crament, he gave all his disciples an example of Christian and loving condescension, even to the washing one another's feet, John xiii. 4–14. After this institution, he presses upon them the commandment of love, as the chief commandment, and their principal duty, both by the precedent and precept of love, showing that his supper was a communion of love, John xiii. 34, 35.

2. Consider the appellations of this sacrament. It is called the communion, the table of the Lord, the Lord's supper; a word not noting the time of, but fellowship in eating; cœna, anò TOU KOVOU. Eating together was ever held a token of friendship. Joseph's love to his brethren was testified by feasting them. David's love to Mephibosheth, by causing him to eat bread at his table continually, 2 Sam. ix.

7.

David calls his familiar friend "one that did eat of his bread," Psal. xli. 9. The eating at one rack hath bred peace between savage beasts. And that hatred which was between the Jews and Egyptians could no way be more fitly expressed than by their mutual abominating to eat bread one with another. Men by nature are directed to express their love and reconciliation by feasts and invitations; and this communion which by eating and drinking the faithful have one with another, the apostle tells us comes from their partaking of one Christ. "The cup of blessing which we bless," saith he, " is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we being many are one bread, and one body for we are all partakers of that one bread," 1 Cor. x. 16, 17; that is, we partaking of the same Christ, and having communion in his merits and benefits, have thereby communion also one with another in the Lord's supper. And we all partaking of that one bread, broken and divided into divers parts, are made "one body and one bread," though we are never so many. The faithful then partaking all of one Christ, and every one of them having communion in his body and blood, have also communion among themselves: nor can this but be a communion of much dearness and nearness, which arises from partaking of this one Christ, and all his benefits and merits; for hereby,

(1.) They are all children of the same Father. We are all the sons of God by faith in Christ, Gal. iii. 26; and "to as many as received him, he gave power to be the sons of God;" and what nearer bond than to be the children of the same father? In the Lord's supper the faithful sit like olive branches round about their Father's table. "Love as brethren,"

saith the apostle. "How good and how pleasant it is," saith the psalmist, "for brethren to dwell together in unity!"

(2.) By partaking of this one Christ the faithful are all members of the same body, and they grow up into him who is the Head, Eph. iv. 15, and from him receive life and grace; being as members animated with the same Spirit, and incorporated into his mystical body, and therefore the apostle speaks of drinkinto one Spirit in the Lord's supper. Now what can more aptly express the near union, dear affection, and tender sympathy between Christian and Christian than this, being fellow members of one body; one member counting the woe and welfare of another as its own?

(3.) By partaking of one Christ in the sacrament, they profess themselves to be of the same faith and religion; to expect life and happiness the same way, for Christ is the way; and this sameness of religion has bound those who have been of false religions very strongly together. Now that by feeding together in the Lord's supper there is professed a com

munion in the same religion, the apostle strongly proves, 1 Cor. x. 18, from the practice of Israel after the flesh, that is, the Jews who descended from Jacob or Israel. These carnal Israelites who lived in his time, and denied Christ, were, saith the apostle, by eating of the sacrifices" partakers of the altar;" that is, professed themselves to be of the Jewish religion and worship, and to approve of the same.

(4.) By partaking of one Christ at the Lord's supper, the faithful profess themselves to be the servants of one Lord and master. Fellow servants must not fall out and beat one another, Luke xii. 45. The servants of this one Lord should be of one mind. If Christ be not divided, his servants should shun division.

(5.) Hereby they profess, that they are to be pardoned by the same blood, "shed for many for the remission of sins," Matt. xxvi. 28. And what inducement stronger to move us to forgive a few pence, who have been forgiven so many pounds! What will quench hatred, if the blood of Christ will not! (6.) Hereby they profess both that they all live in the same family here, where they feed at the same table, serve the same Master, own the same Father; and that they shall live together in the same habitation for ever, partaking of that meritorious blood which is the purchase of the same inheritance, and having all thereby the same key to open paradise withal. They who receive Christ, as communicants profess to do, shall be received. One saint may truly say to another, You and I must be better acquainted. And what an engagement to love is this, for us to consider we shall for ever live and love together in heaven! Oh how should Christians begin to do that here, which they shall never be weary of doing to all eternity! If one house, then one heaven, calls for one heart. Thus the appellations given to the sacrament, the table of the Lord, the Lord's supper, the communion, &c., show it to be a love-feast.

3. The outward elements, bread and wine, used at the supper, evince the same. Separated and several grains and grapes make one and the same bread and wine. They who are severed and disjoined from one another, not only by sea, habitation, trades, but in heart also and affection, are, by the receiving of Christ in this sacrament, reunited into one spiritual body, as the elements, though originally several, are into one artificial mass. "We being many," saith the apostle, "are one bread." How necessary, then, is the Lord's supper in these times, when love so much decays! If the Christians in their summer season, when love was burning hot, so often laid on this fuel, what need have we then to do so in this winter season, when the love of most grows so cold! Confident I am, that the withdrawing of this sacrament that feeds and foments love, has much tended to its decay among us. And further, this discovers the great policy of Satan, not only in hindering from the sacrament, which was appointed to strengthen love, but in breaking love by this very sacrament. Who would ever have expected to have heard of a sacramentary war? How many valiant champions lost their lives in this land, in their Smithfield fights, about the controversy of transubstantiation! and how subtlely hath the murderer of souls mixed his poison with the sacramental bread, and stolen away the cup in the papacy! What fierce contests have there been between Calvinists and Lutherans about consubstantiation ! Who remembers not the prelatical fury, in imposing superstitious for sacramental gestures? And oh that the flames of these unchristian quarrels about the sacrament did not blaze and spread even at this very day! Oh the unbrotherly breaches between brethren about the admission and

qualification of communicants! Consider, dear Christians, whether Satan is not likely to prevail, when he turns that artillery whereby we should batter his forts upon ourselves, and makes his strongest weapons of war of olive branches, ensigns and emblems of peace; and is not love in danger of death when its food is daily poisoned? Who warms his hands at these flames of contention, but only our adversary? Satan, as they say of the lawyer, will be the only gainer, when you fall out, like unkind brethren, about your Father's will and testament. The Lord humble us for all those unworthy receivings which have made us so unkind and quarrelsome about receiving this feast of love, the Lord's supper; and make us for the future, in all our opinions about and participations of it, to be men in understanding, and children in malice.

Obs. 4. Spotted and spotting sinners are unfit guests at holy feasts. The apostle, by saying these seducers were spots in the feasts of charity, notes the unsuitableness of such blemishes to assemblies that should be clean and Christian; these spots casting an uncomeliness upon those holy meetings, which made those spots appear and set off with the more ugliness and uncomeliness. The mixture of scandalous persons in church fellowship is here by the apostle blamed; and if their meeting at these feasts of charity be reprehended by the apostle, if at these feasts these spots appeared so black and deformed, how much more reprovable was their meeting at the Lord's supper, which is an ordinance of Christ wherein approaches to him are more near, and ought to be more holy, than in those feasts of charity. Spots and blemishes, as Mr. Perkins well spake of his times, ought to be washed off by ecclesiastical discipline from the face of holy assemblies at the Lord's supper, because they pollute it. True it is, that, 1. There are two sorts of pollution of the Lord's supper; the one, that which makes the sacrament no sacrament, but a common or unhallowed thing, to those who receive it, as if it were given by those who are no ministers, or to those who are no church, or without the blessing and breaking of the bread; the other sort of pollution of the sacrament is, that which makes its administration to be sinful, and those who administer it to be guilty of doing that which is contrary to the revealed will of God. This latter kind of pollution is by admitting spotted and scandalous sinners. 2. It is granted, that the mixture of the scandalous pollutes not the sacrament to those who have used all the lawful means against it, who, being officers, have discharged their duty by exercising church discipline, and being private Christians, admonished the offenders, and petitioned those who have the authority to restrain them from the sacrament in that case, though the scandalous partake of the sacrament, yet officers and worthy communicants partake not of their sin. But otherwise, the admission of scandalous persons to the sacrament is a pollution of that ordinance. "Give not," saith Christ, "that which is holy to dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine," Matt. vii. 6. By that which is holy, I understand, though primarily, yet not solely, the word; but consequently the sacraments, prayer, and Christian admonition. Christ does not speak of one holy thing only, nor does he say, the pearl; but he saith, that which is holy, and pearls. And by dogs and swine are not only to be understood infidels, heathens, open apostates, and persecutors, which, like dogs, bite, bark, and contradict; but also such who, like swine, profane, trample these pearls under their feet, and by an impure, swinish life show how much they despise holy things. And needs must the sacrament be profaned, when in its use not

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grace, but sin is increased, because hereby the main end of the sacrament, which is to be food to nourish grace, and poison to kill sin, is perverted; but no grace is nourished in any profane, impenitent sinner, he being spiritually dead, and so without the life of grace. And further, his hand is strengthened in sin; for by his receiving the sacrament his conversion is much more difficult than that of a sinner who has been kept back from the sacrament altogether; and by joining in the highest act of church communion an impenitent sinner entertains a good opinion of his spiritual happiness, and so trusts in lying vanities. And again, the giving of the sacrament to those who are known to live in gross voluntas non erit sins without repentance, is a contradic- in æternum, ut tion to, and a confutation of, the word, ana, alicui grawhich denounces condemnation against tiam Christi et them that eat and drink unworthily; catorum, annunand in the faithful delivery thereof we divini denezet, et pronounce the wrath of God to such as eidem exhibitione live impenitent in sin: the word saith, spondeat? Ursin. "Be not deceived, neither fornicators, cipl. Ecclesiast. nor idolaters, nor adulterers," &c., "shall inherit the kingdom of God." And do we not, by giving the sacrament to these, give the lie to the word? do we not in the sacrament absolve those whom we condemn in the word, and open the kingdom of heaven in the sacrament to those against whom we shut it in the word? for is not the sacrament a seal of the covenant, the righteousness of faith, and the promises of the gospel, as is evident by, those sacramental phrases, "This is my body, This is my blood," which denote a spiritual obsignation and exhibition of the benefits of Christ's body and blood? and doth not Christ say to those to whom he delivered the sacrament, This is my body which is given for you, and this is my blood which is shed for you, and for many, for the remission of sins? Matt. xxvi. 28; Luke xxii. 19, 20. Do not they, then, who consent to wicked and scandalous persons taking the sacrament, acknowledge the children of the devil to be the children of God, and the enemies of God to be in covenant with him, and so partake of the benefits of the covenant from him? Further, is it not a profanation of the sacrament of baptism, to baptize a Jew or a pagan professing a resolution to turn Christian, who yet is an openly profane and wicked liver, and continues under the power of visible and abominable sins, although he be able to make a sound and orthodox confession of faith? And shall a scandalous living in adultery, swearing, lying, keep a man from entering into the visible church by the door of baptism, and shall they not as well hinder him from being welcomed at the table, in the house, as a child and friend? Yet, again, is the sacrament profaned by admitting infants and idiots, who can make no good use of it; and is it not as much, if not more polluted, by admitting those to it who will make a very bad use of it ? Also may not one man by ignorance, drunkenness, defence of sin, and heresy, lie under a sinful contracted disability to examine himself, and so to be an unfit communicant, as another man may lie under a natural disability? and is not a man more blamable for the former than the latter? Further, holy things under the Levitical law were polluted and profaned by wicked and profane persons: "They have defiled my sanctuary," &c.; "for when they had slain their children to their idols, they came the same day into my sanctuary to profane it," Ezek. xxiii. 38, 39. And in that question, "Who shall abide in thy tabernacle?" Psal. xv. I, the prophet shows by those offences for which men were excluded from the sanctuary, what it was which should keep men from

eternal life; and why that moral unholiness, for of such he speaks, which made men unfit to go into the sanctuary, which had a sacramental signification of Christ, should not as well exclude them from the sacrament, I understand not. Were not the sacrifices of old polluted by profane and morally unholy persons offering them?" So," that is, unclean, "is this people before me; so is every work of their hands, and that which they offer therein, unclean," Hag. ii. 14. Where it is plain that the moral unholiness of the persons defiled holy ordinances; the people and their works being evil, the Lord for that cause accounted their sacrifices to be unclean. If morally profane persons defiled the sacrifices of old, they may surely be charged with defiling our sacraments now, Psal. 1. 16. Obs. 5. Such things as are given for the public benefit of the church, are not to be consumed in or converted to any other uses. These feasts of charity, which were appointed for the relief of the poor Christians and the ministry, were profanely wasted by these seducers. This sin is commonly called sacrilege, which by some is thought to be so called, q. sacræ legis, vel rei læsio, the hurting, spoiling, or violation of a holy law or thing. Others better consider it q. sacra legere, to gather holy things; and they define it to be a taking away of things consecrated and devoted to the Lord. This is mentioned in Scripture to be done either ignorantly or knowingly; if ignorantly, it required, according to the law, 1. Restitution of the principal, with an addition of the fifth part over and above, as a forfeiture for the offence, and a caveat against the like in future time. 2. Reconciliation or atonement; the priest making an atonement with the "ram of the trespass-offering," Lev. v. 16, 17; xxii. 14, to note the greatness of the offence against God. If this sin were committed of knowledge and wittingly, that which was taken, and all that the taker had, was for the Lord as a sacrifice for restitution, and he with his whole family stoned and burnt for purgation. This judgment of God upon Achan for taking that to his own use which was devoted to God is vii. 1; 2 Mac. iv. largely related, Josh. vii.; as also the punishment inflicted upon Ananias for changing that which was dedicated to a holy to his private use. And in this latter instance the word voopioaro, which we barely translate kept back, properly signifies a nimming or purloining, and so is the word rendered, Tit. ii. 10. "It is a snare," or destruction, "to the man," saith Solomon," who devoureth that which is holy, and after vows to make inquiry," Prov. xx. 25; that is, to apply or take that to his own use which was appointed to God's, yea, to go about to do it by inquiring how the vow might be made void. For that may be called holy which is not such only by creation, as angels and the first man, but also by dedication and separation; and that whether this separation were by God's command, or by man's free and voluntary bestowing it. In the old law, tithes and first-fruits were holy; so now in the times of the gospel, those things which are either appointed by law, or bestowed by the liberality of men, for maintaining the worship and service of God, and Divine uses; and the taking away of these is the devouring of holy things; a sin so much the more heinous in these times, by how much the more bounty has been exercised by those who lived in times of blind superstition for maintaining idolatry. How unseemly is it that men should live as if all their light seemed to show them how to delude God; as if faith had banished all fidelity; as if any worship better deserved maintenance from men than his, who gives men both their own maintenance

Sic usurpatur a LXX. in casu sacrilegii. Josh.

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et Hieron. Ep. 8.

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and worship; yea, as if the more they saw into religion, the more they saw in it which deserves starving and overthrow! This sin, which some divines make to be a breach of the eighth commandment, "Thou shalt not steal," must needs be of thefts the worst, because it is a robbing of him who is the best, even God himself. "Will a man rob God? yet ye have robbed me," Mal. iii. 8.

It is a sin to wrong our beast, yea, our enemy's beast, Prov. xii. 10; a greater to wrong man: and if no injury may be offered to man, no, not our enemy, much less to our brother, 1 Cor. vi. 6; and if not to our brother, much less to our superior, to a king, 2 Sam. xvi. 9; and if not to an earthly king, far less to the King and Lord of heaven, who is our superior in the highest degree, who is our Father and Benefactor, our Maker, and Feeder, and Father. When Joseph had feasted his brethren, then to steal his cup! what greater injury? "God forbid" (say they) "we should do this thing," Gen. xliv. 7. And aptly does Solomon call the devouring of holy things a snare, because it is a sin alluring us to overthrow; there is in it a bait to cover the hook, and somewhat scattered to draw us into the net. To a foolish sinner, the gain appears very beautiful and beneficial. The wedge of gold, and the Babylonish garment, seemed to Achan at first great enticements; but the garment clothed him "with shame and dishonour," Psal. xxxv. 26, and the wedge of gold was a wedge to rive his soul and body asunder. How severely does God threaten those of Tyre and Sidon for their sacrilege in ransacking the temple, and in taking away the gold and silver appointed for his service, and carrying it into their idol temples, Joel iii. 4, 5. If it were not lawful for Ananias and Sapphira, having consecrated the whole price of their own land to God, to keep away part thereof; then it is much more unlawful to keep away any part thereof from the church, which we never gave, it being the church's possession before we were born; such alienation not being made in case of extreme necessity for maintaining the commonwealth, and preserving life, or for the church's greater benefit and conveniency, Lev. xxv. 23; Ezek. xlv. 4. Satan knows that the outward worship of God and religion cannot be continued without a ministry, nor a ministry without ministers, nor ministers without such goods as should sustain them; and hence he instigates profane men to violate and steal church goods, that thereby the ministry, God's worship, and the salvation of souls may be overthrown. The alienation

ann. 308.

2. ann. 326.

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of church goods has been prohibited by Synod Ancyr, the decrees of sundry ancient councils. Synod Arelateus. If our forefathers by the injury of their Synod Antioch, times, mistaking the truth, gave aught ann. 344. Concil. superstitiously to Romish priests to re- 401. Concil. Tolet. ligious uses, it is fit their general pur- Concil. Syn. 9. pose should be kept, with amendment ann. 658. of their particular error.

2. ann. 529.

Obs. 6. The godly in this world are never totally freed from the company of the ungodly. It was the lot of these Christians to have these wicked men with them. The godly must never love, but yet they will always have the company of the wicked; though they should not feast together, yet they will always live together. They who will be quite freed from the company of the wicked, "must," as Paul speaks, "needs go out of the world," 1 Cor. v. 10. Our delight should only be in the godly, but it will be our condition to be among the ungodly; and God thus disposes of the outward estate and condition of his people for sundry causes. Hereby they are made more watchful over their hearts and ways: the greater their danger is, the less is their security; the more dirt and defile

ment they see, the more they labour to keep their garments pure, and to gird up their loins. When enemies approach our cities, we double our watch. In times of infection, we most mind our preservatives. "Save yourselves from this untoward generation," said Peter to the new converts, Acts ii. 40; he means not so much by leaving the places, as by taking heed of the impurities, wherein the wicked live. By this abiding likewise among the wicked, the godly are more put upon loving and cleaving to one another. It is noted, Gen. xiii. 7, 8, upon the mention of the Canaanite and Perizzite being in the land when the strife was between the herdmen of Abram and Lot, that Abram desired there might be no strife between them. Countrymen in a strange country should beware of contention; the common foe should make disagreeing brethren unite; dissension will be both their ruin and their reproach, and will both disgrace and destroy them. If a Herod and a Pilate could be made friends, should not saints join together when Christ is struck at ? Sometimes God makes his people by the presence of the wicked more zealous against wickedness; the nearness of contraries strengthens their opposition; the eye increases grief and hatred: nor have any saints so much set themselves against sin, as they who have been most compelled to see sin: the best men have oft lived in the worst times; the hottest fire is in the coldest winter, the brightest stars in the darkest night. In the midst of a crooked and perverse nation the godly shine as lights, Phil. ii. 15. Lot's righteous soul was vexed with the unclean conversation of the wicked, and David's eyes ran down with rivers of tears when he saw God's law broken. What a work of power is it, that a sea of ungodliness should, instead of damping, redouble the heat of a saint's love to holiness! Further, God will hereby either better the wicked, or render them inexcusable; either their living among his people shall change or condemn them; either the holy conversation of saints shall turn the hearts, or stop the mouths of sinners; they shall not be able to plead ignorance of their duty, when they have been instructed by the language of lip and life. Though Noah by preparing the ark saved his own house, yet he condemned the world, Heb. xi. 7. To conclude, by the company of wicked men, God makes his people more prize communion with himself, long for heaven, where there shall be neither sin nor sinner to molest them, where they shall no longer sojourn in Meshech, nor dwell in the tents of Kedar, nor their souls with them which hate peace, Psal. cxx. 5, 6. Heaven would not be sweet, if the world were not bitter; nor the company of saints in glory be so desirable, were it not for the unkindness of and vexation by sinners on earth. Oh how sweet will that condition be, where all the society shall be of one mind! How melodious that choir, which shall ever sing without any jarring, any discord! Till which condition, let us, whatever our times, wherever we abide, neither impatiently complain of God, nor sinfully comply with the ungodly, but account it our duty to do the wicked what good we can, if we cannot do them what good we would; to be careful that they may not, and comforted that they cannot, do us that harm they would; but contrarily, both by their company, yea, and unkindnesses, that good they would not.

The

Obs. 7. Feasting is not always unlawful. Christians here are not blamed for their cheer, but warned of their guests. The holiest men, in Scripture we read, have made feasts, as Abraham, Lot, Isaac, David, Solomon, Gen. xix. 3; xxi. 8; xxvi. 30; 2 Sam. iii. 20. Nehemiah also and Ezra commanded the people to "eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and send portions unto them for whom nothing

was prepared," Neh. viii. 9, 10. And more than once I read of our Saviour's honouring a feast with his presence, Luke v. 29; John ii. 1-11. God has provided not only for our necessity, but also lawful delight; and his bounty reaches not only to our being, but honest solace; nor does it only give us naked lives, but lives clothed with many comforts, that we may more than live, even live cheerfully. When Christ's mother told him they had no wine, he turns water into wine, even to a very great proportion; he thought it not enough that they should have water to quench their thirst, he gives them also wine to cheer their spirits; and it being at a feast, that quantity which at another time had been superfluous, was now but necessary. A man may be angry so he sin not, and take lawful delights so he surfeit not: why has God given man such choice of earthly delights, but for his use? Some observe, that God has made more creatures serving for the delights of man than for his necessity; and certainly he has made nothing in vain. The whole earth, full of his goodness, is a well-furnished table; if we altogether fast, we show ourselves but sullen guests: some indeed have run from the world, and, to avoid the danger of pleasure, have changed places of plenty for solitary and barren mountains and deserts; but may not the world be in a desert? a boiling desire in a neglected body? Did not Jerom find Rome in his heart, when only rocks and bushes were in his eye? But God has appointed a better way than this; the wise man will be a hermit at home; and it is a much more Christian practice, to turn the world out of ourselves, than ourselves out of the world: we may distinguish between the love of pleasure, and the use of it; we may warm ourselves in the sun, without worshipping it; we may be merry without being mad; and get crucified affections to our lawful and delightful comforts: and without this inward mortification upon the heart, notwithstanding our leaving outward enjoyments, we shall be snared; as the bird, which though getting loose from the stone to which she was tied, yet flying with the string about her leg, is in danger to be entangled in every bough. But yet,

Obs. 8. Gluttony is a great sin. It was here the sin of these seducers; they fed themselves, though among men, yet not like men, but beasts; and all their food was but fuel for their lusts: Peter joins their feasting and their eyes full of adultery together, 2 Pet. ii. 13, 14. Several ways is the sin of gluttony committed.

(1.) When men offend in the quantity of what they eat; when they eat and drink in too great abundance: it is lawful sometimes to exceed in provision, but never to exceed the bounds of moderation. We are forbidden to be among riotous eaters of flesh, Prov. xxiii. 20: the feasting of the ancients was called but eating of bread; and Christ bids us to take heed lest our hearts be overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness, Luke xxi. 14. That proportion of meat, I confess, surcharges the stomachs of some, which perhaps is not enough to satisfy the hunger of another; as that quantity of rain will make a clay ground drunk, which will scarcely quench the thirst of a sandy country; but this I fear not to assert, that we offend in the excessive quantity of our food, when at any time we eat so much as to be disabled to perform the service which we owe to God, either in our general or particular callings. Fulness of bread was one of Sodom's sins. Moderate showers refresh the earth, immoderate drown it. Nor yet are men only gluttons by overcharging their stomachs, but also by overcharging their estates, spending that in superfluity which they should use for necessity.

(2.) When we offend in the quality of our food.