rod signifieth a long thing to 
 strike with, but j-ot used as shepherds use tbe like about 
 their sheep, to keep them in by threatening them, and 
 a little tipping them. Tbe word stii/f is borrowed from 
 a word that signifieth to lean on, wliicb sbei)berds use 
 to lean on, and withal to keep tbeir sheep, liut in pro- 
 per, the prophet declarcth that tbe Lord woidd not 
 chasten bim ; or if he did, his chastisement should be 
 but such as sliould comfort him, as be saith elsewhere, 
 * That is 'frighteneth'?— El>. 
 
 Psalm cxix., 'It was good for me that I was punished ; 
 and before I was smitten, I went wrong.' Columella, 
 writing* of the use of the latter word for stafl', saith, 
 that in some countries, the shepherds use to lean on 
 then- staffs, and never sit down, but stand upright to 
 look on their flock, lest that any sheep coming after 
 might be intercepted of wild beasts, of which the coimtry 
 is full. In which sense, if w^e take the word staiT, it 
 sheweth that the Lord is watchful over his, and so regard- 
 etb them, that none of his perish. And look what chas- 
 tisement he giveth them, it shall in the end turn to their 
 salvation ; and hence it was that the apostle Paul, when 
 the Lord bade him 'be of good courage, none shall hurt 
 him,' Acts xxi. 31, he boldly and joyfully went about his 
 calhng, even then when the Lord was not with him in 
 bis power to deliver him, but yet, by bis goodness to 
 comfort him, as I said ; yea, when be knew that he 
 should be delivered up, lie boldly, without fear, went 
 on to build up that body which he was sent for, teaching 
 us, by his example, to remember that, in the epistle 
 to the Komans, cap. viii. 31, 37, 38, 39, ' If God be 
 on our side, who can be against us ?' Nothing can sepa- 
 rate us from his love which we have in Christ Jesus. 
 
 Wherefore, that this might the better be kept 
 and performed, the jsastors are to stir up the people to 
 this boldness, remembering that, even in weakness, 
 the Lord will perfect his strength, and bring his will 
 to pass, and that he often useth weak instruments 
 to gi'eat purposes ; which they should do well to re- 
 member that separate themselves from us, because 
 there is not that perfection in us which they dream 
 there should be. In the chm-ch of Sardis, there were 
 but a few names left among them ; was the minister 
 then to leave them, because it was even then decay- 
 ing and declining ? No ; he was to stir them up again 
 to awake and strengthen the things that remain, which 
 is not spoken to the ministers alone, but to all the rest 
 that remain, as appeareth, ver. 1, -1. The like charge 
 Paul gave to Archippus, Col. iv. 17, namely, that he 
 shoulcl ' take heed to the ministry, that he should 
 fulfil it,' which certainly ought to stir up all such as 
 have charges, that they employ themselves about tbeir 
 calling, teaching them privately and publicly, as it is, 
 Acts XX., not thinking it enough to read unto their 
 charge once a month, for so they shall never fulfil 
 their ministry. Well may they indeed quite starve 
 their flock, which Columella, writing of shepherds, 
 well sheweth, and when he saith a few sheep well fed 
 will bring more profit to the owner than a great many 
 ill fed, for, besides that they bring small profit, they 
 also perisli, and infect others ; for leanness breeds 
 scabs, and scabs death ; and therefore are ministers to 
 labour and feed the Lord's flock according to their 
 gifts, that the Lord may receive the advantage accord- 
 ing to the quantity of the talent. And, therefore, let 
 me beseech them to give themselves to reading and 
 exhortation. 1 f their maintenance be not suflicieut that 
 * Co'.umella, lib. vii. cap. iii. 
 442 
 
Ver. 6, 7.] 
 
 SERMON Xr. 
 
 65 
 
 thoy shoiald leave theii- college, let them remember 
 liow the Lord fed the Israelites with mamia, and how 
 the widow's oil was increased, and how Elijah was fed 
 with ravens, and, not to go to miracles, how the Shu- 
 namitess provided for the prophet, how Paul laboured 
 with his own hands, nay, remember that golden medi- 
 ocrity which Paul speaketh of in Timothy, ' If we have 
 food and raiment, we ought therewith to be content,' 
 1 Tim. vi. 6. And for such as have charges and yet 
 preach not, but pretend they be not eloquent, &c., 
 let them remember what the Lord said to Moses, pre- 
 tending the like ; will they do better than they can ? 
 You laiow what Julius Florus said to Julius Secundus, 
 a little boy should make a declamation, which he had 
 done, saving he wanted a fit prooem which he laboured 
 three days for, and could not hit off any to his liking, 
 and thereby grew very heavy. Julius Florus, his uncle, 
 would needs know the cause. He told him ; where- 
 upon he, smiling, said, Ntonquld In melius vis cUcere 
 quam poles ? So may we say to them. Will they do 
 bettor than they can ? God regardeth that they can do, 
 
 not that which they cannot. When as Socrates had bid 
 many to dinner, his wife told him that there was but 
 a little meat ; Why, saith he, if they be honest men it 
 is enough, if not, too much. So may they think, if their 
 hearers be godly, be it a little that they bring, it shall 
 suffice ; be they wicked, it will be too much ; and there- 
 fore fear not to be bold, the Lord will be with you in 
 the preparation and in the delivery. And see others 
 which are hearers, such as take not that profit by the 
 work as they hold,* whose flesh is always rebelling 
 against the spirit, let them endeavour, and the Lord 
 will add a blessing. Endeavour they must, to reform 
 themselves and to inform others ; for the more they 
 hear, the more they understand, the more will be 
 looked for at their hands. Let them not use those idle 
 excuses of a lion in the street ; let neither the frost in 
 the winter, nor the heat in the summer hinder you 
 from going forward ; be faithful unto the death, and 
 you shall have the crown of life, which the Lord grant, 
 for his Sou's sake Jesus Christ. Amen. 
 * Qu. ' sbould' ?— Ed. 
 
 Yet once again {that is but a little) and 
 the Desire of all nations shall come 
 II. 6, 7. 
 
 SERMON XL 
 
 I will sJiakc the heaven and the earth, and I will move all nations, and 
 ■ and I ivill/ill this house uith glory, saith the Lord of hosts. — Haggai 
 
 OF the three most gracious promises whereby the 
 Lord encouraged Zerubbabel and the i-esidue of 
 the Jews to go forward in the building of the temple, 
 the second (in these words ensuing) doth declare that 
 our Saviour Christ, by his presence and powerful 
 preaching to the salvation of them tliat should believe, 
 would replenish this house with glory : a blessing which 
 how excellent it is, we are by St Paul, Eph. i. 18 and 
 Col. i. 17, sufticiently taught. And this is both com- 
 pared to and amplified by the benefit which the people 
 had in their deliverance out of Eg}'pt, mentioned in 
 the former verse, when he saith here, ' Yet once that 
 is small,' for so it is in the original, which is diversely 
 supplied by the learned interpreters. Some thinking 
 here a short time to be meant, put it thus, ' after, or 
 yet a little while,' as if it had been spoken to com- 
 fort the godly in the shortness of the time, as Isa. s., 
 Hab. ii., Heb. x. ; others, deeming the thing before 
 spoken of to be meant, which sense I take to be more 
 agreeable to the place, read it by a parenthesis, 'yet 
 once (that is a small thing),' viz., to bring them out 
 of Egypt, I will do a gi-eater matter, which kind of 
 phrase we have also Isa. slix. G. But howsoever it 
 be taken, the rest of the woi'ds wherein these leanes* 
 do extol the benefit of the gospel by Christ brought to 
 all nations, comparing it with the law delivered to the 
 Jews, as the apostle infers it, Heb. xii. 20, 27, where, 
 having stirred them up to receive the gospel, he adds 
 * Query?— Ed. 
 413 
 
 that as a reason, that ' if they escaped not which 
 refused him that spake on earth, much less, should 
 they that refuse him speaking from heaven, whose 
 voice then shook the earth, and hath now also 
 declared, saying, Yet once more will I shake not the 
 earth only, but also the heaven;' to which in this 
 place is added the seas and lands as parts of the earth, 
 for greater amplification, whereby is implied that, as 
 when the Lord gave the law on mount Sinai, he made 
 the earth to shake, Exod. xix., so now would he shake 
 not only the earth, but the heaven also, to authorise the 
 gospel, which corporeally was done, as both Matthew 
 and Luke record. Whenas reconciling the Gentiles by 
 his passion the earth quaked, and when the glad tidings 
 of this reconciliation was sent to the apostles, there 
 came a voice from heaven as a mighty wind, and the 
 earth cftsoons shaked. Although taken figuratively, 
 spiritual things may be thought to be intimated, as 
 some expound it, that the earth and the heaven may 
 rejoice for that wdiereby a new heaven and a new earth 
 was to be made, as did the angels in heaven as well 
 as the men on earth. Then, ver. 8, there follows the 
 efficacy of the gospel toward them to whom it is sent, 
 wherein are noted two points : _/ns?, their moving; 
 secondly, their drawing. 
 
 First, Their moving, I will move cdl nations; which 
 was done partly by himself, when, John xii., many of 
 the Gentiles desired to see him, and partly more fully 
 by his servants the apostles, by whose preaching all 
 
56 
 
 nAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 nations were moved, as appears Acts ii. 13, aud the 
 ecclesiastical histories report. The lalti'i- he notes 
 when he saith, ' And the Desire of all nations shall 
 come,' which was performed when the desired persons, 
 i. e. the elect, came unto the temple unto Christ, and 
 to the church, verifying that which began in the first- 
 fruits of the Gentiles, Acts xiii., where it is said that 
 when Paul preached Christ unto them, ' as many as 
 were ordained unto life believed ;' which exposition 
 I take to be agreeable unto this place, especially 
 because the verb in the Hebrew is of the plural 
 number, renient desiderium, which according to the 
 phrase both in the Hebrew and other languages we 
 translate renient desiderati: meaning thereby, that the 
 church of God, which is called, Jer. sii., 'the portion 
 of desire,' as Daniel is called ' a man of desires,' 
 Eph. i., the faithful are called the ' adopted in Christ, 
 according to the good pleasure of his will.' Our 
 Saviour Christ, Mat. viii., when he had found in the 
 centurion more faith than in Israel, speaking of his 
 coming, said, that ' many shall come from the east 
 and west,' &c. ; and yet of this he spoakcth, John vi., 
 where he saith, ' None can come to me except the 
 Father draw him ;' and, John sii. 23, shewing the 
 means how the Father will draw all the elect, as 
 Austin and Gregory well expound it. Against this is 
 opposed simply the exposition of Jerome, who reads 
 it in the singular, 7-eniet desiileralns, which to coun- 
 tenance, Ribeira, a learned man and industrious, if he 
 were not sometimes lilindod or bleared with a papist 
 humour, saith that the original was since Jerome's 
 time corrupted, which is a great marvel that he should 
 say, whonas the Greek interpreters, the LXX, long 
 before Jerome, took it in the plural, translating it by 
 desidcria, the elect, as Jerome himself doth, us also 
 that is strange, the miracles wrought in the establish- 
 ing of the gospel (on which Jerome and Ambrose 
 ground), he should take the sense to be allegorical, 
 rather of shaking the heavens, whenas so nothing can 
 be meant but the angels, but greater than any circum- 
 stance is that of the apostle's, Heb. xii. 28, that they 
 shall come to Christ ; for if he had spoken of his own 
 person, as they would have it, likely he would not 
 have spoken in the third person, having before spoken 
 in the first, ' I will shake,' ' I will move;' and so after 
 in that as follows, ' and I will fill this house with glory,' 
 when his glory after his death should he published, 
 which was done when, in the Acts, by the preaching 
 of the apostles his glory was spread far and near, and 
 so he became glorious who in liis passion had been 
 infamous ; and therefore the apostle, 2 Cor. iii., often 
 repeats that the ministry of the gospel was glorious, 
 because it did publish the glory of him. Now this 
 being done, first at Jerusalem, Luke xxiv., and the 
 apostles abiding in the temple, Acts i., and when they 
 were arrested, Acts iv. 5, therefore ho saith hero that 
 he will fill it with glory. This, then, is the comfort 
 whereby the Lord seeks in this place to stir them ; 
 
 repeating eftsoons that the Lord of hosts would do it, 
 that considering not the earth but the heaven also 
 should be moved, so they should in greater alacrity 
 go forward in their duty. Out of which, that we may 
 note something concerning our duty, 1, the first words, 
 yet once, so give occasion to note what the apostle 
 saith, Heb. xii. 17, that the things which are shaken, 
 as being made with hands, are removed, that the 
 things which are not now shaken may remain for ever; 
 yet that notes a change but once, that sheweth that 
 we must expect but one change lasting for ever. 
 
 Now what the things shaken aud made with hands 
 are, appears in the type of the law, the parts of the 
 taheracle, noting the heaven and earth, which should be 
 shaken, and the ceremonies taken away, when Christ 
 should enter not into the sanctuary made with hands, 
 but into heaven above, as Heb. ix. 21. But those 
 things which are purchased by Christ must continue 
 not shaken ; therefore the gospel is called rh ihay- 
 yiXwj 'r,i (iasiy.iiai raZ QioZ, Mark i. 11, an everlasting 
 gospel, not to be altered any more, hut to endure for 
 ever. I need not here to take occasion to refute those 
 heretics who think that, as Christ added to the law, so 
 also there remains to be added to the gospel, as Mon- 
 tanus did take upon him, the person of the Holy 
 Ghost. But I rather note another error in some 
 churches not far from us, if not also iu some of our 
 own, viz., that popish error which have brought in 
 types and ceremonies which were by Christ abolished, 
 that the thing signified, which cannot be shaken, might 
 remain for ever ; as might be shewed at large, in 
 respect of both time, and place, and persons, out of 
 their missals, decretals, pontificals, but I will only 
 note that which this present time brings to pass out 
 of their year of jubilee. We read, Lev. xxv., that God 
 commanded that the fiftieth year should be kept holy 
 unto the Lord, as a year of deliverance from service, 
 release of debt, aud restoring of land to the owners ; 
 thereby shadowing the time of liberty which Christ 
 was to bring from sin. Now Pope Boniface, 7th chap- 
 ter iu the Extravagants, hath set down that the fiftieth 
 year is a year of pardon and freedom from all sins what- 
 soever, to them that will come devoutly to visit certain 
 churches in Rome, and to al iidc there, if they be strangers, 
 for the space of thirteen days; if Italians, thirty; be- 
 cause, saith he, the fiftieth year is the year of remis- 
 sion, and Christ came not to abolish the law but to 
 fulfil it. And yet the prophet, Isa. vi. 1, 2, sheweth 
 plainly that that was a type, the substance whereof 
 was established by Christ, who was anointed (as lie 
 saith) to preach deliverance to the captives, and the 
 acceptable year of the Lord ; as he expounds it of 
 himself, Luke iv. 18, the accepted year of God's 
 favour, wherein, as at the jubilee, all were set at liberty 
 aud restored to their former estate. So when Christ 
 came they should be delivered from bondage, aud re- 
 stored to the liberty of the sons of God ; wliicli to be 
 done by Christ to continue, as the apostle witnesscth 
 
 444 
 
Ver. 7, 8.J 
 
 SERMON XI. 
 
 0/ 
 
 where lie saith, ' Now is that acceptable time, now is 
 that clay of salvation.' Which to restrain to one year 
 in fifty, if I should compare them to beggarly rudi- 
 ments I should too much honour them, being rather a 
 profane error, which I need not further to make in- 
 famous than by opening their covetousness showed 
 therein, which Polidore Virgil, our own historiographer, 
 chap, xxvi., sets down, writing that the last great 
 jubilee before this, in the year 1500, Pope Alexander 
 VI., in great kindness to the Englishmen, sends them 
 over a Spaniard to shew them the way how to come to 
 heaven by this jubilee, yea, and further also, how they 
 might have the benefit of it and stay at home. But, 
 saith Polidore Virgil, ejus liheraUtas non fuit gratuiln ; 
 and lost (saith he) the king should hinder it, he was 
 content to part stakes with him. But as for us, this 
 yet once sheweth that our jubilee is perpetual; every 
 day, yea, every hour is a year of jubilee and deliver- 
 ance unto us if we seek it. The time, once changed, 
 continues for ever ; for therefore (saith the apostle) 
 was it said. Yet once more, that those things which 
 were made with hands being abolished, these might 
 continue for ever. 
 
 Another thing hence the prophet here commends 
 unto us, in that it is the Lord that speaks unto us 
 himself from heaven, as here he saith, ' I will shake ; ' 
 that therefore, with all dutifulness, we are to accept 
 the doctrine of the gospel, for so the apostle concludes 
 all that he had said of keeping faith, retaining hope, 
 maintaining love, receiving the kingdom unshaken, 
 that, not despising him that speaketh, we may have 
 grace to serve him with shamefacedness and fear. And 
 lest the earthliness else should abase the credit there- 
 of, therefore he saith, ' the heavens,' which yet he 
 pm-posed to do, only by the ministrj- of his servants, 
 for that which they do he accounteth it as that which 
 he himself doth, having said, Luke x., 'He that 
 heareth you hearethme.' And therefore St Paul saith 
 that Christ speaketh in him, 2 Cor. xiii., 1 Thes. 
 ii. 13. He thanks God for them that they received 
 the word of him, and Silvanus, and Timotheus, ' not 
 as the word of men, but as it was indeed, the word of 
 God.' And doth not our Saviour cite that out of 
 John,* I say they shall be all taught of God? Now 
 God teacheth inwardly by his Spirit, and outwardly 
 by his ministers, as from Christ, and Christ from 
 heaven by them, for so the apostle speaketh, Heb. 
 xii. 5. We must therefore come with these and such 
 like minds to such assemblies, that as Eli bade 
 Samuel say, when the Lord called him, ' Speak, Lord, 
 for thy seiTant heareth,' so when the servant of the 
 Lord speaks the Lord's message unto us, we should 
 hearken as to the Lord. Esteem of them as to the 
 ministers of Christ, lest God say of us, as of the 
 Israelites to Samuel, ' They have not cast away thee, 
 but they have cast away me;' which also may be a 
 lesson for the minister to deliver the Lord's message, 
 * Qu. ' Isaiah ' ?— Ed. 
 445 
 
 not his own. John and James are called, Mark iii., 
 ' Boanerges, the sons of thunder,' but, howsoever, 
 certainly they were so called, because by them ho 
 used to shake the heavens as in thunder. Now how 
 James thundered may appear, in that he was chosen 
 as the chief preacher lii-st to bo put to death, Acts xii. 
 And John, though he lived longer, yet how did he 
 thunder in his Gospel against the heretics that denied 
 Christ's deity, and in his epistle against the great 
 breaker of the bond of love '? It were to be wished 
 that our preachers would thunder but as the sons of 
 thunder, to shake the heavens so as to move aU 
 people to those things which remain and continue, 
 Psalm xlv. ; by the sharp arrows the people shall be 
 subdued unto thee. It is not by bolts, but by sharp 
 arrows ; therefore the ministers of God had need to 
 shaqjen then- arrows by ' taldng heed,' as the apostle 
 wisheth, 1 Tim. iv. 15, ' to learning,' to wrap him- 
 self as it were therein, for so the word signifies, that 
 ' so he may save himself, and those that hear him.' 
 
 For though God's providence do cast somewhat 
 further, tliat all that hear are not saved, hereby 
 humility and modesty is commended to the ministers, 
 as to know that they are only instruments, and there- 
 fore to pray, as Paul requested the Ephesians for him- 
 self, ' that a door of utterance might be given him; ' 
 and yet, when they have that, all is nothing, but that 
 God it is by whom that is performed which followeth, 
 that the Desire shall come, &c. ; yet all must be moved, 
 for that is an effect in all. ' Many are called, but few 
 are chosen ; ' many moved, few drawn, and none can 
 come to Christ except they be called. Mat. xxi. When 
 Christ came to Jerusalem, many, even the whole citv, 
 were moved, and what a tumult was there, and yet 
 not many drawn ; and, Acts ii., many were pricked 
 hearing Peter, when at first they jested ; and. Acta 
 xvii., when Paul preached at Athens, some mocked, 
 and some, as Damaris, clave unto the Lord. These 
 were of the desired of the nations ; and so was Lydia, 
 of whom it was said that it was God that opened her 
 heart to attend unto that which Paul preached. The 
 whole glory therefore is to be ascribed unto the Lord, 
 who, of his special mercy, draws some, and leaves 
 others to their own corruptions : ' For it is not in him 
 that willeth, nor in him that runneth, but in God that 
 sheweth mercy.' He it is that accepteth and ap- 
 proveth, and maketh desired, where by the way is a 
 lesson for us, how we accoimt of them whom God 
 makes his desire and liking ; especially. Psalm xv., the 
 prophet requires, as a thing necessary in him that will 
 dwell in God's tabernacle, and rest in his holy moun- 
 tain, that, in his eyes, ' a vile person be contemned, 
 but that he make much of them that fear the Lord.' 
 And Psalm xvi., ' All my delight is on the saints that 
 dwell on the earth. And Isaiah xlv., where God de- 
 seribeth the state of his church, he saith, ' He will lay 
 her stones with carbuncles, and her foundation with 
 sapphires, and make her windows of emeralds, and her 
 
58 
 
 EAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 gates of shining stones, and all her borders of pleasant 
 stones, or stones of delight,' those that he builds up 
 his church withal, that so we may sa}' with the pro- 
 phet Da\-id, ' All my deli;,'ht is in them.' But, alas, 
 too too many ways are our delights carried, but not that 
 way as they should. Valerius Maximus reports that 
 a gentleman of Ca2oua, coming to Cornelia's house 
 shewed her his jewels, and desired to see hers; but 
 she having none, as was likely, put him off with some 
 other talk, till her sons, the two Gracchi, came in from 
 the school, which then she shewed, saying, Here are my 
 jewels ; and indeed these are jewels well brought up. 
 If she took such joy in her children, how may we 
 think God doth ; and therefore we may delight and re- 
 joice in his godly children, especially seeing he reckons 
 of them as his chief treasure and choice jewels, Psalm 
 cxsxv. 4, Mai. iii. 17, I will fill this house with ;/lo>i/ ; 
 which commends upon us a double point, first of 
 wisdom, secondly of comfort; first to teach us, and 
 then to strengthen us. 
 
 To teach us, first, that the glory here spoken of 
 doth signify that true glory wherewith he will fill this 
 house, for other places are filled with painted glory, 
 the want of which wisdom draweth many to noisome 
 lusts and pleasures for false glory. Again, we must 
 know to this glory is joined infamy, as we see in the 
 apostles, who were counted the scum of the world ; 
 yea, how many speak contumeliously of Christ him- 
 self, and his followers, who were voted with that igno- 
 minious name of Nazaritcs, Acts xxiv., touching 
 which, when Paul came to Pkome, Acts xxviii. '2'2, the 
 Jews told Paul, that it was ' everywhere spoken 
 against,' which may put us in mind of that which 
 Simeon spake of Christ, Luke ii., that Christ was ap- 
 pointed ' as a sign to be gainsayed ;' wherefore it is 
 to be meant true glory, which is here accompanied 
 with unjust and true reproach and infamy, which yet 
 the godly may rejoice in. Austin, Tractat. 100, in 
 fol. 16, on these words, the Holy Ghost shall ijlorify 
 me, defining glory to be a speech of many, consisting 
 in one's praise, saith he, when we commend or praise 
 either for that things should not be commended ; or, 
 secondly, that person that is indeed not to be com- 
 mended ; as, for example, saith he, to bestow money 
 on stage-players, is a fault, and not a virtue : yet, 
 saith Austin, many praise it; for the wicked, saith he, 
 citing out of the 20th Psalm, are praised for the lusts 
 of their own hearts : and so again, saith he, the 
 wicked, when hearing- the face of the righteous, thoy 
 are praised, and men deceived, this is false glory. But 
 if the righteous, not seekiug praise of the world, 
 arc praised for their virtues, this is true glory. Now 
 Bt Austin, meaning that Christ was glorilied with true 
 glory, for the glorious works of his function and pas- 
 sion, may teach us to avoid the occasion of their 
 error, which mislike the calling of the ministry, and 
 grief at their reproach. St Paul, considering how this 
 • Qu. ' bearing' ? — Ed. 
 
 true glory was joined with ignominy, but false, re- 
 solves, 2 Cor. vi. 10, to approve himself ' by honour 
 and dishonour, by good report and ill report,' as we 
 see. Acts xxiv., he was accused as a chief maintainer 
 of the sect of the Nazarites ; herein appeared his glory. 
 So Athauasius, as it is in Theodon-t. i. chap. 13, being 
 falsely accused of murder and adultery, his glory ap- 
 peared when the man was brought forth with both his 
 arms whole, whose arms he was accused to have cut 
 off; and when the woman had falsely accused him for 
 being naught with her, charging another in his pre- 
 sence, as mistaking him, Athauasius sufficiently cleared 
 him. So Calvin is accused in this place for receiving 
 venient desiderati, to apply unto others that which be- 
 longs unto Christ, by one in that book called Calvinus 
 Jadaizans, wherein Stapleton sooths him, as glad to 
 find any fault ; but that this and others which he brings 
 are but false reproaches, David Parens doth suffi- 
 ciently make clear ; but if, Heb. xii., our Saviour him- 
 self did so patiently endure the gainsayings of sinful 
 men, how may these be content ? And since not only 
 Paul, and Athauasius, and Calvin, but even Christ 
 himself, suffered reproach, this shews that since Christ 
 was glorified with true glory, that a Christian may have 
 true glory, though untrue ignominy and reproach do 
 accompany it. 
 
 Which may serve, in the second place, for the 
 increase of our comfort, since it is said, Mat. v., 
 ' Blessed are ye that suffer,' &c., so that we need not 
 to marvel that. Acts the 5th, the apostles so rejoice 
 that they were thought worthy so to sufl'er for Christ; 
 or that, Philip, i., Paul saith, that it was ' given to 
 them to sufler,' and that he would rejoice in the cross 
 and marks of the Lord Jesus, which we may so much 
 the more do, if they be wicked that wrong us, but if 
 they be godly, yet take comfort in this we may, that 
 the cause is not just. If all were like Datiuius, Milo 
 might take comfort, as Tully saith ; but it is likely 
 that oven Cato, being, as to his praise Pliny notes, 
 forty-four times accused, and ev6ry time acquitted, 
 yet was sometimes accused by honest men. But then, 
 
 Hie murus aheneus esto 
 Nil conscire sibi, 
 
 consider the example of Job, James v., ' what end the 
 Lord made;' ho was charged with hypocrisy, but in 
 the end cleared. Yea, put Christ for example ; if they 
 have called the Master of the house Beelzebub, no 
 marvel that they use the servants sharper ; but we, 
 dear brethren, must here follow Christ, who, Heb. xii., 
 ' for the glory that was set before him, endured the 
 cross, despised the shame;' for, Rom. viii., -If wo 
 will reign with him, we must also sutler with him ;' 
 we must not think to go to heaven in a horse-litter. 
 Hero we shall have true glory, but hereafter more per- 
 fect glory. 
 
 Lord, instruct us, that we may embrace the things 
 that remain ; and hearken unto that thou commaudest, 
 
 440 
 
Ver. 8, 9.] 
 
 SERMON XII. 
 
 .59 
 
 that -wo may stir up ourselves so to perform our dutj', 
 that here being partakers of true glory, wo may here- 
 
 after be brought to perfect glory, 
 glory, Christ Jesus. Amen. 
 
 even by the God of 
 
 SEEMON XIL 
 
 The silver is mine, and the gohi is mine, saith the Lord of hosts. The ijhnj <,/ this hist house sliall he greater 
 than the ;/Ioni of the Jirst, saith the Lord of hosts ; and in this house uill I ijive peace, saith the Lord of hosts 
 — Haggai II. 8, 9. ■ 
 
 /^ODLINESS is profitable to all thinf/s, harimj the 
 ^-^ promise of this life, and that to come, saith Paul 
 to Timothy, the truth of which sentonce is here illus- 
 trated by an example of a duty here commanded, 
 touching the building of the temple ; for of the three 
 gracious promises made by the Lord to stir up the 
 Jews thereto, the two lastly handled concern the pro- 
 mise of the life to come, the glad tidings of the gos- 
 pel ; and the last now to be unfolded, comprised in 
 the words read, contains the promise of this present 
 life. Silver is mine, &c. We heard before, as may 
 be gathered from the prophet's words, is it not as no- 
 thing, &c., that the people were discouraged when they 
 saw the foundation of the temple, how far short it 
 ■would come of the former, to recomfort them ; there- 
 fore this is added, that the glory of this latter house 
 should be greater than the glory of the former, and 
 that not only in respect of the spiritual glory men- 
 tioned in the former verse, ' And I will fill this house 
 with glory,' but even with temporal and eternal 
 glory also, wherewith, because the other was so beau- 
 tified, they were cast down and discouraged, as if the 
 latter would be nothing in respect of the former. 
 Therefore the Lord here doth not only promise to fill 
 it with glory, but also that the glory thereof shall 
 be greater than the glory of the former, which for 
 that (in respect of that glory which they meant, it 
 might seem a thing impossible, since they had not the 
 riches of Solomon, which built the former) ; therefore, 
 first, the Lord mentions that the silver is his, and the 
 gold is his, &o. : ' The silver is mine, and the gold is 
 mine ; ' as if he had said, Notwithstanding ye are now 
 poor, and see no means how to efl'ect this, yet it is in 
 my power to enrich you, ' The earth is the Lord's, 
 and all that therein is,' Ps. xsiv., which he shewed 
 when he fulfilled his promise by raising up Herod, 
 and em-iching him to build up this house in glory, as 
 an eye-witness, Josephus by name, Antiquitat. 1. xv. 
 c. ult., and de hello Judaico, lib. vi. cap. v., as it is 
 divided in the Greek, doth testify. The disciples 
 desire our Saviour to behold the goodly buildings of 
 the temple, Mat. xxiv. And Luke xxi. 5, it is said 
 that some did admire the temple, how it was gainiished 
 with goodly stones and consecrated things. Now for 
 the stones, Josephus, who at large expounds that in 
 Luke, saith the temple was made all of white stones, 
 some five cubits long and five broad, some of twelve, 
 and some of twenty-live, some of forty-five, in respect 
 447 
 
 of which, perhaps it might be compared with that 
 other built by Solomon. Now for those consecrated 
 things which Luke calleth a'ja6>i,'/,ara, the same 
 Josephus saith, that all the upper parts of the temple 
 were set about with spoils which Herod had taken 
 from the Ai-abians and others. Further, he affirmeth 
 that nine of the doors were covered with gold, the 
 upper gate with Corinthian brass, the inward with 
 gold; the posts were covered with gold, the fore- 
 fronts with plates of gold, the roof set with round 
 spires and boules of gold, so that all was either 
 glistering white, or shining with gold. And so also 
 within : the vessels were many of gold, some of those 
 as were before, others made new, especially the golden 
 table, candlestick, and altar of incense ; insomuch 
 that besides Luke and Josephus, even extern writers, 
 as Tacitus lib. v., Historia saith, that it was imniensm 
 opulentia templum. Now whether in these respects it 
 may be said to be more glorious than the former, I 
 pronounce not ; but certainly in respect of the spiri- 
 tual glory mentioned in the former verse, and this 
 temporal added together, it was much more eminent 
 and glorious than the former. Now hereto is added, 
 ' And in this house I will give peace,' meaning there- 
 by that not only war and dissension should cease, aa 
 we commonly take the name of peace ; but that also 
 all prosperity and temporal blessings should be added, 
 as the word in the Hebrew doth signify perfection and 
 integrity, salubrity and incoUumity, as they used it 
 in theii- salutations, ' Peace be unto you,' wishing them 
 all good, as we may see 2 Sam. xi. 7, where it is 
 said that David asked of Uriah, of the peace of the 
 war, that is, of the prosperousness and of the good 
 success of the war, which Zechariah, chap, viii., 
 makes plain to be meant here, speaking of the same 
 thing two years after; for there he asked them whether 
 before they received the commandment of building the 
 Lord's house, they did not remember there was no 
 peace. Nay, saith God, I did set every one against 
 his brother, but now there is a seed of peace, as 
 translations render it a prosperous seed ; noting that 
 by peace is meant prosperity, for which they must 
 wait, as husbandmen do until it grow up, which is 
 plain from the words following, that as other peace 
 cannot (as it is said doth) make the vines to bud, but 
 is God's gift of peace, as after he saith, and you that 
 were once accm-sed shall bo a blessing among all 
 nations. So that by peace there is not meant only 
 
GO 
 
 EAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 concord and unity, but that as is promised, Deut. 
 xsviii., all prosperity to them that oboj- the Lord. 
 
 And this you see, that the Lord of hosts, the 
 almighty God, signifying unto these people that gold 
 and silver is his, and therefore that he can perform 
 what they cannot, doth promise also that he will 
 make the glory of this latter house greater than the 
 former, and therewithal will bless it with peace and 
 temporal prosperity. 
 
 The foundation of which promise being a premoni- 
 tion to take away distrustfulness from them, ' the 
 silver is miuo,' doth instruct us in this ground of 
 common faith, that the Lord of heaven, by the right 
 of creation, doth enjoy and possess all earthly bless- 
 ings, and can as he please dispose them. This Moses 
 and Aaron did not so well remember, when. Num. ss., 
 being commanded to speak to the rock, and promised 
 that the water should flow out, they by distrusting 
 God's power did not sanctify the Lord in their hearts, 
 nor so before the people by believing his promises as 
 they should have done, that therefore he would not 
 let them bring the people into Canaan ; God then [is] 
 sanctified by believing this which here is said, that 
 the silver is his, under which are comprehended all 
 other creatures and temporal blessings, as his own and 
 at his disposing, serving for the performance of his 
 will, the benefit of his servants. When Samaria was 
 besieged, and the famine so sore that the mother was 
 to boil her son, and to refresh herself with her own 
 child, as we read, 2 Kings vii., and the prophet coming 
 to the king told him from the Lord, that by to- 
 morrow this time there should be plenty in the gate 
 of Samaria, a prince on whom the king leaned, 
 thinking it a thing impossible, answered the man of 
 God and said, ISohokl, if God should make windows 
 in the heaven, could this come to pass ? The pro- 
 phet replied that he was sent from God, and confirm- 
 ing that which he said, threatened him punishment 
 for his incredulity, that ho should see it with his eyes, 
 but that he should not taste thereof, as also it came 
 to pass. When the angel Gabriel, sent from God, 
 promised Zacharias a son, Luke i., ' How can this be,' 
 saith he, ' since I am old and my wife barren ?' Well, 
 saith the angel, I am sent from God and it shall be, 
 but because thou hast not believed, thou shall be 
 dumb until this thing be done. Which example of 
 Moses, of Aaron, of the prince, and of Zacharias, 
 doth teach us to believe that what the Lord doth pro- 
 mise in his word, it shall undoubtedly bo made good 
 by his work in due season. Silver is his, and gold is 
 bis, for so saith the Lord of hosts, ' The silver is 
 mine, and the gold is mine,' &c. 
 
 A point that maj" further teach us to remember tliat, 
 seeing also these earthly blessings are the Lord's, 
 therefore, in getting, using, losing, or wanting them, 
 we should have care so to behave ourselves, as those 
 liat know they are not ours, but the Lord's. In r/et- 
 tiiiij, ho givcth it them to whom it pleaseth him, and it 
 
 is not, as manj- foohshly imagine, committed to the 
 prince of the world, to be disposed by him at his 
 pleasm-e. It is true, indeed, 'that Satan said so, that 
 all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, 
 are delivered unto him, and to whom he would he 
 gave them ; but he said it falsely, and for the most part 
 as false as this we see here worldly men, as if silver 
 and gold and these worldly things were not the blessiugs 
 which God bestows, seek them by unjust and unlaw- 
 ful means, belike thiuki:ig they are none of God's at 
 all. Otherwise, as Jacob said he would servo Laban 
 seven j"ears for his daughter Kacbel, so they would 
 also serve God for his blessings. But with many, as 
 the wise man saith, ' stolen waters are sweet, and his 
 bread is pleasant.' The sons of Eli robbed the people 
 that came to sacrifice, and took by force that which 
 was not theirs ; and I would to God that not only the 
 sons of Eli, but that also our Elis themselves, for I 
 would be loath to judge auj-, did they not, I will not 
 say rob, but did they [not] take more than their own 
 from the portion of the Lord's sacrifices, &c. Sure, if 
 any so do, thej' consider not with David, Psalm Ixsv., 
 that preferment comes not neither from the east, nor 
 from the west, but that it is the Lord that doth give 
 it, else they would be of David's mind, I hope, who 
 would not do anything that he should not against Saul, 
 a wicked king, no, not for a kingdom: 1 Sam. ssvi. 11, 
 ' God forbid that I should do this, and sin against 
 God,' &c. They that pray to God as their heavenly 
 Father, ' Give us this day our daily bread,' and j-et 
 delight in stolen waters, shew that they do the lusts 
 of another father, John viii. 44. God forbid that I 
 should say they are of another father, but sm-e here- 
 in they servo him, by serving another than the Lord 
 in good duties ; they should get that they desire by 
 good means, for ' silver is mine, and gold is mine,' Ac. 
 
 Secondly, In iisiuf/. Wo are but stewards to tho 
 Lord in using and disposing those blessings which wo 
 enjoy, and therefore must remember that we must giva 
 an account thereof unto the Lord. Nabal, when David's 
 messengers came to him for some provision to refresh 
 himself and his followers, 1 Sam. xxv., ' Shall I take 
 my bread, and my wine, and my llesh, &c., and givo 
 it to strangers ?' All was mine, and mine, and miuo 
 with him ; he did not consider that he had received 
 them from God, to be at his will disposed, not all for 
 himself, but some for others also. It is said, Proverbs 
 iii., ' Wilhliold not the goods from the owner thereof; 
 neither say to thy neighbour, Go, and come again to- 
 morrow,' &c. The owners are called ; them that have 
 need of any good wo have, and wo are but as stewards 
 to dispose it to them, according to that rule iu the 
 epistle to the Corinthians, 2 Cor. ix. G, ' Ho that 
 sowcth bountifully shall also reap bountifully, for tho 
 Lord loves a cheerful giver,' and ho gives twice that 
 gives ()uickiy. 
 
 Tho Israelites in Hosca, chap. ii. 9, had forgotten 
 that it was tho Lord that gave them silver and gold, 
 
 448 
 
Ver. 8, 9.] 
 
 SERMON XII. 
 
 61 
 
 flax and oil, whicli they gave to Baal, and therefore 
 he threatens to take it away ; so, if we hestow those 
 blessings that he gives us amiss, let us know that he 
 yet retains an interest in them to take away. What 
 if his silver and his gold be bestowed upon papists' 
 images, idolatry, &c. ; what if men make their bellies 
 their gods, as Philip, iii., and serve them with their 
 riches like Polysemus in Euripides, who said he 
 never sacrificed to any god but to his belly, and he 
 thought that wise men would think that it is a man's 
 god to eat and di'ink : yet all for this, the right of 
 these blessings, thus abused by wicked men, belongs 
 unto God, and he will, at his pleasure, both take them 
 away from them, and call them to an account for the 
 abuse of them. Alas, if it were not so with us also, 
 we should be more ready to come to these assemblies, 
 whenas we are so ready to fill our own bellies ; but 
 let us know, that we have now but the disposing of 
 these things, and the Lord will require an account 
 of us. 
 
 Thirdly, What if we lose them ; yet let us comfort 
 ourselves with Job, remembering ' that the Lord gives 
 and the Lord takes away, and therefore blessed be the 
 name of the Lord.' 
 
 Fourthly, If wo want them, yet remember they are 
 the Lord's, who, if he please, can give them ; but say 
 that we want them, and the Lord bestows them upon 
 the wicked that worse deserves them. This is a great 
 temptation, I confess, to the godly, as we may see in 
 David, Psalm Ixxiii., and Jeremiah, chap. xii. ; yet, 
 consider he is the Savioiu- of all, though especiallj' of 
 the godly, and he makes his sun to shine, and his 
 rain to fall, on all sorts, that so, by his longsuft'ering 
 and goodness, he may call them to repentance, Rom. ii., 
 or at least, as Acts, xiv. ' filling their hearts with 
 food and gladness,' he may not leave himself without 
 witness. 
 
 But to come from this point, which is set down to 
 strengthen their ftiith in the power of God, to the pro- 
 mise itself of greater gloiy. ' The glory of this house 
 shall be gi-eater than the former ;' which ministers 
 greater comfort to the church, as comprehended with 
 Judah in this promise under the name of Israel, Zech. 
 viii. 13, where by Israel is meant the same as in that 
 speech. Gal. vi., ' As many as walk according to this 
 rule, peace shall be upon them, and upon the Israel 
 of God,' &c. : Israel not according to the flesh, but 
 according to the spirit. Even the Gentiles which are 
 joined in the building of this latter house, as the pro- 
 phet Isaiah speaks, chap. yi. 13, alluding to the 
 temple, ' The glory of Lebanon shall come to thee, the 
 fir-tree, the elm-tree, and the liox-tree together,' ;'. c. 
 the Gentiles, ' to beautify the place of my sanctuary ;' 
 and then, shewing he means hereby the church to be 
 gathered out of all nations, he saith, ' The sons of 
 them that hated thee shaU bow to thee,' &c. ; and ' I 
 will make thee an eternal glory and joy ;' noting 
 thereby, that before the gospel was preached, the Jews 
 449 
 
 were hated by all who then, being converted, shall 
 submit themselves to that religion which before they 
 detested, so that thei'e should be a perpetual joy mado 
 for all the church. And verse 9, he saith that 'the 
 isles shall come, and the ships of Tarshish,' &c. ; even 
 ' they that growbj- merchandise unto greater wealth,' as 
 Isa. xxiii. speaks of Tyrns, that came with their silver 
 and their gold unto the Lord, to beautify therewith his 
 spiritual temple, the church. 
 
 This is that, then, which here is promised, that God 
 will provide for the merchandise of his church those 
 things that may be sufficient, as for food and raiment; 
 for so the apostle, interpreting the promise, limits it 
 in 2 Tim. vi., 'When we have food and raiment, let 
 us therewith be content.' Howbeit, to this is added 
 a greater glory due in this life ; that prerogative ' to be 
 called the sons of God,' John i. 12, and ' fellow- 
 heirs with Christ, Rom. viii. ; and after this life, to 
 enjoy an exceeding weight of glory,' 2 Cor. iv. So 
 that the church shall be blessed, though not with 
 abundance and superfluity of earthly goods (it may 
 be) for it was not for nought that Solomon prayed, 
 Prov. ssx., 'Give me neither poverty nor riches;' 
 and, Deut. xxiii., we see, that when the people waxed 
 full, they spurned against the Lord ; but always with 
 sufficiency, and with a spiritual glory greater yet in 
 this hfe, and an immortal weight of glory in the life 
 to come. Therefore, to those that lead a religious, 
 Christian, and a godly life, that endeavour to build up 
 themselves and others in an holy building to the Lord, 
 is this promise made, that this latter house shall be 
 more glorious than the former ; they before Christ, 
 having but a taste in comparison of that whereof wo 
 have the full fruition. This is it that Solomon hath, 
 Prov. viii., ' Exalt wisdom, and it will exalt thee ;' and 
 he learned it from his father, who taught that God 
 would 'give both grace and glory,' Ps. Ixxxiv. 11, 
 ' and no good thing will I withhold from those that 
 walk uprightly;' no good thing, nothing that is indeed 
 good for them, with that moderation. 1 Cor. xiv., 
 the apostle saith of himself, and such as he was, that 
 they were a gazing-stock unto angels and men, hungry 
 and thirsty, naked and bufieted ; but, 2 Cor iv., he 
 addeth that those small afllictions should work in them 
 a far more excellent and eternal weight of glory ; so 
 that God works always that which is most of all for 
 our good. Therefore, in respect of those other greater 
 good things, these lesser are denied. 'Whosoever,' 
 saith Christ, ' shall lose father, and mother, or 
 friends, for my name's sake, he shall, even in this life, 
 receive a hundred fold,' but ' with persecutions, and 
 in the world to come, life eternal.' ' He that hath 
 given us his Son, how should he not give us all things 
 together with him ?' The Lord can deny nothing that 
 is good to them that walk uprightly, Ps. Ixxxiv. 11 ; 
 but then we must walk uprightly, and in so doing our 
 glory shall be the greater. For if we build the Lord's 
 house, then we glorify and honour him'; and there it is 
 
 Ff 
 
62 
 
 RAINOLDH ON HAaUAI. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 written, ' I'Ikmi Uml, Iioikiiii- im; I will lidiioiir,' Haitli 
 tliii lioi'il, i Hiuii. ii. iiO. 
 
 Now tliii IuhI jil'oliiiHO, /(/"/ III lliin lioii.iii I ii'ill i/iri! 
 pi'iii-ii, \h nmdo of a hiuxI oI' yvmw, itc.., uot only timt 
 diHHonHioii hIiiiII couiui, Ijiit tljiit tliu licaviniH nliall lioar 
 tlid liarth to (^ivo linr iJiiw, and thti imu til Hiiali lioar tlio 
 corn to f^ivi) lior (iiiit, Ai;., anil tiuiy hIiiiII lic.ar JhiiujI, 
 lloHoii ii. 21 , 22 ; HO travail in tho linildiiif;; of tliu lioiiHo 
 ol' tlio Ijord and tin; Hiirvico of liiin aH tljcy ought, 
 wljic.li may jiiit \M in niinil that wo may foar that W(3 
 luivii not lal>oin'<:d ho hh wo onf.djt in llio liuildin}^ of 
 tliii lioiiHO of tliii iionl, foraHnjiicli mh tliuni lio ho many 
 liicaclidH and vnnlh* anionj.; nH ; and in tlio Huvenlli 
 (diaptur, tlio jiroplidt tellH lliom that l/cforo, vvhun tlniy 
 liuilt not thii liord'H honno, hut cvi;i'y ono IiIh own, 
 that Ihii heaven hliiyed itwilf from (hiw, and tho earth 
 lierHelf fiom her IVnit, there wan no \wm:h ; nay, Haitli 
 /eeliariah, viii. JO, ' liel'oi'e thoHu dayn them wan no hire 
 for man nor boaHt, noitlier wan there any jieace to hinj 
 Unit went out, nor to him that canio in, hecaUHO of the 
 alllirtion;' for, Haith Ood, I Het overy ono a^'ftinfit hiH 
 li()if.;lihoiir, anri that hy the JiiHt jiid^^rnent and ven- 
 goanee of <lod, heciuiHe they travailed not in tliehilililiii(^ 
 of the, hoiiHe of tlio liord. ' I'Vom wluiiieo aro wiu'h 
 and roiiteiilionH y Haith Janien, chap. iv. 1, 2; 'are 
 they not htiiiee, even from your own liintH and pleaKureH 
 lliat (l^;lit in your memherH 'I' And are not our con- 
 tentiouH to miiintain onr luntn and oiu' iileaHnreH? 
 AIho, I woidd to (lod we did eoiiHidio' ari(.dit the root 
 of them. It iH an old proverli, to linh in troiihliil 
 waterH. (!leon, in AriHto|iiauieH, Wan told that lie 
 dealt lil(o tlieiii that liHliod for ooIh; for as they, when 
 the lalce in ealiii and clear, can take nothing, and 
 Iheroforo do they troiihle it and ntir up the mud and 
 Hlinie, HO, when the city wiiH ipiiet, he eoiild get no- 
 thing, and therefore lui fought to nialiii Htiife in tlie 
 city. Jf any nnidi (lleoiiH he aniongKt uh, J would they 
 would ri^niendiir Unit tliiiy are called, not to he liHlierH 
 of eelH ; hut to he fiHlinrH of nien, not <if HUidi Hiimy Htiilf 
 which, llah. ii., in called tliiidi clay, hnl, for the kouIh 
 of men, which are iiiohI preeioUH, and which tiny niiint 
 Heeli for. Ah for the wiHiloin of Hindi an finh for ccIh, it 
 ' ileHiuindeth not from ahove,' an Ht •liinieH Haith, ' hut 
 Ih earthly, HeiiHiud, cariiiil, and deviliHli,' Hindi iiH do 
 not couHidc'r that the Lord naitli, ' Hilver iH mini', luid 
 gold in mine, and I will give peace in IIiIh lioiiNe.' I'.iil, 
 if Ht JamuH cannot Hurve to jierHUade, then lei, Ihnn 
 • Qu. ' rihlH 'V Mn, 
 
 yet remiMrihei' what a he.itlicii man, worthy tlunrromom- 
 hrancn, naith, Varro hy name,* whom AuHtin ho com- 
 nieiidH : IHHliiicduiii' i:ii iiiiii, naith he, liiiiiiiic»rit, jiraxi- 
 piiiim i:iri.liil.!« liiiiniiii I'l. iiiiijiit inf/riitiire i:l. ilijloii'uriire. 
 Out of all conlroveiHy (ho prophet, having promiHcd 
 peace unto them when tho tcmplo and hnuKo of tho 
 Ijord wan built, doth hliew ]ilainly that wedo not huild 
 the liord's houHO, hccauKo wo arc not at puaco. But 
 if, hy tho example and jiromiHe, wo hopo to have 
 jieace, let uh look to he ImherH of men, and not of 
 eeln; then nhall wo he Hure to have proHperousHUCCcKH, 
 and to hn enriched, an the JewH were afierward. ' Woo 
 he to him,' Haith Ood to •Tihoiakini, Jer. xxii. L't, 
 ' that hiiildelh liin Iiohho with uiirighteoiiHneHH, and 
 IiIh (diaiiihi'rH hy wrong.' I'id not (hy father ,JoHiaU 
 eat and drink, and pronper, when he executed judg- 
 ment anil jimtice ? If men could he content witli 
 moderation, aH Josiah waH, and not Heek to jiintify 
 their inordinato lusts and all'ectionH, bb many do, 
 then might they oat and drink, and prowper, aH Joniiih 
 did. lint when they begin, with Jelioiakim, to follow 
 afl-er their own wiidced IiihIh, then it is not modcrato 
 eating and drinking that will nerve Iheii' turn. They 
 think they mimt shift for more by other niciuiH. Tho 
 Bontence that Kt JainiiH adiletli upon his exhortatioa 
 and reproof of their contentioiiH, JamcH iii. 15, is 
 worthy our remembrance, i'/>., ' tho fruit of riglit- 
 ooiiHiieHH Ih Hown in pe;ice to then) that exerciHe jieiico,' 
 where in the fornnr place jieiico Ih taken for (iod's lovo 
 and favour, nndiiipiinieil with temporal and sjiiritual 
 blcHningH, iiiid ill the latter for peace and concord. 
 And HO, doubtloHH, God'H eternal jieace, which pasHoth 
 all niidoiHtanding, Ih sown (o Ihein that make peaco ; 
 yet (hey must wait, an I he himhiindman doth, for 
 Irnit, and not think to have it Htiaighlway ; but cor- 
 tainly they niiiy ex|iect ii, for the Lord halh ])roniiflod 
 (bat iiH many an how rightcoUHiieHH kIiiiII havo tlio 
 fruit of peace in thin life, and in the lil'o to como lifo 
 everlaH(,ing. lint 1 beheoidi you to rcniembor that 
 which in propheHied to como to pasH in the time of tho 
 go.spel, ' to break our HWorilH indi nnittoidiH, rind our 
 HpiiU'H into HcythiiH,' Iwa. ii. '1. Let iih lay asido tho 
 inHlniinentH of war, and lake unto uh (be inslrunieiits 
 of (iod'H hiiHbiindmen and biboiireiH, and ho bnild tho 
 hoiiHO of find that the fjord nniy dwell iiinong UH. 
 Sanctify uh, Lord, that wo may rcmomber that tho 
 gold iH thino. 
 
 ♦ Vlin-l), Iih. I. (1(1 villi linjnlli linlll. 
 
 HEUMON XIII. 
 
 ill Ihr finiilli (liii/iiiiiir llir inuil iif llir I .mil .ini/iiiil, 'I'liiis !,iiilli llir I. mil, Anl; iinir llir inii'sh rmiiiiiiiiin the 
 law, mid Hill/, If uiii< liriir Imli/ Jli'fli in llm al.iil of liix i/iiiiiniil, iiiiil liilli lii.i sUil ilii liniili Iniuiil, iir jmlliiild, 
 (If ii'liii', or oil, or mil/ mrnt, nliiill il In' Imlij ! Awl llin firiful.t iiiimri'ii'il ami .iiiiil. No. — Haoiiai II. 11, 12. 
 
 A 
 
 I'TI'M! nimn imd great |iriiiiilHen of miiiliy blcHH- 
 ii];ii mill In 111 litH, wberdiy the Lord hud before 
 
 encoiiriiged (heHe 
 the hiiililin'' of th 
 
 |U'n|ile of IliO .TeWH to go forward in 
 1 li'iiiple, wherein at (IiIh time they 
 '100 
 
Ver. 11, 12.] 
 
 SERMON XTII. 
 
 63 
 
 shewed themselves somewhat slack, here again, for 
 the strengthening of their hands, and the cheering 
 of their hearts to stir them up, again, in these words, 
 the prophet reneweth one of the former promises con- 
 cerning the plenty of temporal blessings of wine and 
 oil, so the comfort of which benefit is annexed and 
 set out by the contrary, to wit, barrenness, blasting, 
 by which for their sins they were chastised in the 
 foi-mer year ; and lest, being the only people chosen 
 to serve the Lord, they should flatter themselves in 
 the multitude of their sacrifices and religious wor- 
 shipping of the Lord, and think, therefore, that they 
 were not so plagued for their sins, they are advertised 
 from the Lord, that notwithstanding their daily 
 offerings and services, and not only their other actions 
 were displeasing to him, but even their sacrifices 
 abominable in his sight, so long as they neglected his 
 commandments and left his temple unlsuilt. 
 
 The several points to be observed are these : 
 
 First, That then- sins is opened, and they by them- 
 selves convinced of it, ver. 12—16. 
 
 Secondly, The prophet sheweth that therefore they 
 were plagued with barrenness, from ver. 10-19. 
 
 Thirdly, Upon amendment of this fault, and going 
 constantly on in building, plenty is promised, ver. 
 19-20. 
 
 The first point is as much as I shall be able to 
 handle at this time, though I did read all because of 
 the connection and coherence of one part with another. 
 
 For the first, therefore, to admit the other_whereon 
 this depends. 
 
 Their sin, the prophet opens by two mystical re- 
 eemblances drawn from Moses's law, ver. 13, 14, and 
 declaring thence, ver. 15, that they being themselves 
 unclean, so were all their works and their sacrifices, 
 which, the more effectually to persuade them, the 
 Lord, ver. 12, commandeth Haggai to ask the priests 
 concerning the law, as by the witnesses of them that 
 ■were therein skilful to convince them, and perhaps to 
 reprove the priest which should before have taught 
 the people according to the law. 
 
 Now the law of Moses layeth open these two types: 
 for 1, Lev. vi. 27, concerning the sin-offering, the 
 Lord by Moses pronounceth that it was most holy, 
 and whatsoever should touch the flesh should be 
 holy ; and here is the former question made by the 
 prophet, ver. 12, 13, if one bear holy flesh in the 
 skirt of his garment, and with the skirt do touch the 
 bread, or the pottage, whether the bread or the meat 
 so touched shall be holy, whereunto the priest an- 
 swered, no. And that rightly; for though it be said 
 there, that whatsoever thing the flesh of the sin- 
 ofiering toucheth shall be holy, yet doth he not say 
 that whatsoever toucheth that which toucheth the 
 flesh shall be holy. In like manner, the Jews in 
 their sacrifice could not be said to be holy, because 
 they touched that only which touched the thing that 
 ■was holy, and never touched that thing which was 
 451 
 
 holy, to wit, the true flesh of sin, as he called, Gal. ii., 
 the body of those shadows, Heb. is. 9, who was 
 sacrificed on the cross to take away sin, whom and 
 whose garments, as they only who touched by faith 
 were healed, Mark vi. 50, Mat. ix., so, only as many 
 as touched him in the sacrifices of the Jews, spiri- 
 tually, by a true and lively faith ; first, those that 
 spiritually believed in him were saved, and so conse- 
 quently sanctified ; which spiritual touch is required, 
 John iii., Heb. xi. 6. Wherefore, as the Jews, by 
 neglecting the building of the temple, and therein 
 their obedience, shewed their unbelief, wanting that 
 faith which worketh by love, although they touched 
 the outward shadows and ceremonies, yet, since they 
 touched not Christ, the substance and body of them, 
 by a true faith, they remained yet unholy still.' Again, 
 Num ii. 19, it is written, that ' Whosoever toucheth 
 the corpse of a dead man shall be polluted and un- 
 clean, and whatsoever the unclean person toucheth, 
 it shall be also uncle.an.' And hence is the second 
 question moved, whether, if a person so polluted by 
 touching a dead body (as the word in the original 
 sheweth, and is, although not here, yet. Lev. xxii. 4, 
 translated, touch anything unclean by the dead), 
 whether the thing touched should bo unclean ? To 
 this question, the prophet answers yes, it shall be un- 
 clean, and that also agreeable to the law, as before 
 we have heard ; wherefore the touching of a dead body 
 doth betoken the committing of sin, which is called a 
 dead work, Heb. ix. 4, as may appear by Ckrist'3 
 blood purging from us the uncleanness of sin, to that 
 cleansing water which purged them from that unclean- 
 ness of the dead, Heb. x. It remaineth that the 
 Jews, howsoever by the sacrifices and ceremonies they 
 were outwardly washed from such pollutions, yet 
 being not washed by Christ's blood, they were dead in 
 trespasses and sins, and so polluted with dead works, 
 that all of them were unclean, yea, and their sacrifices 
 defiled ; and all they did, which is the main point of 
 reproof, inferred as from those former proofs, by the 
 testimony even of the priests themselves concerned, 
 ver. 15, where the prophet answereth, ' So is this 
 people,' viz., which say it is not time to build the 
 Lord's house ; and so is this nation unclean before 
 me, saith the Lord, /. e. in my judgment, howsoever 
 they think themselves clean by their sacrifices, and so 
 are not one but all the works of their hands, and that 
 which they effect here, viz., as we may gather their 
 daily burnt-offering, are unclean. Thus were the Jews 
 informed how they did ofl'end against the law of God 
 in not building, as they were commanded, the temple 
 of the Lord ; and therefore, for all their sacrifices, 
 they were unclean, and all their works, yea, and their 
 own sacrifices, an abomination unto him ; and that by 
 the confession of the high priests, their own teachers, 
 of which instruction given unto them we may make 
 our profit, wherein we may see, 
 
 1. The sin of these Jews, viz., the neglect of the 
 
64. 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 fulfilling of the Lord's commandment, in building a8 
 before. 
 
 2. The convicting of them hence by the law. 
 
 3. By resemblances and types out of Moses's law. 
 And this may serve for opening the meaning of these 
 words. Now, see what here we learn for instruction 
 and our further use : ver. 12, ' Thus saith the Lord, 
 ask the priests,' de lege ; whence, — 
 
 1. We learn in general, that for convicting men of 
 sin, and instructing them in the way of God, the word 
 of God is an infallible rule, and ought to be the square 
 of all our actions : ' The law of the Lord is perfect, 
 converting the soul : and the testimony of the Lord 
 is sure, and giveth wisdom to the simple,' Ps. six. 
 Neither doth only David, Ps. cxix., say that ' it 
 tcacheth a young man to redress his way,' but even 
 of his own he saith, that ' the word is a lantern unto 
 his feet,' ver. 105. And our Saviour Christ, when he 
 was asked of the scribe how he miobt have eternal 
 life, sendeth him to the law, saying. How is it written, 
 how readest thou ? Mat. xix. And so being to prove 
 to the Sadducees the resurrection, he sendeth them to 
 the Scripture, saying, ' Have ye not read?' Mat. xxii. 
 So the apostle Paul persuaded Timothy, and in him 
 all the ministers, to continue in the things they had 
 heard, which are able to make them wise unto salva- 
 tion, 2 Tim. iii. 15, and desired Titus to continue in 
 the doctrine taught him, and thereby to convince them 
 that gainsay, Titus i. 9 ; not by men's doctrine, which 
 are all but vain rudiments. Col. ii., and which they 
 teach, but all in vain, to worship God, Mat. xv. : a 
 doctrine necessary to be noted touching the sufficiency 
 of the word of God against the doctrine of men's tra- 
 ditions, which the Lord, by Isaiah, complaineth of in 
 the Jews that gave themselves to the Talmud, tying 
 themselves to the doctrine of Rabbins, and also digging 
 broken cisterns that would hold no water, and forsaking 
 the fountain of living waters, alleging those canons 
 for directing of men's actions, as now the papists in 
 their giving directions for the training up of their 
 novices. A Jesuit, Ribeira, on these words, Afik llie 
 priests, saith that it is as much as wo say. Now ask 
 the priests in eases of conscience ; and the observation 
 is very true ; but, then, seeing cases of conscience are 
 decided in God's word, they that be thus asked must 
 be guided b}' God's Spirit, and be able to answer as 
 the papists* here did, out of the law of the Lord, 
 what God saith, and not out of men's doctrines, what 
 Thomas Aquinas saith. 
 
 they be cases of conscience 
 
 determine and resolve ; and 
 
 their own doctor, Thomas 
 
 quest. 1, art. 8, upon the 
 
 words of Titus, saith, that although by way of reason 
 
 men's authorities may be alleged, as of Aratus by the 
 
 apostle, yet these are but probable, not demonstrative, 
 
 and that only the doctrine of the canonical Sorip- 
 
 * Qu. 'priests'?— Ed. 
 
 P)Ut remember that 
 which God only doth 
 lierein let them take 
 Aquinas, who, par. 1, 
 
 tures is certain and infallible, and such as whereon 
 our faith may and must'alone be grounded, as on the 
 revelation given immediately by God unto the pro- 
 phets ; whereon also Saint Augustine saith, that he 
 had learned to give only to the holy Scriptures that 
 reverence, that they could not err, when all other 
 men might, and in their writings often did.* But as 
 for us, my brethren, we are not to rely upon Thomas 
 Aquinas, or any other man ; our heavenly school- 
 master hath taught us better : Isa. viii., ' Should 
 not a people inquire at their God '? To the law and 
 to the testimony, if they speak not according to this, 
 it is because they have no light in them.' They have 
 no light in them that have not learned this ; and 
 this we learn, in that the prophet did ask the papists f 
 concerning the law. 
 
 The nest thing to be observed here is, that the pro- 
 phet being bidden to ask the papists, f the papists f 
 make answer out of the law, where we may observe 
 the duty of the papists,} viz., that they ought to be 
 men who ought to know the law, and thence to be 
 able to resolve the truth in any question being asked 
 out of the law ; for so saith God, Mai. ii., that ha 
 made his covenant with him of life and death, and 
 hereupon infers that the priest's lips should preserve 
 knowledge, and the people should seek the law at his 
 mouth, for he is the angel of the Lord of hosts. We, 
 my brethren, that are called to the ministry of the 
 gospel, succeed the priests in this office, though the 
 name indeed be not given to us in the New Testament, 
 but together with other Christians, as may appear by 
 Isaiah Ixvi. 21. There the prophet, alluding to the 
 old name to sot down our office, saith, ' In the Lord's 
 name I will take of them,' i.e. from all nations, ' priests 
 and Levites unto me some' ; and therefore we also 
 must know the law of God, and that, as it was said 
 then, so it is now said of us also, that our lips also 
 should preserve knowledge, that we may teach the 
 people. And this St Paul rcquireth of Timothy, to 
 give attendance to reading, although he had been 
 brought up in it from his youth ; and though old 
 men may think that this was spoken to young men 
 such as Timothy, yet may they know that this also 
 belongs to those who are old persons such as Paul, 
 and that from Augustine, Epist. Ixiii., terti. ad Vol- 
 sianam,J to whom, having written for resolution to 
 Austin (as if he thought ho knew nil things), Austiu, 
 correcting the opinion, saith that so profound aud 
 deep were the Scriptures, that he might profit still in 
 them, although from his childhood unto his old age, 
 with most diligent study, he was conversant in them. 
 Not as things necessary unto salvation were to bo 
 attained unto by so great difficulty, an exception 
 needful to bo inserted for the papists, but that when 
 
 * All Ilipronymum. — Bpist. xix. 
 t Qu. ' priests'?— Kn. 
 
 J Tiinta est profuiulitas, &c. — August., epist. iii. ad 
 Volsianam. 
 
 452 
 
Ver 11, 12] 
 
 SEEMON SlII. 
 
 65 
 
 they have attained to Christian faith. Yet such mys- 
 teries are there, and so shadows, that, although the 
 ministers bo ingenio acutissbno, aniiiio jiiKjrantissiDio, 
 yet they cannot in all their life, as Eccles. vii., attain 
 to knowledge of them ; so that the lesson given to 
 young Timothy is to extend to the old. Also, Paul 
 himself doing what he exhorteth Timothy to do, as 
 the gloss thereon, Cherion notes, and Chrysostom, 
 that Paul did that himself which he exhorteth Timothy 
 to do by Paul's so often writing of the oracles of God 
 in the Old Testament, and by other circumstances. 
 Now, this knowledge is not to be kept under a bushel, 
 but we must teach and instruct the people, and resolve 
 of questions, according as it is said, ' ask the priests ;' 
 which thing, before they should have done, since they 
 could not choose but read in Deuteronomy that they 
 should teach Jacob God's judgments and Israel his 
 laws, which the better to perform they are forbidden, 
 Lev. X., to drink wine or strong drink when they 
 enter into the Lord's tabernacle, that they may dis- 
 cern things aright, and teach w'hat was to be observed 
 among other Christian duties, as to instruct, correct, 
 reprove, 2 Tim. iii. Paul also requireth of the minis- 
 ters, not in the strictness of that law, to drink no 
 wine at all, 1 Tim. v.['23, yet not to be vinodcdUui, 1 Tim. 
 iii. 3, given to wine, and for the same end, accord- 
 ing as Plato in Ciatijlo saith, that temperance is 
 called 6o<p^'j>c\j'jy, — quasi aofi'iu, ^ffwr/jcsw;, whereto Aris- 
 totle assents. Ethic, p. G; which etymology, although 
 some grammarians dislike, yet it is true that temper- 
 ance preserveth wisdom, and contra, as Pliny saith,* 
 lib. xxiii. cap. 1, Sapicntia ohwnbrctur vino ; and 
 therefore of bishops and pastors it is required that 
 they be temperate in diet, that so they may preserve 
 knowledge to instruct others, the want of which makes 
 the prophet, Isa. Ivi., denounce woe against the pastors, 
 as blind guides wanting knowledge, which he ascribes 
 partly to their covetousness, and partly to riot and 
 excess. The plagues which such draw on them for 
 letting the people be destroyed for want of knowlcilge 
 we may see in Hosea iv. : 'Because thou hast refused 
 knowledge, saith the Lord, I will also refuse thee, that 
 thou shalt be no priest to me ;' since thou hast for- 
 gotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy chil- 
 dren. To which, if any shall reply that they have no 
 children, and therefore think in this respect that they 
 shall escape the curse, let them remember the curse 
 there denounced ; and so, Zech. xi. 17, ' idle 
 shepherd that leavest thy flock, the sword shall fall 
 upon thy right eye!' &c. 
 
 And I would the wise consideration of these things 
 might stir us all up to the diligent study of the law of 
 the Lord, and faithful delivery of the same unto his 
 people, to feed the flock of God that dependeth on 
 us ; and that of our Saviour, of the wise and faithful 
 steward, ought to be a lesson for us in this case; and 
 
 * Sic qiioque in pniverbium [proc]essit. Sapientiam vino 
 obumbrari. — Lib. xxiii. cap. i. 
 453 
 
 this duty required of those priests a direction unto us 
 for the performance of our duty in this behalf. 
 
 A third observation. — Hence it is gathered by the 
 papists that the priests were, and so, consequently, 
 the church, that is, as Bellar. iii. de verba Dei, 
 interpreteth, the pope with his council, are sovereign 
 judges of all controversies, and that in their judging 
 of the same they cannot be deceived, wdiich chap. iv. 
 of that book proving, or rather endeavouring to prove, 
 he brings for his purpose amongst others this place, 
 where it is said, ask the priests ; and that of Mai. 
 ii. 7, Sacerdotes custodient scientiain : ' The priest's 
 lips shall preserve knowledge, and they shall seek the 
 law at his mouth,' as here the prophet is commanded. 
 Whence [hadj he concluded only that this the priest's 
 lips ought to do, it had been well, and that which the 
 law would bear. But whereas hereupon they would 
 infer that they cannot err in doing it, so making that 
 a promise what they should do, not onlj' a precept 
 what they ought to do, that very place in Mai. 
 ii. 8 sheweth the contrary, where it is added by way 
 of reproof, ' But j-e are gone out of the way, ye have 
 caused many to fall by the law.' So that it is mani- 
 fest by the whole drift of that place, that the priest's 
 lips should preserve knowledge, for he is the messen- 
 ger of the Lord of hosts, and therefore they that do 
 not so deserve punishment, as followeth, ver 9 : 
 Therefore ' I have made you contemptible.' But 
 after this interpretation of the Jesuit, every man in 
 his calling, almost as well as the priests, may claim a 
 prerogative of not learning in the performance of this 
 duty. Rom. xiii., of the magistrate, it is said that ho 
 is for the praise of them that do well ; what, there- 
 fore, shall wo say ? Nero, being a magistrate, never 
 failed therein ; or, that all they that did well received 
 a promise* of Nero ? Again, the wife is said to be 
 made a help unto her husband. What ! may we 
 think that every wife is so, or that Job's wife was so, 
 and did perform this duty to her husband ? Again, 
 Mai. i. G, 'A son honoureth his father, and a servant 
 his master.' What ! therefore is there no stubborn 
 child nor disobedient son to his parents ? Was that 
 law, Deut. xxi., for no purpose ? or are all servants 
 faithful to their masters '? and is that false of our 
 Saviour, Luke ix., '0 wicked servant ' ? These 
 places shew, indeed, that the magistrates should be 
 for the praise of them that do well ; that the wife 
 should be a help to her husband ; that the child 
 should be obedient to his father ; but not all of these 
 are so always. And so the priest's lips should pre- 
 serve knowledge, as in the future tense this word is 
 often used, or imply a duty, as even Ribeira, a papist, 
 confesseth that even Bellarmine from his own men 
 might have learned not to have abused his reader ; 
 and for the thing itself, although the priests here 
 twice answer well, yet other examples shew how foully 
 they erred oftentimes, as to note but two for all in 
 * Qu. ' praise ' ? — Ed. 
 
66 
 
 EAINOLDS ON HAGGAl. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 Jer. xxvi. Concerning the cburc-b, when the prophet 
 threatened that God would make the temple as Shiloh, 
 the priests pronounced that it was a crime worthy of 
 death, when yet the princes confessed that it was 
 according to law, and so delivered Jeremiah out of 
 their hands. And secondly, Mat. xxvi., concerning 
 Christ the head of the church, when Christ said that 
 hereafter ye shall see the Son of man sitting at the 
 right hand of God, the high priests rent their clothes 
 and pronounced it to be a blasphemy, when indeed it 
 was not ; and perhaps he had not fallen into that 
 error if he had not known our Saviour. 
 
 This point therefore we are not to learn by the 
 prophet in this place, but rather because they are 
 false teachers, which come in sheep's clothings ; 
 therefore it behoveth us to be careful that we be not 
 led by false guides ; for such, as you have heard, may 
 be blind, and, if the blind lead the bhnd, do not both 
 fall into the ditch together ? Therefore, as we are com- 
 manded, let us examine the spirits. 
 
 Now, as these points may be learned out of the 
 answer of the priests, for skilfulness and faithfulness 
 is required in God's ministers, so is there here left 
 unto all sorts a lesson of wisdom in touching* of 
 sinners out of Haggai, his wise dealing with them ; 
 who, because the calamity was general, and the priests 
 in fault as well as the people, by his wise command 
 bringeth the priests to confess against themselves, and 
 so convinceth them also of sin together with them. 
 
 So did Nathan deal with David, proposing the 
 parable of the poor man's only sheep, in such wisdom 
 that David gave sentence even against himself; and 
 had it returned into his own bosom with this personal 
 arrest. Thou art the man. So Christ dealt also with 
 the Pharisees by a parable of a vineyard let out to a 
 * Qu. ' teaching ' ? — Ed. 
 
 husbandman, Mat. xxii. And after the same manner 
 did Ampbitochius, bishop of Iconium, convince Theo- 
 dosius the emperor of his sin in bearing too much 
 with an Arian heretic ; for when he had entreated the 
 emperor to banish the assembly of the Arians out of 
 the city, as utter enemies to the Son of God, Christ 
 Jesus, and the emperor had denied his request, being 
 loath to deal so hardly with them, Ampbitochius was 
 silent for a season, but afterwards most wisely attempted 
 the matter again on this manner : entering on a time 
 into the emperor's palace, and beholding his son Radius 
 (whom be had now made emperor) standing by him, 
 he after his wonted manner saluted the emperor him- 
 self, but of purpose did not obeisance unto his son, 
 which the emperor observing, and thinking it to be 
 done by Ampbitochius only of forgetfulness, he com- 
 manded him to come unto his son, and in token of 
 honour to salute him with a kiss. Ampbitochius 
 answered, that it was sufficient that he had done his 
 duty unto him. Whereat the emperor was much 
 moved with great indignation, interpreting the neglect 
 of his son to be the coutempt of himself. Then imme- 
 diately the most wise Ampbitochius (as Theodoret* 
 styles him), declaring the whole purpose and drift of 
 that, he said, and cried aloud, emperor, dost thou 
 so take to heart the neglect of thy son, and art thou 
 so vehemently angi\v with them that are contumelious 
 against him ? Why, then, remember that the 
 almighty God doth hate the blasphemers of his only- 
 bogotten Son, and is angry with them, as being un- 
 thankful towards him, their Saviour and benefactor. 
 The emperor being convinced by these his words and 
 deeds, did forthwith make a law for the restraint of 
 the Arians, heretics, according to the petition of Am- 
 pbitochius. 
 
 * Theodor. Eccl. Hist., lib. v. cap. v. 
 
 SEEMON XIV. 
 
 If one hear Iwly flesh in the skirt of his c/arment, and uilh the skirt Jo touch bread or jiottaije, sh<dl it he holy ? 
 And tlie jiriest answered and said, No, (Cc. And Uarjijai said. So is this people, (fc. — H.vggai II. 13, 14. 
 
 rj^O pass over all coherence of those words that follow 
 J_ with these (noted heretofore), r.nd to remember 
 yon only of the drift and meaning of the same ; the 
 Jews being now returned from their Babylonish cap- 
 tivity to Jerusalem, although they went not forward 
 with the building of the temple, as the Lord com- 
 manded them ; yet because they offered sacrifice on 
 the altar of the Lord built long before, they supposed 
 that they were thereby sanctified, so that their dis- 
 obedience in not building tlio temple did not defile 
 them. The contrary thereto here they are taught out 
 of the law by two resemblances, Lev. i. and Num. 
 ii. 10; for that first, avouching everything that touched 
 the flesh of the sin-offering to be clean, did not yet 
 imply that the bread and wine that touched the skirt, 
 
 which touched the sin-ofl'ering, should be likewise 
 clean ; and the second, allirniing them that touched a 
 dead body to be unclean, and whatsoever they touched 
 also to be unclean, did shew plainly that all that such 
 a party did touch, whether bread or oil, was thereby 
 defiled and unclean, after which points out of the law, 
 avouched by the confession of the priests (for God bade 
 the prophet ask them), the latter part of the second 
 similitude followeth, ' So is this people, and so is this 
 whole nation before me,' &c. The force of the illation 
 or argument, w by the Jews were not sanctified bj' their 
 sacrifices, but count their sacrifices defiled by their dis- 
 obedience, doth consist in the mysteries represented by 
 those ceremonies; for, first, Christ Jesus our Saviour 
 was signified by the sin-ofl'ering, whose flesh was most 
 
 454 
 
Ver. is, 14.] 
 
 SERMON XIV. 
 
 67 
 
 boly, here called holy flesh, the touching of which here 
 signifies the spiritual touching of Christ by faith, as 
 the woman, Luke viii., is by our Saviour said only to 
 have touched him, whenas others did more than so. 
 Wherefore, since they that truly do believe in God do 
 love him and keep his commandments, and the Jews 
 did not build the temple as he commanded them, it 
 followeth that although the Jews did touch that which 
 in some sort might bo said to touch Christ, viz., the 
 sacrifices and shadows of the law, wherein he was 
 covered as in the skirt of a garment, yet they did not 
 touch Christ himself by a lively faith working by love, 
 therefore they were not by these sacrifices sanctified 
 and made holy; nay, contrarily, all their sacrifices 
 were by them defiled and made unclean, since the 
 touching of a dead body did signify the committing of 
 sinful disobedience, which was deadly. And whatso- 
 ever such a person did touch did signify whatsoever 
 Le did, which thereby he defiled; so that the Jews, 
 being themselves defiled by their disobedience in not 
 building of the temple, defiled all their works ; even 
 their very ofierings, seemed they never so holy before 
 men, yet before God they were but pollutcfl and defiled. 
 Now, to pass by the ground of this reproof, the testi- 
 mony, namely, of the priests out of the law, of which 
 before, verse 12, and to proceed to other notes of 
 instruction ; — 
 
 1. From the two similitudes in general, from the 
 ptne* of their meaning applied, we may observe, 
 that the sacrifices and ceremonies of the old law were 
 ordained by God, not to signify only those things 
 which the W'Ords barely did import unto the Jews, but 
 other mysteries also for the comfort of the godly unto 
 the end of the world. This the apostle. Col. ii. 17, 
 sheweth us, that these were but shadows; i.e. as it 
 were the just draughts of the lineaments, as painters 
 (whence the phrase seemeth to be taken) use first in 
 a darker sort, as with a coal or the like, to shadow 
 forth their portraiture, as Apelles did Ptolemy his 
 servantf (Plio. lib. xxxv. cap. x.), which after they 
 make more perfect. And yet more plainly, Heb. 
 viii. 5, where it is said that Moses made the taber- 
 nacle, and all things therein, according to the heavenly 
 l^attern which God shewed him in the mount ; which 
 pattern, what was it but the mysteries of our redemp- 
 tion by our Saviour Christ, which were shadowed out 
 by the tabernacle ? To shew this by examples : 
 Exod. xii., there was a paschal lamb appointed to be 
 killed, and the blood to be sprinkled on the door- 
 posts; 1 Cor. v., the apostle applieth this to Christ, 
 saying, ' For Christ our Saviour is offered.' Exod. 
 xxix. 38, there was appointed in the daily sacrifice 
 two lambs to be offered, one in the morning and the 
 other in the evening ; John the Baptist seeing our 
 Saviour Christ, John i., saith, ' P.ehold the Lamb of 
 God, that takes away the sins of the world ! ' whereof 
 indeed the other were but shadows. Num. xxi., Moses 
 * Qu. ' aptness ' ? — Ed. t His name was Planus. 
 
 455 
 
 is appointed to erect a brazen serpent, that the people 
 who were stung with the fiery serpents might look 
 thereon and be healed ; in John iii., our Saviour Christ 
 doth shew that himself was shadowed by that serpent, 
 for ' as Moses lifted up the serpent,' &c. I need not 
 to open other mysteries hid in these touching the 
 faithful, as that 1 Cor. v., that when the paschal was 
 eaten they ate unleavened bread. The apostle there 
 seems to signify that we being by our Saviour re- 
 deemed, are to put away all leaven of maliciousness, 
 and to keep a continual feast all our life with the un- 
 leavened bread of sincerity and truth. And so in this 
 place, the touc'ning of the fleshof the sin-offering, which 
 did make holy that which did immediately touch it, 
 though not that which did only touch that as did 
 touch it, did signify, as by the prophet's application 
 wo learn, the touching of our Saviour Christ by a 
 lively faith, which did sanctify those that did so 
 touch him, although not those which did only touch 
 the shadows wherein he was Japped; as contrarily 
 the touching of a dead body, which did defile whom 
 it touched, and made him also to defile what he 
 touched, did signify the committing of deadly dis- 
 obedience, which did defile the Jews, and the very 
 best works thej' did. 
 
 These things, beloved, may servo to stir us up to 
 the meditation of that which the apostle saith, Heb. 
 V. 11, that there are in the Scriptures of God ' many 
 things hard to bo uttered;' and we are dull of hearing, 
 and such as had need of milk, and not of strong 
 meats, though wo may confess with St Augustine,* 
 Epi. iii. ad Vohisiam, that even the strongest among 
 us may learn still more, since such a man as he did 
 not stick to say of himself that the Scripture is so 
 profound a depth that one of tar better wit and gifts 
 than he, though ho should study in it alone and nothing 
 else ever from a child unto his old age, yet still might 
 profit therein, non quasi, saith he, ca qua sint ad 
 satutcm ticcessririn, were not therein plainly delivered. 
 To prevent the objection that the papists make why 
 the people should not read the Scriptures, but after 
 these plain things are learned, there are so many 
 darklier shadowed mysteries (as are those, in inter- 
 preting of which many have missed, not only in the 
 depth of the words, but even of the things therein 
 contained), that the Icarnedest may therein increase 
 his knowledge. And this may serve to be noted from 
 the two similitudes in general. 
 
 2. Secondly, It follows that from the first similitude, 
 vei'. 13, we observe that by the outward serrice of 
 God, they are not sanctified that have not religious and 
 believing hearts, which being here by their similitude 
 shadowed forth, is in other places of Scripture plainer 
 set down, according to that which Augustine hath, 
 lib. ii. DeDoct. Chiistimta, where he saith that nothing 
 is taught obscurely in one place of the Scripture which 
 
 * Tanta est Christianarum profunditas literarum ut in 
 eis quotidie iiroficere si eas solas ab ineunto atate, &c. 
 
68 
 
 EAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 is not in auothor more plainly expounded;* and for 
 this doctrine, it is plain : as first, by that of Samuel 
 unto Saul, 1 Sam. xv. 22, ' Doth the Lord more 
 delight in burnt-offerings than when the voice of the 
 Lord is obeyed ? Behold, to obey is better than 
 sacrifice,' &c. Isaiah goeth farther, chap i., bringing 
 in the Lord as accounting all their sacrifices no belter 
 than abominable, ' What have I to do with the multi- 
 tude of your oblations? &c.; incense is an abomination 
 unto me ;' but bis moaning is the same that Samuel's 
 was, that God did regard more their obedience, the 
 ■washing of their hands, and cleansing their hearts 
 from sin, their ceasing to do evil, &c., than all those 
 oblations without these. Hosea vi. G, the place which 
 our Saviour allegeth. Mat. ix. 12, ' I desire mercies, 
 and not sacrifice,' bis meaning is, by way of com- 
 parison, not sacrifice in respect of mercy (as the 
 latter words added shew), and the knowledge of God 
 more than burnt-offerings, such koowledge, namely, 
 as 1 John ii. speaketh of, which is joined with love, 
 when he saith, ' Hereby we know that we know him, 
 if we love him, and keep his commandments;' as he 
 indeed will that doth know God as our Saviour. No 
 marvel, therefore, if the Jews, disobeying God in 
 what he commanded touching the building of the 
 temple, though they were very ready and forward in 
 their sacrifice, as we may read, Ezra iii., yet were not 
 hereby sanctified, &c. B3' their disobedience, they 
 and their sacrifices were defiled, as hereafter we shall, 
 God willing, hear from the second type. First, the 
 outward service of God doth not sanctify any in whom 
 there is not a believing and obedient heart. Our 
 Saviour Christ, by bis coming, hath (as before was 
 foretold he should, Dan. ix. 27) abolished those 
 sacrifices of outward services of the law, which, being 
 but shadows, were to cease, the body once come. 
 Col. ii.; which else would signify Christ to be [not] 
 as yet come ; we cannot, therefore, now serve God 
 with the same manner of external service as they did ; 
 but yet we have some services even under the gospel 
 like in some proportion unto theirs, wherein we arc 
 by ecclesiastical assemblies to oiler sacrifice unto the 
 Lord. The apostle, Heb. xiii. 15, mentioneth some 
 of them, exhorting them, and in them us, and all 
 Christians, to ofl'er up unto God always by Christ the 
 sacrifice of praise, even the fruit of the lips to confess 
 his name; and Romans xv. IG, concerning sermons 
 the apostle saith he was ordained a minister of the 
 gospel of God, that the oflering up of the Gentiles (the 
 word in the original is ne^oefn^a) might be acceptable, 
 being sanctified by the Holy Ghost, according as 
 Isaiah Ixvi. 20 was foretold, that by the preaching of 
 the gospel the Gentiles should be sacrificed up unto 
 God; in the former of which sacrifices of prayer and 
 thanksgiving, as the people are to join with the 
 
 P * Niliil fori do illia obscuritatibus cniilur quod non 
 pianissimo dictum alibi reperiatur. — Aug. de docl. Christ., 
 lib. ii. cap. vi. 
 
 minister and saj'. Amen, so in sacrificing of them- 
 selves in the latter by the preaching of the gospel, 
 they are to join also as the apostle doth eshort, 
 Rom. xii. 1. Howbeit, lest we should herein vainly 
 flatter ourselves, and think that our outward service 
 might sanctify us, although the Jews could not do 
 them, we are to understand that howsoever the Jews 
 strove indeed specially by blood, to make God ap- 
 peased with them, yet had thej' also, together with their 
 sacrifices, both prayers and sermons for performance 
 of this spiritual duty ; eir/o, Ps. cxxii. 4, it is said iu 
 commendation of Jerusalem, where were the sacrifices, 
 that thither the tribes go up, unto the testimony of 
 the Lord, to praise the name of the Lord ; and that 
 wo may know that they had prayers still together 
 with their sacrifices, Acts iii. 1, we read that Peter 
 and John went up into the temple at the ninth hour, 
 i.e. the hour of prayer, which was the hour betwixt 
 the two evenings, when the Jews did offer daily their 
 evening sacrifices ; as also we may find many psalms 
 at that time ordained to be sung ; yea, and besides 
 their prayers used with their sacrifices (which only 
 were offered in one place, viz., at Jerusalem), they 
 had still everywhere throughout Jewry, in their syna- 
 gogues, prayers and divine service ; and Acts xvi. 13, 
 mention is made of a place by the river side whither 
 the Jews usually resorted unto prayer ; and again, 
 verso IG, where Paul saith that the maid met them as 
 they went to prayer. Many think that by ■;rgoff£ii;^>) is 
 meant the place where they used prayer, so called, as 
 Philo,* who lived about that time, that sheweth they 
 used to call their synagogues cpousuj/a; of the praj'ers 
 they used to have in them. Now, that together with 
 prayer, they had also preaching and expounding of the 
 word, as it appears by that place alleged, Acts xvi., 
 where it is said, that at Paul's preachiug God did 
 open the heart of Lydia to attend to that was spoken ;t 
 so also that at Jerusalem it was likewise used, that 
 famous place, Neh. viii. 9, doth shew sufficiently, as 
 also in other places of Jewry, as 2 Kings iv. 23, from 
 that answer which the Shunamite's husband gave unto 
 his wife, when her child being dead, and he not 
 knowing thereof, and marvelling why she saddled the 
 ass, (asked) why she would go to the man of God 
 that day, since it was neither new moon nor Sabbath 
 day. The learned gather that on such feasts (as the 
 new moon and Sabbath days) the people that dwelled 
 far off', even in the countries, did use to assemble unto 
 the cities, where were prophets and Levites, which 
 they called men of God, to bo taught and instructed 
 by them, as, Acts xv. 14, it is said that Moses had 
 them which preached him iu their synagogues, being 
 read every Sabbath-day, as even in our Saviour's 
 time it appcareth by that which is recorded, Luke v. 
 17, where it is said that, to hear Christ, among the 
 
 * Pbil. Juil. Legn. ad Gaiuiu. I'liilo JuJ. de vita Mosis, 
 lib. iii. p. S3:J. 
 + Vid. Bcz. in Act. vi. 9 et Act. xvi. 13. 
 
 45G 
 
Ver. 13, 14.] 
 
 SERMON XIV. 
 
 €9 
 
 rest there came the Pharisees and teachers of the law, 
 out of every town of GaUlee and Judea, and from 
 Jerusalem, insomuch that when the Scriptures were 
 read, if there any likely in the congregation, to preach 
 or make any exhortation, they were requested there- 
 unto, as, Acts xiii. 15, we read how, at Antiochus, 
 after the lectm'c of the law and the prophets, the 
 ruler of the synagogue sent unto Paul, saying, ' Ye 
 men and brethren, if ye have any word of exhortation 
 for the people, say on ;' which farther appeareth by 
 that it is storied of our Saviour, Luke iv. 17, how, 
 coming into the synagogue at Nazareth, the book of 
 the prophets was delivered unto him, which, having 
 opened, he read, and expounded a portion of Gist of 
 Isaiah unto the people. Therefore, since that to these 
 sacrifices here mentioned the Jews joining both prayer 
 and preachmg of the word, and yet were not thereby 
 sanctified without obedient hearts, we may learn also 
 that by our calling on the name of the Lord in prayer, 
 andlearning his will by hearing his word, we cannot 
 at all be sanctified without obedient and believing 
 hearts. And doth not the apostle teach us the very 
 same things ? Why else doth he exhort, 1 Tim. ii. 8, 
 that men should pray everywhere, lifting up pure 
 hands, and without wrath, and without doubting, if so 
 be that only prayer and lifting up the hands would 
 serve, without the purity of the aflections of the 
 heart ? And why doth he say to the Hebrews, chap, 
 iv. 2, that the gospel was preached unto them as well 
 as unto the old Jews in Moses his time ; but the word 
 that they hoard did not profit them, because it was 
 not mixed with faith in those that heard it, if that 
 barely to come to hear the word were all that were 
 required ? Or why doth he sayconcerniug the sacra- 
 ments which are the visible, as the preaching is the 
 audible word of God, 1 Cor. x., that the fathers under 
 the law did all eat of the same spiritual meat and 
 did all drink of the same spiritual drink, and yet with 
 many of them God was not pleased, so that they fell 
 in the wilderness, and addeth that these are examples 
 unto us, but to instruct us that although we have such 
 graces as they, and be partakers of the like sacraments 
 of Christ, j'et, if we be disobedient as the}" were, we 
 must look to taste of the like plagues as they did '? So 
 evident is that doctrine, which, from the former simi- 
 tude in the beginning I observed, that bj- the outward 
 service of God none are sanctified but those only which 
 have faithful and obedient hearts. 
 
 Wherefore, since it behoveth us (reverend and 
 beloved) to be careful of holiness, without which none 
 can see God, Heb. xii. 14, we see how we should stir 
 up ourselves, not only to the outward, but even to the 
 inward worship of the Lord ; for, IVIat. vii. 22, ' Many 
 shall say, Lord, Lord,' so that there shall be prayers, 
 and luive not we in thy name jireached, &c. ? They 
 shall use preaching also, and yet Christ shall say unto 
 them, ' I never knew you.' Seeing then the outward 
 ceremony will not serve to sanctify any, or bring them 
 457 
 
 to salvation, we must be very careful not only to per- 
 form this outward service to God of prayer, which, by 
 an excellency, is called Xar^sia, Kom. is., as all other, 
 Horn, xii., but also to ofler up our souls and bodies, 
 even the best of our inward and spiritual sacrifices 
 and services to God's glory, for we are bought with a 
 price, and I am sorry that I am prevented by the 
 time, so that I must speak briefly, which else I should 
 more largely. 
 
 How many of us are there that do not come to the 
 outward service of God so as they ought '? I refer it 
 to every man's conscience to consider how they fre- 
 quent the assembhes for prayer and divine service in 
 their private colleges ; but for coming at the begin- 
 ning of terms, whenas we are by oath and conscience 
 bound thereto, how slackly is that done, if done at all ? 
 Alas, how far are we from the zeal that was in tho 
 Jews, who, with wearisome journeys, walked on through 
 the wilderness ' till they appeared before God in Sion ! ' 
 Ps. Ixxxiv. How far from that foretold should bo in 
 the people of God, Ps. ex. 3, ' Thy people shall come 
 willingly !' &c. How far from that example which the 
 people give us, Neh. viii., who were said to have 
 ' heard the word willingly from morning until night ! ' 
 So we read. Acts xx., ' Paul being to depart on tho 
 morrow, the people that believed assembled themselves 
 together to hear him, so that he continued his preach- 
 ing until midnight ;' but alas, how do we degenerate 
 from these, who cannot endure but for an hour or two 
 to frequent such religious assemblies ! It is recorded 
 by Sozomeu, 1. vi. c. 18, that when Yalons, an Arian 
 emperor, had forbidden the Christians to have any 
 assemblies, the godly notwithstanding used to meet 
 together in the fields for the service of the Lord. 
 The emperor hearing thereof, was very wroth with his 
 chief captain Modestus (for so he was called, and so, 
 indeed, he shewed himself), because he sufl'ered them 
 so to do. Modestus, therefore, forewarning thpm 
 that they should meet so no more, and threatening 
 that if they dil they should be punished, they, not- 
 withstanding, tho next day, in great multitudes met 
 again, which Modestus understanding, thought good 
 to go out against them with a band, and to scatter 
 them ; but, as he went, a certain woman, w-ith her 
 head not thoroughly tired, and with a little child in her 
 hand, overtaking them, brake thi'ough among the sol- 
 diers, and made haste towards the place where tho 
 Christians were assembled. Modestus, causing her to 
 be called to him, demanded of her whither she was 
 going in such haste. She answered that she was 
 going to the place where the Christians were assem- 
 bled to serve God. Why, said Modestus, dost thou 
 not know that the emperor hath commanded that they 
 all that come hither shall be killed ? Yes, I do, re- 
 plied she ; and therefore I go the rather, that I may be 
 martyred among the rest. And why, said he, dost 
 thou lead with thee that little child '? That he also 
 (answered she) may be partaker of the reward. I am 
 
70 
 
 RAIXOLDS ON HAGGAT. 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 loath to say that vrliich the example of this godly 
 ■woman moveth me unto, but I will only speak in 
 Latin out of the poet, Vos etenim juvencs animum geri- 
 tis muUebrem, illuque virgo viriim. But, 
 
 Secondly, Put case we were without exception in 
 this behalf; yet let them know, that are most dili- 
 gent in the outward service of the Lord, that this 
 sanctifioth none in whom there is not a faithful and an 
 obedient heart. The prophet, Isaiah i., speaketh of 
 much prayer, which yet, because it was done without 
 faith, the Lord accounted no better than abomination; 
 and Ezek. xsxiii. 31, tells us of some that would come 
 and stand before the prophet as if they would learn 
 the will of the Lord, aud yet are reproved. We see 
 that the Scribes and Pharisees, for frequenting ser- 
 mons, and using long prayers, Mat. xxiii., could not 
 be reproved ; and yet our blessed Saviour telleth us, 
 that ' except our righteousness exceed the righteous- 
 ness of them, we cannot enter into the kingdom of 
 heaven,' Mat. v. But one place, Micah vi. 4-8, may 
 serve to seal up all that I have taught. How doth the 
 Lord expostulate with his people '? ' My people, what 
 have I done unto thee, or wherein have I grieved thee ? 
 testify against me.' How we may apply all this unto 
 ourselves, consider we what God hath done for us, 
 and how hath he grieved us. Hath he not brought us 
 out of Egypt, yea, from papistry, ten thousand times 
 a viler slavery than that of Egypt ? Hath he not by 
 a mighty hand redeemed us, when in Queen Mary's 
 time many suffered banishment, and others lost their 
 
 lives ; and sent before us Moses, even our gracious 
 Queen Elizabeth, whose memory is for ever blessed ; 
 and for our preservation under her, hath raised up 
 unto us many Aarons and Miriams endued with pro- 
 phets' spirits to instruct us ? Can we be forgetful 
 what Balak of Spain devised against us, or what 
 Balaam of Kome answered him, from Shittim, under 
 Moses, whither the Moabites sent their daughters to 
 corrupt the people (a hvelj' representation of the send- 
 ing forth of the priests and Jesuits to seduce us) unto 
 Gilgal under Joshua, where (by circumcision) the 
 shame of Egypt was taken away from them ; as of late 
 one branch thereof hath been from us, by our Joshua, 
 his Majesty's proclamation against the profanation of 
 the Sabbath ; and all this that we may know the right- 
 eousness of the Lord ? With what, then, shall we 
 come before the Lord ? Shall we ofler ten thousand of 
 prayers, or ten thousand of sermons, &c. ? No ; ' he 
 hath shewed us what is good, and what he dclighteth 
 in,' more than all these, ' that we do justly, and love 
 mercy, and humble ourselves to walk with our God ;' 
 that we behave ourselves religiously, as they that are 
 endued with an holy spirit, and are heirs of life, re- 
 membering what is said, Isa. Ixvi. 2, that God ' regards 
 him that is of a contrite spirit, and that trembleth at 
 his word.' Needful it is for us to know the word of 
 God, and to use all moaus thereto ; but if we do no 
 more, we do but draw near to God with our lips, aud 
 not with our hearts. 
 
 SEKMON XV. 
 
 Then ^aith Ilaggai, If a polluted person to}ich any of these, shall it be unclean ? ^<t-c. Then ansivered Haggai, So is 
 
 this jjeople, do. — Haggai II. 14, 15, kc. 
 
 IF those two types, brought to convince the Jews of 
 error, who thought they were by their sacrifices 
 sanctified, howsoever they continued disobedient, and 
 did not build the temple as they were commanded by 
 the Lord, the former hath already taught us that the 
 outward service of God doth sanctify none, but only 
 him that hath a faithful aud obedient heart. And by 
 the latter, now further we are to learn, that whoso 
 hath not a faithful and obedient heart, he is not only 
 not sanctified by any outward service, but on the con- 
 trary, both himself and all his actions, yea, even his 
 outward service of God is impure, defiled, and detest- 
 able in the sight of God. For the word in the original, 
 which we translate a pnUulcd person, doth properly 
 signify such an one as is unclean and polluted by 
 touching of a dead corpse (the phrase being to be 
 supplied from Num. ix. 0, compared with Lev. xxii. 
 4), the law concerning whom. Num. xix. is, that 
 whatsoever such an one toucheth should be unclean, 
 as hero the priests confess. Wherein, after the 
 manner of the mysteries of faith, expressed as by 
 shadows and portraitures in a dark manner, by legal 
 
 rites and ceremonies, as heretofore hath been shewed, 
 the touching of a dead man (who came unto the state 
 of mortality by sin. Gen. iii.), doth import the com- 
 mitting of sin, which is called by the apostle a dead 
 work, Heb. vi. 1, ix. 14 ; and that ceremonial un- 
 cleanness which did exclude out of the camp. Num. 
 V. 1, doth imply that moral uncleanness which doth 
 indeed defile the man. Mat. xv. 19, 20; and that 
 none so unclean shall enter into the kingdom of 
 heaven. Rev. xxi. 27 ; and lastly, in that all by the 
 law was defiled which was touched by hand, arm, or 
 leg of any such polluted person, being all instruments 
 of action, Rom. vi. 13, implieth, that all whatsoever 
 is done by the unfaithful and disobedient, is infected 
 through the corruption of their uiibelicviug hearts, 
 Titus i. Hence, therefore, it followed that the Jews, 
 committing dead works of impenitency, security', un- 
 belief, and disobedience, by not building the temple 
 according to the Lord's command, and so being 
 defiled, all their works, together with themselves, 
 were unclean, as, ver. 15, the prophet concludoth 
 hereupon, ' So is this people, and so is this nation 
 
 458 
 
Ver. li, 15.] 
 
 SERMON XV. 
 
 71 
 
 before me,' saith the Lord; where the term, hcjorc me, 
 is significantly added, to note, that although in the 
 sight of men they were accounted holy by reason of 
 their sacrifices, yea, and themselves thought so of 
 themselves (as their predecessors did for another 
 kind of service of fasting, Isa. Iviii. 1), j-et, in the 
 sight of God, who beholds all their hearts and works 
 afar ofl', and not only those that were of greatest 
 lustre, but others also whatsoever, their holiness was 
 but hypocrisy, and themselves and all they did abo- 
 minable ; no otherwise than the Pharisees after them, 
 who did wear brass* phylacteries, and used long 
 prayers, &c. ; and yet because they were hypocrites, 
 covetous, and ambitious, they had the like judgment 
 denounced by our Saviour: Luke svi. 15, 'Ye are 
 they that justify yourselves before men ; but God 
 knows your hearts : for that which is highly esteemed 
 among men is abomination in the sight of God ;' and 
 to the same effect, the Lord concluding this sentence 
 by adding, 'and that which they oli'er here is unclean,' 
 doth seem to refute, as hj name, that wherein the 
 Jews hoped to be sanctified, and which they most 
 esteemed holy both in respect of the thing, viz., their 
 offering on the altar, Exod. xsix. 30, whereof all were 
 holy and some most holy, so that their service of God 
 in this kind was by an excellency called the service of 
 God, witness the apostle to the Hebrews and Romans, 
 and also in regard of the place where they ofl'ered them, 
 here in Jerusalem the place chosen of purpose to that 
 end, called therefore ' the holy city' in Matthew, and 
 greatly praised in sundry of the psalms for that 
 respect. Seeing, then, the people and whole nation 
 of the Jews, yea, aU then- works, even their very 
 sacrifices' offered in Jerusalem, were unclean and 
 detestable in the sight of God, because they had not 
 faithful and obedient hearts, but did neglect the 
 building of the temple commanded by the Lord, the 
 lesson hence to be gathered is plain, which in the 
 beginning' we mentioned, viz., that whosoever hath 
 not a faithful and an obedient heart, himself and all 
 his works, even his divine service of God, is impure 
 and unclean in the sight of God. This in the carnal 
 sacrifices as in the shadow doth Isaiah teach, chap. 
 Ixvi. 3, declaring, that whoso is not of a contrite 
 spirit, as only the faithful are, to tremble at God's 
 word, if he kill a bullock he was as if he slew a man, 
 &c. ; for in these words expressly noting all the 
 several sacrifices that the Jews did ofl'er, as greater 
 beasts and lesser, meat-offerings and incense, and 
 comparing them with dogs' flesh and swine's blood, 
 things forbidden by the law, nay, to the murdering of 
 a man or the blessing of an idol, which bis soul ab- 
 hors, he plainly shews how detestable the Lord holds 
 all these, where was wanting a faithful and an obedient 
 heart in them that offer the same. Also concerning 
 spiritual sacrifices of prayers, and of sermons preached 
 or heard, doth the Spirit elsewhere witness as of 
 * Qu. 'broad'?— Ed. 
 459 
 
 prayers : Prov. xxviii. 9, ' He that turneth away his 
 ear from hearing tuo law, even his prayer shall be 
 abominable ;' of sermons preached, Ps. 1., ' but unto 
 the wicked' (saith God), ' What hast thou to do to 
 take my words in thy mouth, and hatest to be re- 
 formed'? of sermons heard likewise, Ezek. xx., and 
 also Ezek. xxxiii. 31, where fu'st the elders, and then 
 the people, are reproved, because they came and sat 
 before the prophet, as if they would learn the will of 
 the Lord, and yet their hearts went after their covetous- 
 ness, and they did not that they were enjoined. Finally, 
 all the actions of the unfaithful whatsoever are cen- 
 sured by two rules of the apostle. 1. In respect of 
 the things themselves that are done, Piom. xiv. 23, 
 ' whatsoever is not of faith is sin ;' and the 2d, in 
 reg.ird to the persons that do them, Heb. xi. G, 
 ' without faith it is impossible to please God,' &c. 
 So undoubtel an axiom proved by the Scripture is this 
 which here our prophet teachetb, that the best works 
 of men are of themselves unclean in God's sight 
 without a faithful heart, &c. Whence may bo con- 
 futed an error of the papists, who, howsoever the an- 
 cient fathers, Jerome, Gregory, Prosper, and especially 
 Austin (proving the point not only by those two places 
 last alleged out of St Paul, but also by that of our 
 Saviour, Mat. vii., 'A corrupt tree cannot but bring 
 forth bad fruit,') do hold that all the works of the un- 
 regenerate, done before faith, are sin, and deserve 
 God's wrath ; yet the papists, I say, in their authen- 
 tic Council of Trent, Session vi. Can. 7, Pelagian-like, 
 stick not to pronounce, that if any man shall say that 
 all the works done before institution are to be ac- 
 counted properly sins, or do deserve the hatred and 
 wrath of God, let him be accursed. A curse hereti- 
 cally and blasphemously uttered by antichristian 
 imps, whose faces are set against heaven, and their 
 tongues walk through the earth, for all works done 
 without faith are unclean in God's sight (as here 
 Haggai teacheth us) ; but before justification, no 
 works are done with faith, for then we are justified 
 and made the sons of God when wo believe, John i. ; 
 therefore, whatsoever works are done before justifica- 
 tion, are properly unclean, and do defile ; but whatso- 
 ever is unclean, and doth defile, is properly sin, Mark 
 vii. 10, and 1 Cor. 8. Now God hateth all sin, 
 Zech. viii. 13, he being just in all his ways, Ps. cxlv. ; 
 yea, all works done before justification, are properly 
 sin, and deserve God's wrath ; nor can they be pare 
 whiles the heart, the root or fountain whence they 
 proceed, is impure and corrupt. Now the heart 
 is only purified by faith. Acts xv. 9, and all unbe- 
 lievers, even in their minds and consciences, are de- 
 filed, Titus i. 15. The papists, therefore, herein curse 
 the prophets, nay, the Lord of life, who here himself 
 spake by the ministry of his prophet. And shameless 
 is that shift which Ribeira the Jesuit maketh, writing 
 on this place, c. 7(5, first saying that the prophet 
 doth not speak of all the works of the unregenerate. 
 
KAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap II. 
 
 but only of their sacrifices ; from^the ■wbicl: gloss, if the 
 text itself did uot refute it, yet where it is plainly 
 addeJ, and all whatsoever they do, }'et St Jerome's 
 authority, which in other places he would seem to 
 esteem, should have at least occasioned him to have 
 forborne, and to have rather passed it over in silence, 
 than so to have gainsayed him and the text ; for om- 
 nia ct cuiicia qua: ar/it, saith Jerome, nam dc cnnctis 
 loquitur, pyojanantur. Nay, Jerome, uot so content in 
 general only to avouch it, applies it in particular to 
 the works of both Jews, heretics, and Gentiles, and 
 saith that whatsoever they do (not only whatsoever 
 they offer), their vows, their prayers, their charity, and 
 alms-deeds, &c., all are unclean ; for although these 
 actions seem in show to be good, and are so indeed iu 
 their own nature, yet because they are touched by 
 him that is polluted, they are unclean ; but as for us, 
 beloved, who are taught for his sake to bear re- 
 proaches, and to endure curses patiently, that we may 
 become conformable nnlo him, according to that of 
 the prophet, the rebukes of them that rebuked thee 
 are fallen on me (let us, I say), against all Pelagian 
 spirits hold constantly what here the prophet teacheth 
 us, &c., and let the princely prophet David join with 
 Haggai, in interpreting this ceremonial type of Moses, 
 where, Ps. li., having confessed sins actual, and ori- 
 ginal, ver. 7, he prayeth, ' Purge me with hyssop and 
 I shall be clean :' no way to be made clean but by 
 hyssop. Now, what that purging with hyssop meant, 
 we may understand by the ceremony. Num. xix., of the 
 red cow burned without the host, the figure of our 
 Saviour's sacrifice, as the apostle interprets it, Heb. 
 xiii., who, to sanctify us, suffered without the city. 
 And St John plainly setteth down, that which by allusion 
 only was signified in the figure, where, 1 John i. 7, ho 
 saith, that ' it is the blood of Christ that cleanseth us 
 "from all sins ;' but his blood cleanseth none but only 
 such as do believe ; for, Rom. iii. 24, 25, ' AVe ai-e 
 justified freely by grace, through the redemption that 
 is in Christ Jesus, whom God hath made a propi- 
 tiation through faith in his blood.' AVhich Peter, 
 1 Epist. i. 1, calls the sprinkling of Christ's blood, 
 whereby we are sanctified : by allusion to the cere- 
 monies, avouching the same act as plainly, that all 
 men's hearts are cleansed no otherwise than by faith. 
 Therefore, against that cursed and cursing Council of 
 Trent, we now see how Moses, David, llaggai, John, 
 Paul, and Peter do avouch that whatsoever men do, be- 
 fore [by] justification by faith in Christ's blood they be 
 cleansed, all is unclean, and so are the persons that do 
 the same ; all are sin, and deserve God's hate. And let 
 this be the first use of this doe trine, for strengthening us 
 iu the purity of our faith. A second may serve to put 
 us in mind of our duties for the bettering of our life, for 
 if all our works, without faithful and obedient hearts be 
 so detestable, that God accounts them defiled, and 
 unclean in his sight, you see how careful we should 
 be to avoid such works of sin, since howsoever otherwise 
 
 we may seem to do things pleasing unto God, yet they do 
 but defile us, and make us to be shut out of the camp, 
 even excluded out of heaven. And to stir us up here- 
 unto, we have two forcible inducements in that text, 
 1 Peter 14,* from the type or shadow where sin is com- 
 pared to a dead body ; for if we should consider with our- 
 selves how loathsome the touching is, and, which is 
 more, that we are growing thereby ourselves unto death, 
 we shall be the more moved in this behalf: and the pas- 
 tors will, I doubt not, but be stirred up by that which 
 our Saviour speaks to the angel of the church of 
 Sardis, Piev. iii. 1 2, ' I know thy works, for thou 
 bast a name that thou livest, but thou art dead ; be 
 awaked and strengthen the things that remain that 
 are ready to die, for I- have not found thy works 
 cEs-Xjisw/isi/a not full, not perfect' ; so he concludes 
 that ho was in part dead, and in the rest ready to die, 
 if he did not strengthen that that remained by re- 
 pentance for that which was decayed ; so that, except 
 the pastor's works be full, howsoever he have a name 
 that he liveth, yet he is but dead. Now know you 
 the duties of the ministers or divines : if they will ever 
 fulfil their ministry', to be patterns in word, in conver- 
 sation, in faith, in spu-it, in love, in purity, &c., to 
 attend to reading and to exhortation, to be instant in 
 season, &c. And the apostle. Col. iv. 17, command- 
 eth the Christians to say unto Archippus, ' Take heed 
 to thy ministiT, that thou hast received of the Lord, 
 that thou fulfil it.' The word crXjjio;; being compared 
 with that other, m-Xri^oiiMha, doth shew that the pastor 
 ought to fulfil every part of his ministry, else his works 
 are uot full ; and then that may be said to him that 
 was to the angel of Sardis, ' Strengthen the things that 
 are ready to die, for thou hast a name that thou livest, 
 but thou art dead.' Nay, and doth not this duty be- 
 long also to every Christian ? Hath not every one some 
 talent that he must employ in the Lord's service, and 
 not leave it to rot or rust, lapped up in a najjldn'? 
 Doth not Paul both say of himself, that ' the grace of 
 God that was in him was not iu vain,' and bids the 
 Corinthians beware, 2 Cor. vi. ' that they receive not 
 the grace of God in vain,' but that, 2 Cor. vii., they 
 ' cleanse themselves from all filthiuess, both of flesh 
 and spirit,' and grow up into full hohness in the fear 
 of God '? And doth he not, Philip, i., and Colos., pray 
 for them and exhort that they may be ' filled \Nith the 
 fruits of righteousness.' These may serve to let us 
 know, that if we serve God by halves, aud do not 
 labour to have our works to bo full, we are at least 
 half dead, aud so without speedy repentance, growing 
 unto death. Now, according as the heathen speaks 
 of virtue, ^i oculis cerncretnr, quales c.rcitarel amoves, 
 so per contrarium, if wc could consider aud sot bo- 
 fore our eyes bow loathsome a thing it were to touch 
 dead bodies, and by them to grow to death our- 
 selves, it would much affect us to ily from such dead 
 works. 
 
 * Qu. 'Ileb. ix. 14'?— En. 
 4C0 
 
Ver. 14, 15.] 
 
 SERMON XV. 
 
 73 
 
 When our Saviour, coming to raise Lazarus, was 
 about to have the stone rolled away from the door of 
 the sepulchre, his own sister loathing and fearing the 
 infection, ' Lord,' saith she, ' he stinketh now, for ho 
 hath been already four days dead.' Yet here the dead 
 body was farther off from Martha. What if the dead 
 work be nearer unto us ? When King Edward the 
 Second was, by treacherous conspiracj-, imprisoned in 
 castle of Berkeley, and intended to be made away, the 
 tormenters, to hasten his end, put him in an upper 
 chamber, and under him, in a lower room, placed dead 
 bodies, the stink whereof did so stifle and torment him, 
 that as he told one out of the window, he bad never, in 
 all his hfe, endured the like torment, as Thomas de 
 la More, one that served him, records in the story of 
 his life;-" yet these dead bodies were farther ofl" from 
 King Edward than many dead works are from many 
 of us. Clemens Alexandrinns, in his exhortatory ora- 
 tion ad gentes, reXaXes that the barbarians did use to tie 
 unto those live bodies of men that they took captive, 
 other dead bodies, that so both mi^ht rot together : a 
 cruelty which Virgil mentions to have been practised 
 by the cruel tyrant Mezentius, f .iEneid. viii. Tormcnti 
 f/eHns, Virgil might well call it, but the word avaaaosaiji 
 doth express it in Clemens, how the one did cause the 
 other to rot together. The apostle, writing to Ephesus, 
 iv. 29, forbids that Ta: Xo'yo; sa'T^hg should proceed 
 out of their mouth. We commonly translate it aiiij 
 corrupt communication, but the word pi-operly signifieth 
 that which is rotten, which, compared with the verb 
 which Clemens useth, may open more of the apostle's 
 meaning than else haply would come into our mind ; 
 which the apostle seemeth somewhat to expound, where. 
 Col. iv. G, exhorting to the contrary, he wisheth that 
 their words may be gracious, and seasoned with salt ; 
 salt, you know, being the preservative against rotten- 
 ness. And so hence we may imagine of all dead 
 works what there the apostle speaketh of one, viz. 
 foolish and filthy tallying, that they are rotten ; there- 
 fore, as Clemens speaks of those dead carcases joined 
 to living bodies, maaaogutu, they make them in whom 
 they are to rot and putrefy, so that they ought to be 
 no less loathsome unto us, than those dead bodies 
 were to King Edward, or those by the barbarians tied 
 unto their captives. And much more danger of in- 
 fection may we fear than that which ;\rartha feared in 
 a dead body four days dead ; for what if the work have 
 been four j-ears dead ? And the more should we fear these, 
 because, being spiritual, they bring unto us a far gi-eater 
 destruction than the former. Howbeit, if any have not 
 this spiritual sense of feeling, let him consider the two 
 motives following. In that the Lord pronounceth all 
 our actions, touched by the unfaithful and disobedient, 
 
 * Spo Stow's Cliron. in Edw. ii. 
 
 t Mortua qiiin etiam jungebat corpora vivis. 
 
 Componens manulmsque manus atque oribus ora, 
 Tonnenti genus, et sanie, taboque flumentes, 
 Coiiiplexii in misero, louga sic morto necabat. 
 461 
 
 to be unclean in his sight; and not only swearing, 
 lying, slandering, &c., and those that are simply evil 
 in themselves, which should teach us how we ought 
 to have in perfect detestation that which God (see- 
 ing our hearts, who must also be himself judge, and 
 revenger of all) pronounceth in his sight to be unclean : 
 a thing the more of us to bo considered, because 
 otherwise men, not seeing our faults, but looking on 
 our better actions, may haply account us very holy ; 
 na}-, many deceive themselves as the Pharisee, Luke 
 xviii., and they that justify themselves, Luke xvi., 
 thinking that they are holy when they are not. Man's 
 knowledge is defective, and often seeth not many 
 things ; nay, we ourselves many times see not all, and 
 so in that Rev. iii., to stir up the angel to this con- 
 sideration it is added, ' For the works are not full 
 before God ;' for many are accounted free from fault be- 
 fore men which yet are detestable before Hod; yea, and, 
 Eph. V. 4, the apostle we see joins with ,aupoXojyia, 
 ivr^a-ai'/'.ia, also as things unseemly, which Latin 
 philosophers account a virtue rather,* and in itself 
 we used as a thing indiiferent, yet is censured as a 
 dead work, because it is by men commonly abused. 
 And therefore in the same place, ver. 11, he addeth 
 this exhortation, that they should not be partakers 
 with the unfruitful works of darkness, but even re- 
 prove them rather, for it is a shame to speak of those 
 things that are done of them in secret ; and how men 
 flatter themselves in their sins, so they may conceal 
 them from men, Gehazi's example, 2 Kings v., may 
 sufficiently instruct us. When once the talents were 
 conveyed into a secret place, then he comes and 
 stands before his master, and all ho thought was 
 well. He bad been nowhere, Imt God saw where he 
 had been, and revealed it unto the prophet. And so 
 many, if they can, for scholars' places, &c., which 
 should be given freely, take bribes so cunningly, that 
 neither state of prince or parliament shall take hold 
 of them, they think all well and safe enough ; but yet 
 howsoever in man's sight they can cover it, in God's 
 eyes their works are abominable, and ho will discover 
 it. Wherefore good for us it is betime to begin to set 
 before our eyes that consideration which David had, 
 Ps. cxxxix., viz., that whithersoever we go, we cannot 
 hide ourselves fi'om his presence. Seneca, Epistle xi., 
 ad Lucilhim, saith that it would be a great incitement 
 to virtue and restraint from sin if we could always 
 imagine some reverend gi'ave man in our presence ; if 
 Cato were too grave, yet Laslius, supposing that a 
 gi'eat occasion to sin would be taken away, cum pecca- 
 turis testis adsit. But in Epistle xxv. he telleth us that 
 he had yet profited more, that had learned so much 
 as to reverence himself. And, indeed, if none else be 
 present with a man, yet his conscience, which is as a 
 thousand witnesses, at present ought sufficiently to 
 move a man herein ; and so it was Isocrates his 
 * Arist. Etb. lib. ii. cap. vii. et lib. iv. cap. viii. oil //iv 
 /i,laoS iliT^a'TriXoi. 
 
74 
 
 RAINOLDS ON HAGGAI. 
 
 [Chap. 11. Ver. 14, 15. 
 
 counsel, that, none should venture to do anything in 
 hope to conclude it whenas himself yet at least should 
 thereof be conscious to himself. But this witness also 
 is far too short from that which is here commended to 
 us by the prophet, that the Lord sees and censureth 
 our actions, for our consciences may for some time 
 ■wink, and many consciences are seared (as it were) 
 and past feeling. But if one will be afraid to commit 
 evil before a grave person, bow should we fear to 
 commit any in secret alone, since we arc alway in the 
 sight of God, who is the searcher of the heart, much 
 more for this, that others can be but witness only, 
 but God is judge also and avenger, as the Spirit saith 
 to the angel of Sardis, Eev. iii., that if he should not 
 be awake, he would come on him as a thief in the 
 night; the phrase taken from 1 Thess. v. 2 ; and threat- 
 ening sudden destruction, as Gehazi leprous, and those 
 that were unclean in the shadow shut out of the city, 
 and those that are unclean in truth not to enter into 
 heaven. Rev. xxi. Therefore, since it is so that God 
 sees and judges all our actions, let us do as David 
 did, who setteth also before his eyes that other con- 
 sideration, Ps. Isii. 12, that the Lord recompenseth 
 every man according to his works. 
 
 "When he had defiled himself with adultery and 
 murder, and was once made sensible of it, he sought 
 to the Lord to be cleansed, and after, still endeavoui-ed 
 to keep himself clean ; but if we be not both careful 
 of repentance for the present, and after, still to keep 
 
 ourselves clean for the time to come, what may we 
 expect but what is threatened, Prov. xv., that the 
 sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord ? 
 Now, Eccles. iv. 17 wisheth us to look to our feet, 
 the instruments of motion first,* to have a careful 
 regard to all our carriage, even in these things 
 whereby we are to be instructed (when we enter into 
 the house of God), and to be nearer to hear, that is, 
 to obey (as the same word is used likewise, 1 Sam. 
 XV. 22, to obey is better than sacrifice), than to offer 
 the sacrifice of fools, as otherwise we shall if we only 
 outwardly hear or frequent praj'crs, &c. The sum of 
 all is comprised in the covenant of God with Abraham, 
 Gen. xvii. 1, Walk before me and be upright; and 
 this (beloved) is the covenant that is made with us 
 who are by faith in Christ the sons of Abraham, that 
 we being redeemed out of the church from all our 
 enemies, should serve him in holiness and righteous- 
 ness all the days of our life before him, Luke i. 15. 
 Let us, therefore, know that, having our consciences 
 by the blood of Christ purged from dead works to 
 serve the living God, Heb. is. 14, we must labour 
 to have grace so alway to serve him that we may 
 please him with reverence and fear, Heb. sii. ; that we 
 may finally be with those that serve him day and 
 night in bis temple, as it is, Eev. sv. 
 
 * Isocrat. Orat. ad Demon, wutej di to. aai/^aTO. ix tu> 
 ■/.ivriaiuv x^hirai, cZtu xat ra ^'^Jj. Arist. Eth., lib. iv. 
 c. viii. 
 
 END OF KAIN0LD3 ON HAU5AI. 
 
 402 
 
EDINBCEGH 
 PKINTED BY JOHN GKEIQ AND SON, 
 OLD PHYSIC GAEDENS. 
 
DATE DUE 
 
 
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