VePv. 2.] SEKMONS UPON HEBREWS XI. 387
thon. John Baptist's bead in a cliarirer is an ordinary dish at our meals. Wlien men's hearts are warm with wine and good cheer, then the children of God are brought in bke Samson, to make sport for the Philistines. When thev are full, then they call for a holy person, upon whom they may vent their malice, as the Babylonians called for an holy song : Ps. cxxxvii. 3, ' Sing us one of the songs of Zion.'
Use 3. To press you to this active faith. There is great reason for it upon these grounds.
1. Because tbere are so many censures abroad. In times of division men take a liberty to blast opposite parties. ISTow shine forth in the lustre of an holy conversation, that envy may find nothing in you : Neh. V. 9, ' Ought ye not to walk in tbe fear of our God, because of the reproach of tbe heathen our enemies ? ' Should not we be of more strict and holy conversations, that we may silence censures and re- proachers? Well-doing is tbe best confutation of slanders : 1 Peter ii. 12, ' Having your conversation honest among the gentiles ; that whereas they speak against you as evil-doers, they may, by your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation.' The apology is soon diffused, though not by your own mouth ; wicked men become our compurgators. Words are apt to beget strife, and are more liable to suspicion : by a good life you approve yourselves to their con- sciences. Eevengeful replies lose their majesty. When John's disciples came to Christ to know whether he were the Messiah or no, saith our Saviour, Mat. xi. 4, ' Go tell John the things you see and hear.' Christ doth not plead for himself, but shows his works. So this will be the best confutation, those real apologies are best ; let the world see what is in us by the strictness and holiness of our lives and conversations.
2. Because there are so few good works abroad. Man is no further esteemed than he is useful. Many of the heathens were canonised for their usefulness. There is no such way to keep your memory savoury in the church as by public usefulness. For hereby a christian doth not only provide for present esteem, but for future. These elders in the text live in the world to this day. Every age should yield some honourable instances of the efficacy of faith : how few hath Christ in this age whose memory will be fresh and savoury in the church of God ? God hath still his worthies. Transmit a good example to posterity ; you may live and do good hereby after you are dead, 'Who being dead, yet speaketh,' Heb xi. 4; as Elias lived again in John Baptist, ' who came in the spirit and power of Elias.' Luk^ i. 17. Look, as a wicked man lives after he is dead in his evil example, and his sin is perpetuated, as Jeroboam did in the lives of the wicked kings, who walked in his way ; so do you live in some pious monument of your faithfulness to God. I have observed why most good works have been done by superstitious men, who had been men of infamous life, that they may retrieve the wickedness of their life by some acts of charity. But good men do few public works, partly because usually God's people are humbled with wants and poverty, and so have not such advantage in regard of worldly concernments. Or else they do it in a more secret way, and retail their charity out in secret by several parcels ; as good housekeepers are not prodigal in feasting. Or else, that they may abhor the way of doing good only at their death, when they can keep their
388 SERMONS fl'ON HKBKEWS XI. [SeR. VI I.
wealth no lonj^ei-. A\\ii-l(lly men are like the mice, which, they say, feed iuthe golden mines; tliey eat the ore, hut do not deliver it up again till they die, and are cut asunder. It is said of wicked men, ' their hellies are filled with hid treasure,' and when they die they leave their suhstance to their children, Ps. xvii. 14 ; hut the children of God do irood in their lives.
SERMON VII.
Through faith we understand that the loorlds were framed hy the icord of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things lohich do ajypear. — Heb. xi. 3.
In these words the apostle heginneth the history of faith, and therefore goeth so high as God's ancient work of creation. His drift is to prove that faith satisfieth itself in the word of God, though nothing be seen ; and he proveth it in the first instance and exercise of faith that ever was in the world — the creation.
In the words you may observe — (1.) The doctrine of the creation laid down ; (2.) The means whereby we come to the understanding of it.
1. The doctrine of the creation is delivered in all the necessary cir- cumstances of it.
[1.] The matter framed — rov'i alwva^, the ages, that is, the world which hath endured so many ages ; the essence and duration of a thing being so near akin, they are often taken for one another : Eph. ii. 2, * Wherein in time past ye walked, Kar alwva, according to the course of this world : ' which is necessary to note against the Socinians, who to evade that testimony for the Godhead of Christ: ' Heb. i. 2, ' By whom also he made the worlds,' understand it of the ages, and the collection of the church in all times.