represent, we offer to God. Calvin alone, hath said enough, Non possumus, Except we be assisted with outward things, we cannot fix ourselves upon God. Therefore is it part of the malediction here, that they shall be sine sacrificio, without sacrifice; so is it also in inferior helps, sine ephod, they shall be without an ephod. The ephod amongst the Jews, was a garment, which did not only distinguish times, (for it was worn only in time of divine service) but, even in time of divine service, it distinguished persons too. For we have a pontifical ephod, peculiar only to the high priest; and we have a Levitical ephod, belonging to all the Levites; Samuel ministered before the Lord, being a child, girded with a linen ephod. And we have a common ephod, which any man that assisted in the service of God might wear; that linen ephod, which David put on, in that procession, when he danced before the ark". But all these ephods were bound under certain laws, to be worn by such men, and at such times. Christ's garment was not divided; nay, the soldiers were not divided about it, but agreed in one way; and shall we, the body of Christ, be divided about the garment, that is, vary in the garment, by denying a conformity to that decency which is prescribed? When Christ divested, or suppressed the majesty of his outward appearance, at his resurrection, Mary Magdalen took him but for a gardener. Ecclesiastical persons in secular habits, lose their respect. Though the very habit be but a ceremony, yet the distinction of habits is rooted in nature, and in morality; and when the particular habit is enjoined by lawful authority, obedience is rooted in nature, and in morality too. In a watch, the string moves nothing, but yet it conserves the regularity of the motion of all. Ritual, and ceremonial things move not God, but they exalt that devotion, and they conserve that order, which does move him. Therefore is it also made a part of the commination, that they shall be sine ephod, without these outward ritual, and ceremonial solemnities of a church; first, without sacrifices, which are more substantial and essential parts of religion, (as we consider religion to be the outward worship of 37 Exod. xxvi. 6. 38] Sam. ii. 18. 40 John xx. 15. God,) and then, without ephod, without those other assistances, which, though they be not of God's revenue, yet they are of his subsidies, and though they be not the soul, yet are the breath of religion. And so also is it of things of a more inferior nature than sacrifice or ephod, that is of image and teraphim, which is our next, and last consideration. Both these words, (that which is translated, and called image, and that which is not translated, but kept in the original word, teraphim) have sometimes a good, sometimes a bad sense in the Scriptures. In the first, image, there is no difficulty; good and bad significations of that word, are obvious everywhere. And for the other, though when Rachel stole her father's teraphim", (images) though when the king of Babylon consulted with teraphim", (images) the word teraphim have an ill sense, yet, when Michal, David's wife, put an image into his bed, to elude the fury of Saul", there the word hath no ill sense. Accept the words in an idolatrous sense, yet, because they fall under the commination, and that God threatens it, as a part of their calamity, that they should be without their idols, it hath been, not inconveniently, argued from this place, that even a religion mixed with some idolatry, and superstition, is better than none, as in civil government a tyranny is better than an anarchy. And therefore we must not bring the same indisposition, the same disaffection towards a person misled, and soured with some leaven of idolatry, as towards a person possessed with atheism. And yet, how ordinarily we see zealous men start, and affected, and troubled at the presence of a papist, and never moved, never forbear the society and conversation of an atheist which is an argument too evident, that we consider ourselves more than God, and that peace which the papist endangers, more than the atheist, (which is, the peace of the state, and a quiet enjoying our ease) above the glory of God, which the atheist wounds, and violates more than the papist; the papist withdraws some of the glory of God, in ascribing it to the saints, to themselves, and their own merits, but the atheist leaves no God to be glorified. And this use we have of these words, images, and teraphim, if they should have an ill sense in this place, and signify idols. 41 Gen. xxxi. 19. 42 Ezek. xxi. 21. 43 1 Sam. xix. 13. But St. Hierome, and others with him, take these words, in a good sense; to be the cherubim, and palms, and such other representations, as God himself had ordained in their temple; and that the commination falls upon this, that in some cases, it may be some want, to be without some pictures in the church. So far as they may conduce to a reverend adoring of the place, so far as they may conduce to a familiar instructing of unlettered people, it may be a loss to lack them. For, so much Calvin, out of his religious wisdom, is content to acknowledge, Fateor, ut res se habet hodie", &c. I confess, as the case stands now, (says he, speaking of the beginning of the Reformation) there are many that could not be without those books, (as he calls those pictures) because then they had no other way of instruction; but, that that might be supplied, if those things which were delivered in picture, to their eyes, were delivered in sermons to their ears. And this is true, that where there is a frequent preaching, there is no necessity of pictures; but will not every man add this, that if the true use of pictures be preached unto them, there is no danger of an abuse; and so, as remembrancers of that which hath been taught in the pulpit, they may be retained; and that was one office of the Holy Ghost himself, that he should bring to their remembrance those things, which had been formerly taught them. And since, by being taught the right use of these pictures, in our preaching, no man amongst us is any more inclined, or endangered to worship a picture in a wall or window of the church, than if he saw it in a gallery, were it only for a reverent adorning of the place, they may be retained here, as they are in the greatest part of the reformed church, and in all that, is properly Protestant. And though the injunctions of our church", declare the sense of those times, concerning images, yet they are wisely and godly conceived; for the second is, that they shall not extol images, (which is not, that they shall not set them up) but, (as it followeth) they shall declare the abuse thereof. And wheh in the twenty-third injunction, it is said, that they shall utterly extinct, and destroy, (amongst other things) pictures, yet it is limited to such things, and such pictures, as are monuments of 44 Institut. i. 11. § 7. VOL. V. 451 Eliz. 1559. N feigned miracles; and that injunction reaches as well to pictures in private houses, as in churches, and forbids nothing in the church, that might be retained in the house. For those pernicious errors, which the Roman church hath multiplied in this point, not only to make images of men, which never were, but to make those images of men, very men, to make their images speak, and move, and weep, and bleed; to make images of God who was never seen, and to make those images of God, very gods; to make their images do daily miracles; to transfer the honour due to God, to the image, and then to encumber themselves with such ridiculous riddles, and scornful distinctions, as they do, for justifying unjustifiable, unexcusable, uncolourable enormities, Væ idololatris, woe to such advancers of images, as would throw down Christ, rather than his image: but Væ iconoclastis too, woe to such peremptory abhorrers of pictures, and to such uncharitable condemners of all those who admit any use of them, as had rather throw down a church, than let a picture stand. Laying hold upon St. Hierome's exposition, that falls within the va, the commination of this text, to be without those sacrifices, those ephods, those images, as they are outward helps of devotion. And, laying hold, not upon St. Hierome, but upon Christ himself, who is the God of love, and peace, and unity, yet falls under a heavy, and insupportable va, to violate the peace of the church, for things which concern it not fundamentally. Problematical things are our silver, but fundamental, our gold; problematical our sweat, but fundamental our blood. If our adversaries would be bought in, with our silver, with our sweat, we should not be difficult in meeting them half way, in things, in their nature, indifferent. But if we must pay our gold, our blood, our fundamental points of religion, for their friendship, a fortune, a liberty, a wife, a child, a father, a friend, a master, a neighbour, a benefactor, a kingdom, a church, a world, is not worth a drachm of this gold, a drop of this blood. Neither will that man, who is truly rooted in this foundation, redeem an impoverishing, an imprisoning, a disinheriting, a confining, an excommunicating, a deposing, with a drachm of this gold, with a drop of this blood, the fundamental articles of our religion. Blessed be that God, who, as he is without change or colour of change, hath kept us without change, or colour of change, in all our foundations; and he in his time bring our adversaries to such a moderation as becomes them, who do truly desire, that the church may be truly Catholic, one flock, in one fold, under one Shepherd, though not all of one colour, of one practice in all outward and disciplinarian points. Amen. SERMON CXXIII. A SERMON PREACHED IN ST. PAUL'S IN THE EVENING, NOVEMBER 23, 1628. PROVERBS XIV. 31. He that oppresseth the poor, reproacheth his Maker, but he that honoureth him, hath mercy on the poor. Part of the first Lesson, for that Evening Prayer. THESE are such words, as if we were to consider the words only, might make a grammar lecture, and a logic lecture, and a rhetoric and ethic, a philosophy lecture too; and of these four elements might a better sermon than you are like to hear now, be well made. Indeed they are words of a large, of an extensive comprehension. And because all the words of the Word of God, are, in a great measure, so, that invites me to stop a little, as upon a short first part before the rest, or as upon a long entry into the rest, to consider, not only the powerfulness of the matter, but the sweetness and elegancy of the words of the Word of God in general, before I descend to the particular words of this text, He that oppresseth the poor, &c. We may justly accommodate those words of Moses, to God the Father, What God is there in heaven, or in earth, that can do according to thy works1? And those words of Jeremy, to God the Son, Behold, and see, if there be any sorrow, like unto my 1 Deut. iii. 24. |