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glory, once of his greatest extremity; they sleep both times. The other was in the night, more tolerable; this by day, yea, in a light above day. Chrysostom would fain excuse it to be an amazedness, not a sleep, not considering that they slept both at that glory, and after in the agony. To see that master praying, one would have thought should have fetched them on their knees; especially to see those heavenly affections look out at his eyes; to see his soul lifted

to heaven. But now the hill hath wearied their limbs. their body clogs their soul, and they fall asleep. While Christ saw divine visions, they dreamed dreams; while he was in another world, ravished with the sight of his Father's glory, yea, of his own, they were in another world, a world of fancies, surprised with the cousin of death, sleep. Besides so gracious an example, their own necessity, quia incessanter pecco, "because I continually sin," Bernard's reason might have moved them to pray, rather than their Master; and behold, instead of fixing their eyes upon heaven, they shut them; instead of lifting up their hearts, their heads fell down upon their shoulders; and shortly, here was snoring instead of sighs and pray. This was not Abraham's or Elihu's ecstatical sleep (Job xxxiii.); not the sleep of the church, a waking sleep, but the plain sleep of the eyes; and that not a slumbering sleep, which David denies to himself (Psal. cxxxii.) but a sound sleep, which Solomon forbids (Prov. vi. 4); yea, rather the dead sleep of Adam or Jonas; and, as Bernard had wont to say when he heard a monk snore, they did carnaliter seu seculariter dormire. Prayer is an ordinary receipt for sleep.

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and set upon our heads, and never lift up | our hearts to their Creator and ours, either to ask his blessing or to acknowledge it. Of all men under heaven, none had so much need to pray as courtiers. That which was done but once to Christ, is always done to them. They are set upon the hill, and see the glory of the kingdoms of the earth. But I fear it is seen of them as it is with some of the mariners, the more need, the less devotion. Ye have seen the place; see the attend-up in his hands, in that transported fashion, ants. He would not have many, because he would not have it yet known to all: hence was his intermination, and sealing up their mouths with a nemini dicite, "tell no man." Not none, because he would not have it altogether unknown; and afterwards would have it known to all. Three were a legal number: in ore duorum aut trium,“ in the mouth of two or three witnesses." He had eternally possessed the glory of his Father without any witnesses; in time the angels were blessed with that sight; and after that, two bodily yet heavenly witnesses, were allowed, Enoch and Elias. Now, in his humanity, he was invested with glory, he takes but three witnesses, and those earthly and weak, Peter, James, John. And why these? We may be too curious: Peter, because the eldest; John, because the dearest; James, because, next Peter, the zealousest: Peter, because he loved Christ most; John, because Christ most loved him; James, because, next to both, he loved, and was loved most. I had rather to have no reason, but quia complacuit, "because it so pleased him." Why may we not as well ask why he chose these twelve from others, as why he chose three out of the twelve? If any Romanists will raise from hence any privilege to Peter, (which we would be well content to yield, if that would make them ever the honester men) they must remember that they must take company with them, which these Pompeian spirits cannot abide. As good no privilege as any partners. And withal, they must see him more taxed for his error in this act, than honoured by his presence at the act; whereas the beloved disciple saw and erred not. These same three, which were witnesses of his transfiguration in the mount, were witnesses of his agony in the garden; all three, and these three alone, were present at both; but both times sleeping. These were arietes gregis, “the bell- | wedders of the flock," as Austin calls them. O weak devotion of three great disciples! These were Paul's three pillars, rúλ | doxoūvres, Gal. ii. 9. Christ takes them up twice; once to be witnesses of his greatest

How prone are we to it, when we should mind divine things! Adam slept in Paradise and lost a rib but this sleep was of God's giving, and this rib was of God's taking. The good husbandman slept, and found tares. Eutychus slept, and fell. While Satan lulls us asleep, as he doth always rock the cradle when we sleep in our devotions, he ever takes some good from us, or puts some evil in us, or endangers us a deadly fall. Away with this spiritual lethargy! Bernard had wont to say, that those which sleep are dead to men, those that are dead are asleep to God. But, I say, those that sleep at church are dead to God: so we preach their funeral sermons instead of hortatory. And as he was wont to say, he lost no time so much as that wherein he slept; so let me add, there is no loss of time so desperate as of holy time. Think that Christ saith to thee at every sermon,

as he did to Peter, Etiam Petre dormis? | Tertull. in 4. adver. Marcionem. Alter "Sleepest thou, Peter? couldst thou not wake with me one hour?" A slumbering and a drowsy heart does not become the business and presence of him that keepeth Israel, and slumbers not.

These were the attendants: see the companions of Christ. As our glory is not consummate without society, no more would Christ have his; therefore his transfiguration hath two companions, Moses, Elias. As St. Paul says of himself, " Whether in the body or out of the body, I know not, God knows;" so say I of these two. Of Elias there may seem less doubt, since we know that his body was assumed to heaven, and might as well come down for Christ's glory, as go up for his own; although some grave authors, as Calvin, Ecolampadius, Bale, Fulk, have held this body with Enoch's resolved into their elements. Sed ego non credulus illis, Enoch translatus est in carne, et Elias carneus raptus est in coelum, &c. "Enoch was translated in the flesh, and Elias, being yet in the flesh, was taken into neaven," saith Jerom, in his epistle ad Pammachium.

initiator Veteris Testamenti, alter consummator Novi, "one the first register of the Old Testament, the other the shutter up of the New.' I verily think with Hilary, that these two are pointed at as the forerunners of the second coming of Christ, as now they were the foretellers of his departure: neither doubt I that these are the two witnesses which are alluded to in the Apocalypse, howsoever divers of the fathers have thrust Enoch into the place of Moses. Look upon the place, Apoc. xi. 5, who but Elias can be he of whom it is said, “If any man will hurt him, fire proceedeth out of his mouth and devoureth his enemies?" alluding to 2 Kings i. Who but Elias, of whom it is said, "He hath power to shut the heaven, that it rain not in the days of his prophesying?" alluding to 1 Kings xviii. Who but Moses of whom it is said, "He hath power to turn the waters into blood, and smite the earth with all manner of plagues?" alluding to Exodus vii. 8. But take me aright, let me not seem a friend to the publicans of Rome, an abettor of those Alcoran-like fables of our Popish doctors, who, not seeing the And for Moses, though it be rare and wood for trees, do hærere in cortice, "stick singular, and Austin makes much scruple of in the bark;" taking all concerning that it, yet why might not he after death return Antichrist according to the letter, Odi et in his body to the glory of Christ's trans- arceo. So shall Moses and Elias come figuration, as well as afterwards many of the again in those witnesses, as Elias is already saints did to the glory of his resurrection? come in John Baptist : their spirits shall be I cannot therefore, with the gloss, think in these witnesses, whose bodies and spirits there is any reason why Moses should take were witnesses both of the present glory another, a borrowed body, rather than his and future passion of Christ. Doubtless own. Heaven could not give two fitter many thousand angels saw this sight, and companions, more admirable to the Jews were not seen; these two both saw and for their miracles, more gracious with God were seen. O how great a happiness was for their faith and holiness; both of them it for these two great prophets, in their gloadmitted to the conference with God in rified flesh to see their glorified Saviour, Horeb; both of them types of Christ; both who before his incarnation had spoken to of them fasted forty days; both of them for them! To speak to that Man-God, of whom the glory of God suffered many perils; both they were glorified, and to become prophets divided the waters; both the messengers of not to men, but to God! And if Moses' God to kings; both of them marvellous, as face so shone before, when he spoke to him in their life so in their end. A chariot of without a body in mount Sinai, in the midst angels took away Elias; he was sought by of the flames and clouds, how did it shine the prophets, and not found. Michael strove now, when himself glorified speaks to him with the devil for the body of Moses; he was a man, in Tabor, in light and majesty! sought for by the Jews and not found, and Elias hid his face before with a mantle when now both of them are found here together he passed by him in the rock; now with on Tabor. This Elias shows himself to open face he beholds him present, and in the royal prophet of his church; this Moses his own glory adores his. Let that impushows himself to the true Michael. Moses dent Marcion, who ascribes the law and the publisher of the law, Elias the chief of prophets to another god, and devises a hos. the prophets, show themselves to the God tility betwixt Christ and them, be ashamed of the law and prophets. Alter populi in- to see Moses and Elias not only in colloformator aliquando, alter reformator quan- quio, but in consortio claritatis, not only doque, "one the informer once of the people, in conference, but in a partnership of brightthe other the reformer sometimes," saithness," as Tertullian speaks, with Christ

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whom, if he had misliked, he had his choice of all the choir of heaven; and now choosing them, why were they not in sordibus et tenebris," in rags and darkness?" Sic in alienos demonstrat illos dum secum habet; sic relinquendos docet quos sibi jungit; sic destruit quos de radiis suis exstruit. "So doth he show them far from strangeness to him, whom he hath with him; so doth he teach them to be forsaken, whom he joins with himself; so doth he destroy those whom he graces with his beams of glory," saith that father. His act verifies his word, "Think not that I come to destroy the law or the prophets; I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil them," Matth. v. 17. O what consolation, what confirmation was this to the disciples, to see such examples of their future glory! such witnesses and adorers of the eternal Deity of their Master: They saw, in Moses and Elias, what they themselves should be. How could they ever fear to be miserable, that saw such precedents of their ensuing glory? how could they fear to die, that saw in others the happiness of their own change? The rich glutton pleads with Abraham, that "if one came to them from the dead, they will amend:" Abraham answers, 66 They have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them." Behold, here is both Moses and the prophets, and these too come from the dead: how can we now but be persuaded of the happy state of another world, unless we will make ourselves worse than the damned? See and consider that the saints of God are not lost, but departed; gone into a far country with their Master, to return again richer and better than they went. Lest we should think this the condition of Elias only, that was rapt into heaven, see here Moses matched with him, that died and was buried. And is this the state of these two saints alone? shall none be seen with him in the Tabor of heaven, but those which have seen him in Horeb and Carmel? O thou weak Christian, was only one or two limbs of Christ's body glorious in the transfiguration, or the whole? he is the head, we are the members. If Moses and Elias were more excellent parts, tongue or hand, let us be but heels or toes; his body is not perfect in glory without ours. "When Christ, which is our life, shall appear, then shall we also appear with him in glory," Colos. iii. 4. How truly may we say to death, "Rejoice not, mine enemy; though I fall, yet shall I rise; yea, I shall rise in falling.' We shall not all sleep, we shall be " changed," saith St. Paul to his Thessalonians. Elias was changed, Moses slept:

| both appeared; to teach us, that neither our sleep nor change can keep us from appearing with him. When therefore thou shalt receive the sentence of death on mount Nebo, or when the fiery chariot shall come and sweep thee from this vale of mortality, remember thy glorious re-apparition with thy Saviour, and thou canst not but be comforted, and cheerfully triumph over that last enemy, outfacing those terrors with the assurance of a blessed resurrection to glory. To the which, &c.

CONTEMPLATION XIII.—THE SECOND PART OF THE MEDITATIONS UPON THE TRANSFIGURATION OF CHRIST.

A Sermon preached at Whitehall, before King James.

Ir falls out with this discourse as with mount Tabor itself, that it is more easily climbed with the eye than with the foot. If we may not rather say of it, as Josephus did of Sinai, that it doth not only ascensus hominum, but aspectus fatigare, "weary not only the steps, but the very sight of men." We had thought not to spend many breaths, in the skirts of the hill, the circumstances: and it hath cost us one hour's journey already; and we were glad to rest us ere we can have left them below us. One pause more, I hope, will overcome them, and set us on the top. No circumstance remains undiscussed but this one, what Moses and Elias did with Christ in their apparition? For they were not, as some sleepy attendants, like the three disciples in the beginning, to be there and see nothing; nor, as some silent spectators, mute witnesses, to see and say nothing: but, as if their glory had no whit changed their profession, they are prophets still, and foretold his departure," as St. Luke tells us. Foretold, not to him which knew it before, yea, which told it them; they could not have known it but from him; he was Aéyos, “the word" of his Father: they told but that which he before had told his disciples, and now these heavenly witnesses tell it over again, for confirmation. Like as John Baptist knew Christ before; he was vor clamantis, "the voice of a crier :" the other, verbum Patris, "the word of his Father:" there is great affinity betwixt vor and verbum, yea, this voice had uttered itself clearly, Ecce agnus Dei, Behold the Lamb of God;" yet he sends his disciples with an "Art thou he?" that he might confirm to them by him, that which he both knew and had said of him. So our Saviour follows his forerunner in this, that what he knew and told his dis

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ciples, the other Elias, the typical John Baptist, and Moses, must make good to their belief.

This s,"departure of Christ," was oxλngès hoyos, a word both hard and harsh; hard to believe, and harsh in believing. The disciples thought of nothing but a kingdom; a kingdom restored magnificently, interminably; and two of these three witnesses had so swallowed this hope, that they had put in for places in the state, to be his chief peers. How could they think of a parting? The throne of David did so fill their eyes, that they could not see his cross; and if they must let down this pill, how bitter must it needs be? His presence was their joy and life it was their death to think of his loss. Now, therefore, that they might see that his sufferings and death were not of any sudden impotence, but predetermined in heaven, and revealed to the saints, two of the most noted saints in heaven shall second the news of his departure, and that in the midst of his transfiguration: that they could not choose but think, He that can be thus happy, needs not be miserable; that passion which he will undergo, is not out of weakness, but out of love. It is wittily noted by that sweet Chrysostom, that Christ never lightly spake of his passion, but immediately before and after he did some great miracle. And here, answerably, in the midst of his miraculous transfiguration, the two saints speak of his passion. A strange opportunity! in his highest exaltation to speak of his sufferings; to talk of Calvary in Tabor; when his head shone with glory, to tell him how it must bleed with thorns; when his face shone like the sun, to tell him it must be blubbered and spit upon; when his garments glistered with that celestial brightness, to tell him they must be stripped and divided; when he was adored by the saints of heaven, to tell him how he must be scorned by the basest of men; when he was seen between two saints, to tell him how he must be seen between two malefactors: in a word, in the midst of his divine Majesty, to tell him of his shame; and, while he was transfigured in the mount, to tell him how he must be disfigured upon the cross. Yet these two heavenly prophets found this the fittest time for this discourse: rather choosing to speak of his sufferings in the height of his glory, than of his glory after his sufferings. It is most seasonable in our best, to think of our worst estate; for both that thought will be best digested when we are well, and that change will be best prepared for when we are the farthest from it. You would perhaps think

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it unseasonable for me, in the midst of all your court jollity, to tell you of the days of mourning, and, with that great king, to serve in a death's-head amongst your royal dishes, to show you coffins in the midst of your triumphs; yet these precedents, above exception, show me, that no time is so fit as this. Let me therefore say to you, with the Psalmist, "I have said, ye are gods:" if ye were transfigured in Tabor, could ye be more? "but ye shall die like men:" there is your ἔξοδος. It was a worthy and witty note of Jerome, that amongst all trees the cedars are bidden to praise God, which are the tallest and yet dies Domini super omnes cedros Libani, “the day of the Lord shall be upon all the cedars of Lebanon," Isaiah ii. Ye gallants, whom a little yellow earth, and the webs of that curious worm, have made gorgeous without, and perhaps proud within, remember that, ere long, as one worm decks you without, so another worm shall consume you within, and that both the earth that you prank up, and that earth where with you prank it, is running back into dust. Let not your high estate hide from you your fatal humiliation : let not your purples hide from you your winding-sheet, but even on the top of Tabor think of the depth of the grave; think of your departure from men, while ye are advanced above men.

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We are now ascended the top of the hill, let us therefore stand, and see, and wonder at this great sight: as Moses, to see thebush flaming and not consumed;" so we, to see the humanity continuing itself in the midst of these beams of glory. Christ was in pogon doukov, saith St. Paul," in the form of a servant;" now for the time he was truly TapogPál, "transformed:" that there is no cause why Maldonat should so inveigh against some of ours, yea of his own, as Jansenius, who translates it transformation for what is the external form but the figure? and their own Vulgate (as hotly as he takes it) reads it, Philip. ii. 7. μogàv doux, "formam servi accipiens," "taking the form of a servant." There is no danger in this ambiguity; not the substantial form but the external fashion of Christ was changed: he having three forms (as Bernard distinguishes), Contemptam, splendidam, divinam, "the despised, the resplendent, the divine," changeth here the first into the second: this is one of the rarest occurrences that ever befell the Saviour of the world. I am wont to reckon up these four principal wonders of his life; incarnation, temptation, transfiguration, and agony: the first, in the womb of the virgin; the se

cond, in the wilderness; the third, in the mount; the fourth, in the garden. The first, that God should become man; the second, that God and man should be tempted, and transported by Satan; the third, that man should be glorified upon earth; the last, that he which was man and God should sweat blood, under the sense of God's wrath for man: and all these either had the angels for witnesses, or the immediate voice of God. The first had angels singing; the second angels ministering; the third the voice of God thundering; the fourth the angels comforting; that it may be no wonder, the earth marvels at those things, whereat the angels of heaven stand amazed. Bernard makes three kinds of wonderful changes; sublimitas in humilita- | tem, "height to lowliness," when the Word took flesh; contemptibilitas in majestatem, when Christ transformed himself before his disciples; mutabilitas in eternitatem, when he arose again, and ascended to heaven to reign for ever: ye see this is one of them; and as Tabor did rise out of the valley of Galilee, so this exaltation did rise out of the midst of Christ's humiliation. Other marvels do increase his dejection, this only makes for his glory; and the glory of this is matchable with the humiliation of all the rest. That face, wherein before (saith Isaiah) there was no form nor beauty, now shines as the sun that face, which men hid their faces from in contempt, now shines so, that mortal eyes could not choose but hide themselves from the lustre of it, and immortal receive their beams from it: He had ever in vultu sidereum quiddam, as Jerome speaks, a "certain heavenly majesty and port in his countenance," which made his disciples follow him at first-sight, but now here was the perfection of super-celestial brightness. It was a miracle in the three children, that they were so delivered from the flames, that their very garments smelt not of the fire: it is no less miracle in Christ, that his very garments were dyed celestial, and did savour of his glory. Like as Aaron was so anointed on his head and beard, that his skirts were all perfumed: his clothes therefore shined as snow, yea, (that were but a waterish white), as the light itself, saith St. Mark and Matthew, in the most Greek copies: that seamless coat, as it had no welt, so it had no spot. The king's son is all fair, even without. O excellent glory of his humanity! the best diamond or carbuncle is hid with a case: but this brightness pierceth through all his garments, and makes them lightsome in him, which use to conceal light in others:

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Herod put him on in mockage isūra 2æjorgàv, (Luke xxiii.) not a white, but a bright robe (the ignorance whereof makes a show of disparity in the evangelists); but God the Father, to glorify him, clothes his very garments with heavenly splendour. "Behold, thou art fair, my beloved; behold, thou art fair; and there is no spot in thee. Thine head is as fine gold, thy mouth is as sweet things, and thou art wholly delectable. Come forth, ye daughters of Sion, and behold king Solomon, with the crown wherewith his father crowned him, in the day of the gladness of his heart!" O Saviour, if thou wert such in Tabor, what art thou in heaven? if this were the glory of thy humanity, what is the presence of thy Godhead. Let no man yet wrong himself so much, as to magnify this happiness as another's; and to put himself out of the participation of this glory. Christ is our head, we are his members; as we all were in the first Adam, both innocent and sinning; so are we in the second Adam, both shining in Tabor, and bleeding sweat in the garden: and as we are already happy in him, so shall we be once in ourselves, by and through him. He shall change our vile bodies, that they may be like his glorious body: behold our pattern, and rejoice! like his glorious body. These very bodies, that are now cloudy like the earth, shall once be bright as the sun; and we, that now see clay in one another's faces, shall then see nothing but heaven in our countenances; and we, that now set forth our bodies with clothes, shall then be clothed upon with immortality, out of the wardrobe of heaven: and if ever any painted face should be admitted to the sight of this glory, (as I much fear it, yea, I am sure God will have none but true faces in heaven), they would be ashamed to think, that ever they had faces to daub with these beastly pigments, in comparison of this heavenly complexion. Let us therefore look upon this flesh, not so much with contempt of what it was, and is, as with a joyful hope of what it shall be; and when our courage is assaulted with the change of these bodies from healthful to weak, from living to dead, let us comfort ourselves with the assurance of this change, from dust to incorruption. We are not so sure of death, as of transfiguration; all the days of our appointed time we will, therefore, wait till our changing shall come.

Now, from the glory of the Master, give me leave to turn your eyes to the error of the servant, who having slept with the rest, and now suddenly awaking, knoweth not whether he slept still. To see such a light

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