venisti tu, hath God manifested to thee the truth of his Gospel? Bless thou the Lord, praise him and magnify him for ever, whose day-spring from on high hath visited thee, and left so many nations in darkness, who shall never hear of Christ, till they hear himself, nor hear other voice from him then, than the ite maledicti; pity them that have not this honey, and confess for thyself, that though thou have it, thou hast but found it; couldst thou bespeak Christian parents beforehand, and say, I will be born of such parents, as shall give me a title to the covenant, to baptism? Or couldst thou procure sureties, that should bind themselves for thee, at the entering into the covenant in baptism? Thou foundest thyself in the Christian church, and thou foundest means of salvation there; thou broughtest none hither, thou broughtest none here; the title of St. Andrew, the first of the apostles that came to Christ, was but that, Invenimus Messiam, We have found the Messias. It is only Christ himself that says of himself, Comedi mel meum, I have eat my honey", his own honey. We have no grace, no Gospel of our own, we find it here.

But since thou hast found it, Comede, Eat it; do not drink the cup of Babylon, lest thou drink the cup of God's wrath too: but make this honey (Christ's true religion) thy meat; digest that, assimilate that, incorporate that: and let Christ himself, and his merit, be as thy soul; and let the clear and outward profession of his truth, religion, be as thy body: if thou give away that body, (be flattered out of thy religion, or threatened out of thy religion) if thou sell this body, (be bought and bribed out of thy religion) if thou lend this body, (discontinue thy religion for a year or two, to see how things will fall out) if thou have no body, thou shalt have no resurrection; and the clear and undisguised profession of the truth, is the body.

Eat therefore this honey ad sufficientiam; so much as is enough. To believe implicitly as the church believes, and know nothing, is not enough; know thy foundations, and who laid them; other foundations can no man lay, than are laid, Christ Jesus; neither can other men lay those foundations otherwise than they are laid by the apostles, but eat ad sufficientiam tuam,

41 Cant. v. 1.

that which is enough for thee, for so much knowledge is not required in thee in those things, as in them, whose profession it is to teach them; be content to leave a room still for the apostle's Emulamini charismata meliora, Desire better gifts; and ever think it a title of dignity which the angel gave Daniel, to be vir desideriorum; to have still some farther object of thy desires. Do not think thou wantest all, because thou hast not all; for at the great last day, we shall see more plead catechisms for their salvation, than the great volumes of controversies, more plead their pockets, than their libraries. If St. Paul, so great an argosy, held no more but Christum crucifixum, what can thy pinnace hold? Let humility be thy ballast, and necessary knowledge thy freight for there is an over-fulness of knowledge, which forces a vomit; a vomit of opprobrious and contumelious speeches, a belching and spitting of the name of heretic and schismatic, and a loss of charity for matters that are not of faith; and from this vomiting comes emptiness, the more disputing, the less believing but Saturasti nos benignitate tua, Domine, Thou hast satisfied us early with thy mercy", thou gavest us Christianity early, and thou gavest us the Reformation early and therefore since in thee we have found this honey, let us so eat it, and so hold it, That the land do not vomit her inhabitants, nor spew us out, as it spewed out the nations that were before us, but that our days may be long in this land, which the Lord our God hath given us, and that with the ancient of days, we may have a day without any night in that land, which his Son our Saviour hath purchased for us with the inestimable price of his incorruptible blood. To which glorious Son of God, &c.

42 Psalm xc. 14.

43 Levit. xviii. 25.

262

SERMON LXXI.

[At the Hague, December 19, 1619, I preached upon this text. Since, in my sickness at Abrey-hatch, in Essex, 1630, revising my short notes of that sermon, I digested them into these two.]

MATTHEW iv. 18, 19, 20.

And Jesus walking by the Sea of Galilee, saw two brethren, Simon called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea, (for they were fishers.) And he saith unto them, Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men; and they straightway left their nets, and followed him.

SOLOMON presenting our Saviour Christ, in the name and person of wisdom, in the Book of Proverbs, puts, by instinct of the Holy Ghost, these words into his mouth, Deliciæ meæ esse cum filiis hominum, Christ's delight is to be with the children of men'; and in satisfaction of that delight, he says in the same verse, in the person of Christ, That he rejoiced to be in the habitable parts of the earth (that is, where he might converse with men) Ludens in orbe terrarum (so the Vulgate reads it) and so our former translation had it, I took my solace in the compass of the earth. But since Christ's adversary Satan does so too, (Satan came from compassing the earth to and fro, and from walking in it';) since the Scribes and Pharisees do more than so, They compass land and sea, to make one of their own profession, the mercy of Christ is not less active, not less industrious than the malice of his adversaries, he preaches in populous cities, he preaches in the desert wilderness, he preaches in the tempestuous sea and as his power shall collect the several dusts, and atoms, and elements of our scattered bodies at the Resurrection, as materials, members of his triumphant church; so he collects the materials, the living stone, and timber, for his militant church, from all places, from cities, from deserts, and here in this text, from the sea, (Jesus walking by the sea, &c.)

In these words we shall only pursue a twofold consideration of 2 Job i. 7.

1 Prov. iii. 30,

the persons whom Christ called here to his apostleship, Peter and Andrew; what their present, what their future function was, what they were, what they were to be; they were fishermen, they were to be fishers of men. But from these two considerations of these persons, arise many circumstances, in and about their calling; and their preferment for their cheerful following. For first, in the first, we shall survey the place, the sea of Galilee; and their education and conversation upon that sea, by which they were naturally less fit for this church-service. At this sea he found them casting their nets; of which act of theirs, there is an emphatical reason expressed in the text, For they were fishers, which intimates both these notes, that they did it because they were fishers; it became them, it behoved them, it concerned them to follow their trade; and then they did it as they were fishers, if they had not been fishers they would not have done it, they might not have usurped upon another's calling; (They cast their nets into the sea, for they were fishers.) And then, in a nearer consideration of these persons, we find that they were two that were called; Christ provided at first against singularity, he called not one alone; and then they were two brethren, persons likely to agree; he provided at first against schism; and then, they were two such as were nothing of kin to him, (whereas the second pair of brethren, whom he called, James and John) were his kinsmen) he provided at first, against partiality, and that kind of simony, which prefers for affection. These men, thus conditioned naturally, thus disposed at this place, and at this time, our blessed Saviour calls; and then we note their readiness, they obeyed the call, they did all they were bid, they were bid follow, and they followed, and followed presently; and they did somewhat more than seems expressly to have been required, for, they left their nets, and followed him. And all these substantial circumstances invest our first part, these persons in their first estate. For those that belong to the second part, their preferment upon this obedience, (Follow me, and I will make fishers of men) it would be an impertinent thing, to open them now, because I do easily foresee, that this day we shall not come to that part.

In our first part, the consideration of these persons then, though in this text Peter be first named, yet we are to note, that this was

not the first time of their meeting; when Christ and they met first, which was, when John Baptist made that declaration upon Christ's walking by him, Behold the Lamb of God, Peter was not the first that applied himself to Christ, nor that was invited by Christ's presenting himself to him, to do it; Peter was not there; Peter was not the second; for, Andrew, and another, who were then John Baptist's disciples, and saw Christ declared by him, were presently affected with a desire to follow Christ, and to converse with him, and to that purpose press him with that question, Magister, ubi habitas? They profess that they had chosen him for their master, and they desire to know where he dwelt, that they might wait upon him, and receive their instructions from him. And in Andrew's thus early applying himself to Christ, we are also to note, both the fecundity of true religion; for, as soon as he had found Christ, he sought his brother Peter, Et duxit ad Jesum, he made his brother as happy as himself, he led him to Jesus; (and that other disciple, which came to Christ as soon as Andrew did, yet because he is not noted to have brought any others but himself, is not named in the Gospel) and we are to observe also, the unsearchable wisdom of God in his proceedings, that he would have Peter, whom he had purposed to be his principal apostle, to be led to him by another, of inferior dignity, in his determination. And therefore Conversus concerte, think not thyself well enough preached unto, except thou find a desire, that thy life and conversation may preach to others, and Edoctus disce, think not that thou knowest anything, except thou desire to learn more; neither grudge to learn of him, whom thou thinkest less learned than thyself; the blessing is in God's calling, and ordinance, not in the good parts of the man; Andrew drew Peter, the lesser in God's purpose for the building of the church, brought in the greater. Therefore doth the church celebrate the memory of St. Andrew, first of any saint in the year; and after they had been altogether united in that one festival of All Saints, St. Andrew is the first that hath a particular day. He was Primogenitus Testamenti Novi, the first Christian, the first begotten of the New Testament; for, John Baptist, who may seem to have the birthright before him, had his conception in the Old Testa