A century of sermons upon several remarkable subjects preached by the Right Reverend Father in God, John Hacket, late Lord Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry ; published by Thomas Plume ...

THE FIRST SERMON UPON ENOCH. (Book 1)

GEN. V. 24.

And Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him.

DAys appointed for Repentance and Humiliation (you know these to be of that institution) but those are times to do, and not to say; therefore I have read a Text unto you rather of Deeds than Sayings; an active Example, and not a verbal Exhortation. And it is an Example of no mean pitch, you will like it the better for that, one Star differs from another in glory, and one Saint differs from another in sanctity and perfection. There were Pillars in Solomons Tem∣ple, and golden Chapiters on the top of the Pillars; so the Patriarchs of old, the Apostles in the Christian Ages were Pillars of the Church, all of them Pillars: but such as bore the chief praise, for using the gifts of grace with all advantage to Gods glory, these are the golden Chapiters upon the tops of the Pillars. I will promise you to make it good by that which I shall say anon, that I have propounded unto you one of the golden Crowns upon the top of the Pillars, as heavenly and as happy a president as can be found out of a meer man; as compleat a Pattern as can be chosen out of all the Sons of Adam; and who would not write by the best Copy?

In the most ancient Epistle of Clemens the Roman, written to the Corinthians, late∣ly made publick to the world out of the Princely store-house of this Kingdom, that holy Father moves the Corinthians with this extimulation, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉,* 1.1 Let us look stedfastly towards them who have perfectly ministred in holy service to the excellent glory of God. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, not to the Catalogue of Saints in the middle Region, but to them that walked highest above this world. And in the very next words following, Ecce homo! behold the man of his choice to whom he gives precedency above all others, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, let us take out Enoch for our Lesson, that is his Text Letter upon which he flourisheth; Enoch is his Antesignanus, his Standard-bearer, that leads Noah, and Abraham, and many others after him; and the same that he offers to the Corinthians I commend to you. Such a Patriarch that the Holy Ghost hath made a great difference between him and other men: For it is the method of the Scripture to record the lives and deaths of the Saints, but upon this Person the stile alters; he was a priviledged man from death, which is the common condition of all that are born of woman; and Moses speaks of his double life, he could not speak of his death, his life of grace, and his life of glory. Ambulavit cum Deo, or coram Deo, he walked with God, that is the Summary Collection, how he lived the life of grace: And Non apparuit coram hominibus; He was not, for God took him; there is the Miracle

how he was wrapt up into glory. In the dividing of the parts I will put no more upon my text than it was made to bear, and two Points I am sure, upon which only I will insist, are the very bowels of it; First, the Integrity of Enoch; Secondly, his Immortality. First, how uncorrupt he was in his ways, and Enoch walked with God; Secondly, that he suffered no corruption in the body, He was not, for God took him. In the one member is how he used this world; the other how he enjoy'd a better: The one of faith, the other of fruition: The one for our imitation, the other for our consolation. And first, your patient attention how uncorrupt he was in his ways, And Enoch walked with God.

In a good Picture every Limb, nay, every shadow of it is worthy to be looked upon, and, in the story of such a Patriarch as Enoch was, every word that breaths upon his name is sweet and memorable. Now in holy Scripture, or in those books which are contiguous to holy Scripture, four things are remembred of him, which will make him better understood in both parts of this Verse. St. Jude in the four∣teenth verse of his Epistle sets two marks upon him, first, in his Genealogy, he was the seventh from Adam; Secondly, in his divine knowledge, he Prophesied. The Son of Syrach also in his rehearsal of famous men hath given him two additions more, the one, that his vertue was most communicable, He was an example of repentance to all Generations, Eccl. xliv. 16. The other, that his vertue was most unparallel'd, or inimitable, Ʋpon the earth was no man created like Enoch, Chap. xlix. 14. I will dispatch these with a running hand. First, to be the seventh from Adam, what if that was no more than to be the fourth, or fifth, or any other number? For it is a general Rule, there is no prerogative to be born after the flesh; But God rested on the seventh day from all the work which he had made, and God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it, be∣cause that in it he had rested from all his work; therefore some Writers must needs fall upon this observation, as indeed divers have noted it▪ that Enoch the man of the seventh Generation was taken away to rest with God, which bids us la∣bour in the works of mercy and repentance all the six days of this life, and after those days, like Enoch the seventh from Adam, we shall be translated into peace and tranquility for ever. Some others go farther, a little more curiously than certainly,* 1.2 the Patriarchs for six descents all died, and were turned into earth again; Enoch the seventh from Adam was carried away from the world, and saw not death: So death shall reign through six Ages of the world, Septimâ immortalitas vigebit, in the se∣venth Age corruption shall be done away, and immortality shall take place for ever. Such mysteries as these are but Speculations that tangle us, but plainly and direct∣ly this priviledge came to Enoch, because he was the seventh from Adam, that he lived most happily in a brave society of wise men; it was no rude or barbarous Age, as if he alone had pleased God, for five of his Forefathers in a right line were then living, five the brightest Lamps of the Church, when the Lord translated him. A happy thing it is to be well taught by any single wisdom, but there is more affiance in a number of Counsellors; Enoch the seventh from Adam had no less than six renowned Patriarchs to go in and out before him in the fear of the Lord.

2. To be born in such a descent is an accidental thing, a contingency. But the next note upon him is that he had a Prophetical illumination, Enoch the seventh from Adam Prophesied. All the Sons of Adam in the good Race of Seth, whose names are filed in this Chapter, were Heads of the People, Lawgivers, Priests of the most high God. Noah more eminently than the rest a Preacher of righteousness in St. Peters phrase, yet Enoch stands by himself alone for a Prophet. And no marvel if we hear no tidings of his Prophesie till St. Jude divulged it in the last Epistle but one of all the Scripture; it seems to me that it stands there in the fittest place, because it is a Prophesie that concerns neither the first, nor the middle Age, but the very end of the world, Behold the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his Saints, to execute judgment upon all and to convince all that were ungodly. The heavens and earth were but in their first beginnings, men and women did but begin to multiply, yet that divinity was preached in those early days, Behold the Lord cometh with ten thousands of Saints to judge the world; the expectation of that coming draws nearer to us than it did to them; how much more should we prepare to see that with our eyes, which they did but hear with their ears? And to double our watchfulness and attention, as much as the Ages of the world since Enochs time have passed on and multiplied. Enoch pro∣phesied that which Jude hath made Canonical Scripture; This hath troubled some to dispute it, whether ever he wrote such books as were once in the Canon of the

Scripture? I hold the Negative, for though he were a Prophet, and had inspirations, yet Scripture is not only given by inspiration of God, but such inspiration as is pro∣fitable for doctrine,* 1.3 for reproof, for correction, for instruction of righteousness. Such Ora∣cles were deposited by God with his Church, and never suffered to perish. How will it appear but St. Jude received those words by tradition? Or quoted them as he found them cited in some other Author? It were shame such antiquity should scape both Josephus and Philo, who never mention it. But at last some falsary, no man can guess him, authored a most vain Book upon Enoch; Origen, who perused it, gives us a taste of it in his last Homily upon Numbers, that it was stuft with secrets of Phi∣losophy about the motions of the Heavens, and the names of the Stars and Con∣stellations, and with flat Romances about the good Angels falling in love with mortal Creatures, things most unworthy to be fathered upon Enoch, that walked with God. Therefore St. Jerom moderates the variance, Non probavit librum totum Judas, sed illud duntaxat testimonium. St. Jude did patronize no more of that Book, but that Prophesie which he copied out into his Epistle. As St. Paul gave no divine authority to certain heathen Poets, but only to those particular Verses which he borrowed. To come to a point; It sounds nearest to truth, that Enoch was no such Prophet as left Canonical Records, because Christ was wont to argue against the Jews from Moses and the Prophets, allowing Moses for the most ancient Prophet that delivered Scripture to the Church by inspiration. A late Capuchin Frier hath laboured to prove (as he thinks solidly, as I think very superficially) that Monkish Fraternities and Co∣vents were the first invention in the Church, and in his sense to be a Prophet is all one as if Enoch had been of some Colledge or religious Order separated from the ordinary Sons of God.* 1.4 Out of his own conjectures he doth erect two strict sodalities of Religion in those ancient days: From Enos the Enoscaei, such as professed silence from all talk, and sequestration from all men; And from Cainan the Cinaei, or Kenites, such as lived in a regular, but an active Vocation. More of this in due time, but we read of no vow, or affected institution of life into which the Patriarchs entred, we read of some illuminated Prophets, or Prophet among them, and that was Enoch. As he spake by the mouth of his holy Prophets, which have been since the world began, Luk. i. 70.

3. His next mark of glory follows, That he was an example of repentance to all Ge∣nerations. They that are careful to expound these words in Ecclesiasticus accurately are divided in the sense. Some have searched among the Rabbines for their opinions of this, and one of them says, that wickedness did abound in the Age of Enoch, the foul crimes of Sorceries and Witchcrafts had begun to shew their blade, and Lamech was the seventh from Adam in the Race of Cain a Bigamist, and a Murderer. His sins in all likelihood were scandalous and contagious at that time over a great part of the earth, and for these iniquities the Lord drowned the third part of the habitable world in Enochs time; and Enoch threatned an universal Deluge to all flesh, if they did not repent, which indeed came to pass; so his Doctrine and Prophesies gave notice of Repentance to all Generations. But Procopius says upon this Text, and he had it from some Jewish Scribes, that this holy man had been ve∣ry incontinent and vicious before he begat Methusalah,, but after that he proved so relenting a Convert, laid hold so fast on God, because he knew what a misery it was to lose him; that his few years of repentance did God more faithful service than almost a thousand years of innocence in the best of the Patriarchs. Which aspersion upon this holy Saint, since it hath no ground to build upon, it is answered well enough by Cajetan; Enoch is twice commended in this Chapter, that he walked with God, in this Text, and within two Verses before it, the ingemination of that puts it into more probability that he was a constant follower of good works from his youth up, till the time that God translated him. Leaving these far-fetch'd conjectures, this is the most sutable exposition to the words, as I apprehend repen∣tance is often taken for all that sanctification and righteousness which is in man that is born and conceived in sin, Acts v. 31. God hath exalted Christ to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins; but God gives a new heart, and a new spirit to Israel, and new obedience, when he gives them forgiveness of sins. To repent is proper∣ly reverti à peccato, to return from a sinful life, but sometimes it is avertere à peccato, to turn a side from the broad way which leadeth to perdition, though the Child of God never went astray in it. So Enoch having a corruptible body which pressed down the pious alacrity of the soul, and doing those things by frailty some∣times which he ought not to have done, his innocency and holiness is called re∣pentance,

whereupon the Son of Syrach calls him an example of repentance to all Gene∣rations.

4. To be a Prophet, to be an example of repentance; both of these gives us an introduction to understand this Phrase, that he walked with God; but the true key that opens it is the fourth thing, Ʋpon the earth was no man created like Enoch, says the Son of Syrach. A Cedar among other fair trees, a great Star among other lesser lights, a most sanctified man among many just ones, like the man in the Parable that was the truest servant to his Master, exceeded him that gained but two Ta∣lents, exceeded him that gained five Talents, he made return of ten Talents to his Lord, and bore the praise away from them all that had done very well before him, upon the earth was no man created like Enoch. We commend those from our lips that are inter non pessimè malos, not so bad as the worst: But God commends them from his mouth that are inter optimos praecipui, the most excellent of them that are the best. Reuben was kinder towards Joseph than the rest of his Brethren, (so Reuben tells them of it, Gen. xlii. 22.) yet he was but unnatural. Jehu was a truer worshipper of God than the Priests of Baal, yet wanted much of sincerity. Gamaliel was more fa∣vourable to the Apostles than the rest of the Judges, yet he did them unjustice, and was an unbelieving Pharisee. The Kingdom of heaven is not to be look'd for, upon assurance that there are greater sinners than you: but hereby you shall try if the love of God be in you, when you pant and strive with all your soul, and with all your might that none may be better. It is a pitiful, and indeed a dishonourable praise to point out a man, and say he is religious, devout, or conscionable as the world goes. Hath God ever promised to take measure from that form as a bad world goes, how he will give a man an heritage with the Angels in the world to come? To be an Hercules among the Argonautes, I mean the first Champion in the Lords cause in the first file, a Peter among the Disciples, Lovest thou me more than these? An Elias among Prophets, a Moses an Aaron among his Priests, and Samuel among such as called upon his name, an Enoch among the Patriarchs, upon the earth was no man created like him; this is the pitch we must desire to grow unto, and not to say with the Proverb, Occupet extremum scabies; All is well if you be not the worst of a wicked company. Whatsoever you know or hear of, that any Martyr or Confessor departed hath done for Christs sake, it is a shame for you if you do not covet to do as much, or more than that, at least accuse your self if you be not sorry that your frailties make you come short of the best. Lay your hand every one upon his own conscience, and you may well say after me, sweet Jesu, should any of thy Creatures love thee better than I? Should any servant be more obedient than I? Any Mar∣tyr be willing to suffer more than I? Should Enoch that walked with God desire to please thee more than I? Never will I give over to try if I can run before them, for none of thine Elect is so much endebted to thy bloudy Passion as I am, because none of them had so many sins to be forgiven. Press on to be the nearest of them that shall stand before the presence of the Lord, and account it among thy great sins if thy heart do not pant and yearn to be equal with the principal of the Saints. And make not your estimation of a good man by this rule, that his vertues are more than his vices. Or as Guicciardine says, who had cause to know what he wrote, that Popes are praised for their goodness, when they do not exceed the wickedness of other men? and trust not to that fleshly sloth, that a moderate competency of ho∣nesty is well enough; Non omnes possunt esse Scipiones & Maximi; All men cannot be anointed with the oyl of gladness above their fellows. If Noah, and Abraham, and Moses, had roused up their spirit no better, what should the Church have done for exquisite Semplars of Zeal and Faith, but if it had wanted all these, an absolute pattern of holiness had remained in Enoch, upon the earth was no man created like him, we must therefore carry some transcendent sanctity in our notions, to know what it is to walk with God.

First, It commends him that he had much conversation, or, as it were, a familiar friendship with God. Can two walk together unless they be agreed? Amos iii. 3. Agree∣ment is not all, it imports as much as an endearing, and a sociable benevolence. We took sweet counsel together, and walked in the house of God as friends, Psal. lv. 14. Let this embolden none to walk and strout it in the body of the Church while others are at their Prayers in the Quire; they are more bold and familiar with God than wel∣come. I know not what greater contempt could be shewn by a civil man if he were present at the time of sacred hours in one of the Mosques of Mahomet. But I will not digress; To walk with God is to go hand in hand like a loving Associate, and I

need not mince it to say, like the friend of God. We are all servants properly naturâ & debito, in our Nature, and in our debt to the Law. Neither do we ever cease to be servants by the gift of grace, but it is an Evangelical priviledge, that some of those that are servants, and obey his will in all things, should be called the friends of God. So our Saviour says to his Disciples, after he had given them a taste of all saving knowledge,* 1.5 Henceforth I call you not servants, for the servant knoweth not what his Lord doth, but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you. Now although the condition that all men lived in before Christ came into the world was the state of servants, yet such Prophets and Pa∣triarchs as were greatly illuminated with Evangelical faith, praeter rationem status, notwithstanding the bondage of Nature, and of the Law, were vouchsafed this Title the friends of God. A thrice blessed name, which vindicates us from Cap∣tivity, it breaks our bonds asunder, it makes us partakers of divine acquaintance, it consigns us an interest in the love of Christ, more than we dare boast of it. And is this the way to procure it, to walk with God? What say you to walking through Fire and Sword? What think you of walking through the Valley of the shadow of death? Break not hands with such a God, though it should come to a most bitter exigent. But in that ease and safety that we live now, few or none are put to any hardness for Christs sake. No League in the world more sought for, more willing∣ly accepted;* 1.6 no Amity less burdensom, or more beneficial. St. Austin in his Con∣fessions brings in a couple that served the Roman Emperour, thus debating the matter: What can we look for in this Palace more than to be called the friends of the Em∣perour? This is no sure unmovable favour when we have it: and how long must we wait and attend before we get it? Amicus Dei si esse voluero, ecce nunc fio; Let me turn to God to day, and desire to be his friend, it shall be done instantly and never delayed. So they resolved, though their courses were excentrick to the way of ho∣nour and preferment, they would walk in righteousness to be called the friends of Christ, and so Enoch walked with God.

Vera amicitia est idem velle, & idem nolle, says the Oratour; A friendship will hold fast between them, that chuse the same things, and refuse the same things, and agree in all things. So that to walk with God so far till it grow to the tide of a friendship is no more nor no less than Fiat voluntas tua, The will of the Lord be done. The fore-cited Clemens in his lately revived Epistle, instead of saying that Enoch walked with God, phraseth it thus, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, God found him to be a just man through all obedience, and so translated him; and the Chaldee Paraphrase, He walked in the fear of the Lord, turning neither to the right hand, nor to the left. I know the word be∣ing metaphorical may be varied, and followed in many senses, and all according to a godly Canou. Gregory the Great deviseth this distinction of the word out of his own ingenuity. Some walk from God as Apostates, and Demas that turned to the world. Some walk against God, or set their face against him, as the proud and re∣bellious; so the stiff-necked Israelites, Ye walk contrary to me, Lev. xvi. 21. But some on the laudable part may be said to walk before God, as the Prophets; so John the Baptist was a forerunner of Christ, He went before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways. Some walk after God, as humble Penitents, and those that take up their Cross and follow him. Finally, A religious Magistrate, that is solo Deo minor, whose power is from God, and useth that power as he ought, he walks with God, and he that despiseth him despiseth the Lord. Every whit of this may be maintained with good construction, but lest the phrase should be dissected too much to the loss of the sense, I will rather be rude in expression than subtil, to walk with God is to let him draw us after him, as far as his Commandments reach, and no further.

It is not material that there were neither Scriptures extant, nor the Tables of the Law divulged in the days of Enoch, certainly the Children of God in that Age were not left to themselves to woship in a wild undistinct way, without some divine prescription. Some Canon of Faith and good Works they had delivered them; it concerns the Providence of God, and that order which must necessarily be among them to say so, and by the extent of that revealed rule Enoch walked with God. Let all things be done according to the pattern which thou sawest in the Mount, so the Law-giver himself to Moses. Nothing must be changed, though you think for the better, but keep you close to the Pattern in every part and proportion. Honorato jucundissimus honor est quem ipse vult, it is St. Chrysostome's; The Majesty of God takes it for an honour to do him honour by his own Commandment. Peter thought he had shewed himself a

most obsequious Disciple, and reverenced his Master more than all the rest, when he would not let him wash his feet, but Christ shewed him it must be so, and that particular recusancy of his was to dishonour him above his fellows. If you think that God will bate you one inch of that he hath commanded, you walk by your self without him. Alas for that poor soul that is so deceived! whither will his feet carry him? Heaven and earth shall pass away before one tittle of the Law doth perish. Repent and turn to the Lord, and he will run forth to meet you; forgive one another, and Christ will forgive you, there he concurs with you; defraud no man and the righteous Lord will give you an inheritance, there he joyns with you. Hold him fast to you in continual Prayer, and let him not go away till he give you a bles∣sing, there he dwels with you. In all things bear in mind the will of the Lord be done, for no man walks with God, unless he be a complete obedient.

Above all other aberrations 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, or will-worship is that which strides quite over the way, and walks solitary by it self, and not with God. All holy ser∣vice is fitly called new obedience. But can Will-worship, which is a start of a mans own invention be called obedience in any latitude? I think not. For how can a man be said to obey in that which was never enjoyned him? Obedience, and some∣what bidden, and imposed to be done are relatives. His servants ye are to whom you obey, says St, Paul. Wherefore if you frame a Religion, or a part of Religion after your own fancy, you are your own servants and not God's, and you have no reason to look for wages from our heavenly Master. In vain do they worship me, teaching for Do∣ctrines the Traditions of men. Vanum est quod fine suo destituitur; They that serve, serve for a reward, therefore a rewardless service, which is threatned against Will-wor∣ship, is a vanity. But who are comprised in this crime of Will-worship not to walk with God? Such as profess a proper, immediate, essential Worship of God of their own coining; but they want a great measure of understanding, or charity, that inveigh against arbitrary Ceremonies in that name, which are imposed as mere accidental and circumstantial parts of Religion, wherein not the proper Worship of God, but the manner of using the same is intended. Proper Worship of God is an action done immediatly to the honour of God in the act it self, as Prayer and Preaching: Improper Worship is an act done with Gods Service, not directly and by it self, but in conjunction with some proper act of Worship, as kneeling, holding up the hands and eyes, sever these by themselves, and they are no service of God at all. David danced before the Ark in a Linnen Ephod. To dance, to wear a Linnen Garment are things of a mixt use, and therefore can be no parts of Gods proper immediate Worship, neither did David mean them so, but they are de∣cencies, and laudable adjuncts of the very true Worship, and for their sakes, far be it from us to think that Enochs example is violated, who walked with God.

You have heard now that there is a familiar heavenly friendship, and a complete obedience, without all admixtion of Will-worship, in the holy life of this Patriarch, that kept even with God in all his ways. Now thirdly, it makes this sense, that Enoch was a principal upholder of that side that did sincerely profess the true faith, he opposed himself stiffly to the Cainites, that is, to the Sinagogue of Satan; and he that condemns the evil world, and defies the faction of it, deserves this praise, that he walks with God. In vitia alter alterum trudimus, says the heathen;* 1.7 Every wicked man draws his next fellow after him, and the most live rather by custom than by rule and reason, running like those Swine in the Gospel, into which the Devil had entred, by whole herds into the Sea. But a man that esteems his soul by that price which his dear Redeemer paid for it, will dare to set his face in a good cause against plurality, and multitudes, and fears not to stand up alone against an host of the Priests of Baal, like Elias that walked solitary in the wilderness with the Lord, when Ahab and Jezabel had won the whole Land of Israel to Idolatry. Singularity, when it proceeds from self opinion and pertinacy, it deserves to be hooted at; but to divorce from men of erroneous minds, of malicious and filthy conversation, to be cast off from such, like a Pelican in the Wilderness, and like an Owl that is in the Desart, is a singularity to be admired. As soon as ever the Devil left our Saviour at the end of the three Tentations, the words following are, Behold Angels came and ministred unto him. Whereupon one doth thus meditate, Qui expelllit à se Satanam alli∣cit ad se Angelos; Sort not your self with those that have not the fear of God before their eyes, abandon impious Society, and you shall find heavenly comforters in your soul: Bid Satan get him hence, and the Angels take it for an invitation to

come and walk with you. Lot lived like a stranger in his own City, he shut himself up, and barred his doors against those filthy people. What could he do more to keep the ungodly from his vexy sight? As David said. Thus estranging himself from the evil doings of those that were round about him, he was thought fit to give hospitality to Angels, and walkt out of Sodom with those Angels, and when he lingred in that place, they laid hold of his hand, and pulled him away with some violence of love. Thus Enoch could not endure the Cainites, perhaps persecuted them, perhaps was persecuted by them, he would not partake of their fellowship, but shook off their dust from his feet, and so it came to be said that he walked with God.

After this that hath been spoken, I ought not to conceal from you any longer how the Septuagint have translated these words, upon which I insist, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, And Enoch pleased God. This must not be shuffled over without observation upon it, not only because St. Chrysostome, and such other Greek Fathers as I have perused, do so read the Text, nor only for the Son of Syrachs sake, Ecclus. xliv. 16. who consents with the lxxii. But for St. Pauls sake, in whom we find the same character of him, Heb. xi. 5. Before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God. The wisdom of God alone best knows why there should be such a diversity of terms, a diversity I say, without any real difference, for it is but a Consequent put for an Antece∣dent; he that walks in new obedience, eschewing the company of the ungodly, and setting God always before him, consequently he shall please the Lord. If we had such a Master as Nabal was, so crooked and unpropitious that none could speak to him, or please him: If we served under the Lord as Jacob did under Laban, who had nothing but murmuring and persecution for all his fidelity, then we might cross our arms and say we had lost our oyl and our labour. But our service is full of bene∣volence and encouragement, Euge bone serve, Well done good and faithful servant, every title chimes Alacrity. And yet it follows, that servant was 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, faith∣ful, what, In all words and works? No, faithful in a little. Enoch pleased, because God would be pleased with his imperfect righteousness, it is his indulgence to call things that are not, as things that are, he will give a days wages for an hours work in the Parable. If there be a willing mind it shall be commended according to that which a man hath, not according to that which he hath not; he that affects the right way, and would not swerve from it, shall carry this badge upon his name, that he pleased, and walked with God, Quamvis claudicet & labatur; though sometimes he limps, sometimes he stumbles through the infirmity of the flesh. Our renowned Patriarch in my Text was a sinner from his mothers womb, for Adam begat a Son in his own likeness, after his image, but that likeness was the similitude, yea, and the very essence, I may say, of sinful flesh. Yet such a Son of Adam doth please, being made by adoption and grace the Son of God.

But I have not said all, nay, not a moiety what it is to please our holy Father. For his love and complacency is not a bare affection like Man's, Amor Dei in effctu, non in affectu situs est. Where he is pleased he doth not affect a thing only Theorical∣ly, but will effect some good for it, as Aeneas said of his followers, Nemo ex hôc numero mihi non donatus abibit; All that did attend his very games should have some reward for their labour. God is not unrighteous to forget your love and your labour which you have shewed toward his name, Heb. vi. 10. Please not your self, even as Christ also pleased not himself, says St. Paul, Rom. xv. 3. And you shall walk before the Lord in the Land of the living, Psal. cxvi. 9. Placebo Domino, I shall please the Lord in the Land of the living, so the Vulgar Latine readeth it. More precisely to the cause. In some sense all the Creatures, and their natural operations do please the Lord, but in a super∣natural order nothing doth please him, but that into which he hath put a superna∣tural bonity, and those good effects which are wrought in man by his own grace. He doth not only love and delight in them, but will remunerate them, with this sober restriction, which might pacifie many hot contentions if the Devil were not too strong, Bona opera non habent condignitatem ad praemium coeleste, sed quandam ordina∣bilitatem; that is, good works have no intrinsecal worth or value to claim eternal life,* 1.8 but through the gracious promise of God they are ordained unto it. By Faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death. Faith indeed is an ambulatory thing, it hath no rest till it see God, and walks from one degree to another, from righ∣teousness to righteousness, and never stands still, but in the clear Vision of the Beatifical Essence it walks no more, but stands before the face of the Lord for ever.

From those notions which I have passed over grounded upon Text and Reason, I proceed last of all to give them a little room in my discourse, that have made ei∣ther probable or unprobable divinations upon the word. The Jerusalem Targum in∣stead of Enoch walked, reads it more at large, he served or laboured in the truth before the Lord. Whether he were Ruler or Priest that Gloss decides it not, or both Ruler and Priest, as they were coincident in the person of Melchisedech, and I believe long before him, truth is a Princes care as well as a Prophets; he is Custos utrinsque tabulae, and shall answer to the King of Kings, how his people discharged their duty to God, as well as to their Neighbour. But by whomsoever that good work is wrought, that truth shall flourish upon the earth, by the power and authority of the Scepter, or by the diligence and painfulness of the Miter, such a one shall have a blessed name that he walks with God, that he is legatus à làtere, he stirs not from his side, he is set upon his right hand, and shall remain among the blessed at that right hand for ever. But howsoever I may be perswaded that Enoch was a Ruler, and some great Go∣vernment lay upon his shoulders, yet his interest was more than so in labouring for the truth, he was a diligent instructor of the people by word and communication, St. Jude hath rehearsed a piece of a Sermon that he made, wherein he preached of a better life to come. Here again I must have recourse to the Idiom of the Scripture, wherein I will shew, that the very phrase to walk with God doth imply a pleasing or acceptable ministration of office before the Lord; as 1 Sam. ii. 30 I said indeed, it is a message to old Eli, that thy house, and the house of thy father should walk before me for ever; that is, that thou and the house of thy Father should execute the office of a Priest, and offer sacrifice before me. And let it imprint this in your mind, what veneration is due to the divine Oracles of truth when they are delivered unto you.* 1.9 We are Em∣bassadors for Christ, says St. Paul, but you must abstract that word from any earth∣ly similitude; we come indeed in the name of the King of heaven, not as from him that is absent, but invisible: We do not only come from him to speak to men (priviledge enough to our person) but, in the very hour that we deliver the sa∣cred will unto you with fear and reverence, we walk with God. This will not let me pretermit what Origen says, and Irenaeus likewise, was contained in the Apocryphal Book of Enoch, Legatione functus est ad Angelos, that he was sent an Embassadour from the Sages and Patriarchs of the world unto the Angels. I will not go further in the Fiction. The Hebrews had more leisure to tell strange stories than you have to hear them; I believe the meaning is, he walked to several places of the world to settle things in order in divers Kingdoms; as when Samuel judged Israel, he went from year to year in circuit to Bethel, and Gilgal, and Mizpeh, and judged Israel in all those places.* 1.10 A wearisom labour for Governours to make a journey of so many days and months, but safety and the blessing of God certainly is upon it, because they give no rest to their body till they see with their eyes how Religion and Justice are managed in the remotest places of their dominions, this is to walk with God.

I am now making to the Conclusion for this time, with the improbable, and indeed impossible supposition of those Expositors that would make Enoch a Prior or Abbot, or at least a member of such a Society, some regular Canon that vowed stricter orders in obligation of inter-mutual obedience than all others that were called by the name of the Lord. It seems the Monks do greatly want good men of their livery that they would hedge in those into their body that never dreamt of their profession. And I wonder they would accept of Enoch for a Votary, who begat Sons and Daughters (and I hope they will acknowledge in lawful Matrimony) after he walked with God. St. Chrysostome draws no other Doctrine from my Text, and this very vehemently, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉: For Enochs sake let no man think that a married life is any impediment to please the Lord, Cornelius à Lapide the Jesuit could not let this observation alone, but tells us that Enoch shall live upon the earth again, before the day of judgment, for three years and half, and fight with Antichrist, and be slain, and then he shall be unmarried. I think so too, for if he should come into the world at this time (as all that tradition is a most sickly dream) but it he should, he must bear the age of four thousand years, and that were too old in conscience to marry. But put case upon his return he would marry again, how would the Jesuit forbid the Banes? Why he drives it to this case: Enoch was the Great-grand-father of Noah; Noah since the Floud, the common Progenitor of all flesh, therefore when Enoch appears again upon earth he shall be the Father of all women descending from him in a right line, and between such persons no Matrimony can be contracted. This is a subtilty as

wisely laid, as the Sadduces question about the woman that had married seven hus∣bands, Whose wise shall she be in the Resurrection? But because the Jesuits do so much commend Virginity above all things, I would their fathers in the flesh could have been perswaded to have kept it, then the Church had wanted them, who are the only impediment on that part, that probably no peace can be made among our Christian unchristian divisions.

Now they that do invent certain forms of Monastical Institutions from the be∣ginning of the world, divide them into two Sects, the one from Cainan in an active life, such as sung sweet hymns, or ministred in sacrifices, and conversed with the world, Certainly these went the truer way, the active life is most chari∣table, and furthest from tentation. For as Daws and Bats will breed about an house where there is no inhabitant; so many sins will creep into a soul that is not operative. But they of the other order instituted by Enos, says a late Parisian Ca∣puchin, lived not with men, but affected solitude; spake not to men, but affected silence. By this Description, it seems to me, he makes them abhor the two best properties of a man, who is animal sociabile, sermocinativum, the only creature on earth fit to unite himself in an orderly society, and the only creature on earth to whom God hath given speech to utter the conceptions of his mind. Their purpose is, I think, to commend a man dead unto the delights of the world, not taken with the baits of pleasure like a beast, and they make a beast of him by renouncing the best parts of humanity. To enjoy a mans days with some sweetness of delight is far from reprehension; pleasures indeed are to be mitigated, for a little pleasure is enough to season a mans life, as a little salt is enough with ones meat, therefore the excess is to be reproved as the origen of much iniquity; but this I will say in favour of a life that is lead with much alacrity, the most horrible sins that are do usually come to pass through sullen melancholy. Man was first put into Paradise to spend his days in content and joy. Why should he live so opposite to the state of Paradise as to spend all his Age in sowreness, and sad contemplations? Adam was appointed to dress the Garden of God, to keep the trees, and herbs, and grass well pruned, and shorn, and even. Is not the whole world now the Garden of God? And shall every elegancy, mirth, and pleasurable recreation in it be checkt for wanton and abominable? Such censorious sowre-looking Pharisees, of all the rest of the Jews,* 1.11 did least please our Saviour. The great Rabbi Ben Maimon says, that Prophesie comes not upon men either when they are sorrowful, or when they are sloathful, but when they are joyful. Therefore the Sons of the Prophets had before them Psalteries, and Timbrels, and Harps when they came down the Mountains, 1 Sam. x. 5. A good Christian therefore may walk with God with a chearful merry heart, yea, and dance before God as Miriam and David did. Happy are they that can suffer tribula∣tions for Gods name without repining; and no less happy are they that drink of the brook in the way of comforts and pleasures without surfeiting. The Lord sanctifie them both unto us through his holy Spirit and grace. AMEN.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Page 12.
• * 1.2

  Chytreus.
• * 1.3

  2 Tim. 3.16.
• * 1.4

  Bolduc. lib. 1. de Eccles. ante legem.
• * 1.5

  Joh. 15.15.
• * 1.6

  Lib. 8. c. 6.
• * 1.7

  Sen. Ep 41.
• * 1.8

  Heb. 11.5.
• * 1.9

  Eph. 6.20.
• * 1.10

  1 Sam. 7.16.
• * 1.11

  Ainsworth. Num. 12 8.