of reconciliation, which thou hast instituted in thy church, we may have life, and life more abundantly, life of grace here, and life of glory there, in that kingdom, which thy Son, our Saviour Christ Jesus hath purchased for us, with the inestimable price of his incorruptible blood. Amen.

SERMON CXXVI.

PREACHED at st. DUNSTAN'S, APRIL 11, 1624.
The first Sermon in that Church, as Vicar thereof.

DEUTERONOMY XXV. 5.

If brethren dwell together, and one of them die, and have no child, the wife of the dead shall not marry without, unto a stranger: her husband's brother shall go in unto her, and take her to him to wife, and perform the duty of an husband's brother unto her.

FROM the beginning God intimated a detestation, a dislike of singularity; of being alone. The first time that God himself is named in the Bible, in the first verse of Genesis, he is named plurally, Creavit Dii, Gods, Gods in the plural, created heaven and earth. God, which is but one, would not appear, nor be presented so alone, but that he would also manifest more persons. As the Creator was not singular, so neither were the creatures; first, he created heaven and earth; both together; which were to be the general parents, and out of which were to be produced all other creatures; and then, he made all those other creatures plurally too; Male, and female created he them; and when he came to make him, for whose sake, (next to his own glory) he made the whole world, Adam, he left not Adam alone, but joined an Eve to him; now, when they were married, we know, but we know not when they were divorced; we hear when Eve was made, but not when she died; the husband's death is recorded at last, the wife's is not at all. So much detestation hath God himself, and so little memory would he have kept of any singularity, of being alone. The union of Christ to the whole church is not

expressed by any metaphor, by any figure, so oft in the Scripture, as by this of marriage: and there is in that union with Christ to the whole church, neither husband, nor wife can ever die; Christ is immortal as he is himself, and immortal, as he is the head of the church, the husband of that wife: for that wife, the church is immortal too; for as a prince is the same prince, when he fights a battle, and when he triumphs after the victory: so the Militant, and the Triumphant church is the same church. There can be no widower, there can be no dowager, in that case; he cannot, she cannot die. But then this metaphor, this spiritual marriage, holds not only between Christ and the whole church, in which case there can be no widow, but in the union between Christ's particular ministers, and particular churches; and there, in that case, the husband of that wife may die; the present minister may die, and so that church be a widow; and in that case, and for provision of such widows, we consider the accommodation of this law. If brethren dwell together, and one of them die, and have no child, the wife of the dead shall not marry without, unto a stranger, &c.

This law was but a permissive law; rather a dispensation, than a law as the permitting of usury to be taken of strangers, and the permitting of divorces in so many cases, were. At most it was but a judicial law, and therefore lays no obligation, upon any other nation, than them, to whom it was given, the Jews. And therefore we inquire not the reasons of that law, (the reasons were determined in that people) we examine not the conveniences of the law; (the conveniences were determined in those times) we lay hold only upon the typic signification, and appliableness of the law, as that secular marriage there spoken of, may be appliable to this spiritual marriage, the marriage of the minister to the church: If brethren dwell together, &c.

From these words then, we shall make our approaches, and application, to the present occasion, by these steps; first, there is a marriage, in the case. The taking, and leaving of a church, is not an indifferent, an arbitrary thing; it is a marriage, and marriage implies, honour: it is an honourable estate, and that implies charge, it is a burdensome state; there is honos, and onus, honour, and labour, in marriage; you must be content to afford

the honour, we must be content to endure the labour.

And so

in that point, as our incumbency upon a church, is our marriage to that church, we shall as far, as the occasion admits, see what marriage includes, and what it excludes; what it requires, what it forbids. It is a marriage, and a marriage after the death of another: If one die, says the text; howsoever the Roman church in the exercise of their tyranny, have forbidden churchmen to marry, then when they have orders, and forbidden orders to be given to any, who have formerly been married, if they married widows, God is pleased here, to afford us, some intimation, some adumbration, a typical and exemplar knowledge of the lawfulness of such marriages, he marries after the death of a former husband; and then farther, a brother marries the wife of his deceased brother; now into the reasons of the law, literally given, and literally accepted, we look not; it is enough, that God hath a care of the preservation of names and families and inheritances in those distinctions, and in those tribes, where he laid them then; but for the accommodation of the law to our present application, it must be a brother, a spiritual brother, a professor of the same faith, that succeeds in this marriage, in this possession, and this government of that widow church. It must be a brother, and frater cohabitans, says our text, a brother that dwelt together, with the former husband; he must be of the same household of the faithful, as well as profess the same faith; he must dwell in the house of God, not separate himself, or encourage others to do so, for matter of ceremonies, and discipline; idolaters must not, separatists must not be admitted to these marriages, to these widow churches. And then it is a surrendering to a brother dead without children: in this spiritual procreation of children, we all die without children of our own; though by our labours, when God blesses them, you become children, yet you are God's children, not ours; we nurse you by his word, but his Spirit begets you by the same word; we must not challenge to us, that which God only can do. And then being thus married to this widow, taking the charge of this church, he must, says our text, perform the duty of a husband's brother. He must, it is a personal service, not to be done always by proxy, and delegates; he must; and he must perform; not begin well,

VOL. V.

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and not persist, commence and not consummate, but perform the work; and perform the work, as it is a duty; it is a mere mercy in God, to send us to you, but it is a duty in us, to do that which we are sent for, by his word, and his sacraments, to establish you in his holy obedience, and his rich, and honourable service. And then our duty consists in both these, that we behave ourselves, as your husband, which implies a power, an authority; but a power and authority rooted in love, and exercised with love; and then that we do all as brothers to the former husband, that as one intentation of this law was, that inheritances, and temporal proprieties might be preserved, so our care might be through predecessor, and successor, and all, that all rights might be preserved to all men, that nothing not due, or due only in rigour, be extorted from the people, nothing that is in truth, or in equity due, be withheld from the minister; but that the true right of people, and pastor, and patron be preserved, to the preservation of love, and peace, and good opinion of one another.

First then, that which we take upon us, is a marriage. Amongst the Jews, it was almost an ignominious, an infamous thing, to die unmarried, at least to die without children, being married. Amongst the Gentiles it was so too, all well-governed states ever enlarged themselves, in giving places of command and profit, to married men. Indeed such men are most properly said to keep this world in reparations, that provide a succession of children; and for the next world, though all that are born into this world, do not enter into the number of God's saints, in heaven, yet the saints of heaven can be made out of no other materials, but men born into this world. Every stone in the quarry is not sure to be employed in the building of the church, but the church must be built out of those stones; and therefore they keep this world, they keep heaven itself in reparation, that marry in the fear of God, and in the same fear bring up the children of such a marriage. But I press not this too literally, nor over persuasively, that every man is bound to marry; God is no accepter of persons, nor of conditions. But being to use these words in their figurative application, I say, every man is bound to marry himself to a profession, to a calling: God hath brought him from being nothing, by creating him, but he resolves himself into

nothing again, if he take no calling upon him. In our baptism we make our contract with God, that we will believe all those articles there recited; there is our contract with him; and then, pursuing this contract, in the other sacrament, when we take his body and his blood, we are married to him. So at the same time, at our baptism, we make a contract in the presence of God, and his congregation, with the world; that we will forsake the covetous desires of the world, that is, the covetous proprieting of all things to ourselves, the covetous living only for ourselves, there is our contract with the world, that we will mutually assist, and serve our brethren in the world; and then, when we take particular callings, by which we are enabled to perform that former contract, then we are married to the world; so every man is duly contracted to the world, in baptism, and lawfully married to the world in accepting a profession. And so this service of ours to the church is our marriage.

Now in a matrimonial state, there is onus and honos, a burden to be borne, an honour to be received. The burden of the sins of the whole world, was a burden only for Christ's shoulders; but the sins of this parish, will lie upon my shoulders, if I be silent, or if I be indulgent, and denounce not God's judgment upon those sins. It will be a burden to us, if we do not, and God knows it is a burden to us, when we do denounce those judgments. Esay felt, and groaned under this burden, when he cried Onus Babylonis, onus Moab, and onus Damasci, O the burden of Babylon, and the burden of Damascus, and so the other prophets groan often under this burden, in contemplation of other places: it burdened, it troubled, it grieved the holy prophets of God, that they must denounce God's judgments, though upon God's enemies. We read of a compassionate general, that looking upon his great army, from a hill, fell into a bitter weeping, upon this consideration, that in fifty or sixty years hence, there will not be a man of these that fight now, alive upon the earth. What sea could furnish mine eyes with tears enough, to pour out, if I should think, that of all this congregation, which looks me in the face now, I should not meet one, at the resurrection, at the right hand of God! And for so much as concerns me, it is all one, if none of you be saved, as if none