abjecerunt, we ourselves cast him away, since we have been told where to find him, and have not sought him: and let no man be afraid to seek or find him for fear of the loss of good company; religion is no sullen thing, it is not a melancholy, there is not so sociable a thing as the love of Christ Jesus.

It was the first word which he who first found Christ of all the apostles, St. Andrew, is noted to have said, Invenimus Messiam, We have found the Messias, and it is the first act that he is noted to have done, after he had found him, to seek his brother Peter, Et duxit ad Jesum 1, so communicable a thing is the love of Jesus, when we have found him.

18

But when are we likeliest to find him? It is said by Moses, of the words and precepts of God, They are not hid from thee, neither are far off, not in heaven that thou shouldst say; Who shall go up to heaven for us to bring them down? nor beyond the seas, that thou shouldest go over the sea for them; but the word is very near thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart; and so near thee is Christ Jesus, or thou shalt never find him; thou must not so think him in heaven, as that thou canst not have immediate access to him without intercession of others, nor so beyond sea, as to seek him in a foreign church, either where the church is but an antiquary's cabinet, full of rags and fragments of antiquity, but nothing fit for that use for which it was first made, or where it is so new a built house with bare walls, that it is yet unfurnished of such ceremonies as should make it comely and reverend; Christ is at home with thee, he is at home within thee, and there is the nearest way to find him.

It is true, that Christ in the beginning of this chapter, shadowed under the name of Wisdom, when he discovers where he may be found, speaks in the person of human wisdom as well as divine, Doth not wisdom cry, and understanding utter her voice? where those two words, wisdom and understanding, signify sapientiam, and prudentiam; that wisdom whose object is God, and that which concerns our conversation in this world; for Christ hath not taken so narrow a dwelling, as that he may be found but one way, or in one profession; for in all professions, in all nations, in all vocations, when all our actions in our several 14 Deut. xxx. 11

13 John i. 34.

courses are directed principally upon his glory, Christ is eminent, and may easily be found. To that purpose in that place, Christ, in the person of Wisdom, offers himself to be found in the tops. of high places, and in the gates of cities; to show that this Christ, and this wisdom which must save our souls, is not confined to cloisters and monasteries, and speculative men only, but is also evidently and eminently to be found in the courts of religious princes, in the tops of high places, and in the courts of justice (in the gates of the city) both these kinds of courts may have more directions from him than other places; but yet in these places he is also gloriously and conspicuously to be found; for wheresoever he is, he cries aloud, as the text says there, and he utters his voice. Now temptations to sin, are all but whisperings, and we are afraid that a husband, that a father, that a competitor, that a rival, a pretender, at least the magistrate may hear of it; temptations to sin are all but whisperings; private conventicles and clandestine worshipping of God in a forbidden manner, in corners, are all but whisperings; it is not the voice of Christ, except thou hear him cry aloud, and utter his voice, so as thou mayest confidently do whatsoever he commands thee, in the eye of all the world; he is everywhere to be found, he calls upon thee every where, but yet there belongs a diligence on thy part, thou must seek him.

Esaias is bold (says St. Paul) and says, I was found of them that sought me not, when that prophet derives the love of God to the Gentiles, who could seek God no where but in the book of creatures, and were destitute of all other lights to seek him by, and yet God was found by them; Esaias is bold (cries the apostle 13) that is, It was a great degree of confidence in Esaias, to say, That God was found of them that sought him not: it was a boldness and confidence, which no particular man may have; that Christ will be found, except he be sought; he gives us light to seek him by, but he is not found till we have sought him; it is true that in that commandment of his, Primum quærite regnum Dei; First seek the kingdom of God; the primum is not to prevent God, that we should seek it before he shows it, that is impossible; without the light of grace we dwell in darkness, and

15 Rom. x. 20.

in the shadow of death; but the primum is; that we should seek it before we seek anything else, that when the sun of grace is risen to us, the first thing that we do be to seek Christ Jesus : Quærite me et vivetis, Seek me, and ye shall live, Why? we were alive before, else we could not seek him, but it is a promise of another life, of an eternal life, if we seek him, and seek him early, which is our last consideration.

The word there used for early, signifies properly auroram, the morning, and is usually transferred in Scriptures to any beginning of any action; so in particular, Ecil shall come upon thee, and thou shalt not know, shakrah, the morning, the beginning of it'; and therefore this text is elegantly translated by one, Aurorantes ad me, They that have their break of day towards me, they that send forth their first morning beams towards me, their first thoughts, they shall be sure to find me. St. Hierome expresses this early diligence, required in us, well in his translation, Qui mane vigilaverint; They that wake betimes in the morning shall find me; but the Chaldee paraphrase better, Qui mane consurgunt, They that rise betimes in the morning shall find me; for which of us doth not know that we waked long ago, that we saw day, and had heretofore some motions to find Christ Jesus but though we were awake, we have kept our bed still, we have continued still in our former sins; so that there is more to be done than waking: we see the spouse herself says, In my bed, by night, I sought him whom my soul loved, but I have found him not13; Christ may be sought in the bed, and missed; other thoughts may exclude him; and he may be sought there and found, we may have good meditations there; and Christ may be nearer us when we are asleep in our beds, than when we are awake; but howsoever the bed is not his ordinary station; he may be, and he says he will be, at the making of the bed of the sick, but not at the marriage of the bed of the wanton, and licentious.

16 Amos v. 4.

a

17 Isaiah XLvii. 11., auroram. But this more probably means, morning after the night of evil;" although all the versions render it otherwise.-ED.

18 Cant. iii. 1.

To make haste, the circumstance only required here, is that he be sought early; and to invite thee to it, consider how early he sought thee; it is a great mercy that he stays so long for thee; it was more to seek thee so early: Dost thou not feel that he seeks thee now, in offering his love and desiring thine? Canst not thou remember that he sought thee yesterday, that is, that some temptations besieged thee then, and he sought thee out by his grace, and preserved thee? and hath he not sought thee so, so early, as from the beginning of thy life? nay, dost thou not remember that after thou hadst committed that sin, he sought thee by imprinting some remorse, some apprehension of his judgments, and so Miro et divino modo, et quando te oderat diligebat1, By a miraculous and powerful working of his Spirit, he threatened thee, when he comforted thee, he loved thee when he chid thee, he sought thee when he drove thee from him; he hath sought thee amongst the infinite numbers of false and fashional Christians, that he might bring thee out from the hypocrite, to serve him in earnest, and in holiness, and in righteousness; he sought thee before that amongst the herd of the nations and Gentiles, who had no church to bring thee into his inclosures and pastures, his visible church, and to feed thee with his word and sacraments; he sought thee before that, in the catalogue of all his creatures, where he might have left thee a stone, or a plant, or a beast; and then he gave thee an immortal soul, capable of all his future blessings; yea, before this he sought thee, when thou wast no where, nothing, he brought thee then, the greatest step of all, from being nothing, to be a creature; how early did he seek thee, when he sought thee in Adam's confused loins, and out of that leavened and sour loaf in which we were all kneaded up, out of that massa damnata, that refuse and condemnable lump of dough, he sought and severed out that grain which thou shouldst be; yea, millions of millions of generations before all this, he sought thee in his own eternal decree; and in that first Scripture of his, which is as old as himself, in the book of life, he wrote thy name in the blood of that Lamb which was slain for thee, not only from the beginning of this world, but from the writing of that eternal decree of thy salvation. Thus early had he sought thee

19 Gregory.

in the church amongst hypocrites; out of the church amongst the heathen; in his creatures amongst creatures of an ignoble nature, and in the first vacuity, when thou wast nothing he sought thee so early as in Adam, so early as in the book of life, and when wilt thou think it a fit time to seek him?

There is an earliness which will not serve thy turn, when afflictions, and anguish, shall come upon thee; They shall seek me early, and shall not find me, early in respect of the punishment, at the beginning of that; but this is late in respect of thy fault, or of thine age, when thou art grown old, in the custom of sin; for thus we may misuse this early, and make it serve all ill uses, if we will say, we will leave covetousness early, that is, as soon as we are rich enough; incontinence early, that is, as soon as we are old or sick; ambition early, that is, as soon as we have overthrown and crushed our enemies irrecoverably; for thus, we shall by this habit, carry on this early to our late and last hour, and say, We will repent early, that is, as soon as the bell begins to toll for us.

21

It is good for a man that he bear his yoke in his youth, that he seek Christ early, for even God himself, when he had given over his people to be afflicted by the Chaldeans, yet complains of the Chaldeans, that they laid heavy loads upon old men ; though this yoke of this amorous seeking of Christ be a light yoke, yet it is too heavy for an old man, that hath never used himself in all his life to bear it; even this spiritual love will not suit well with an old man, if he never began before, if he never loved Christ in his youth, even this love will be an unwieldy thing in his

age.

Yet if we have omitted our first early, our youth, there is one early left for us; this minute; seek Christ early, now, now, as soon as his Spirit begins to shine upon your hearts. Now as soon as you begin your day of regeneration, seek him the first minute of this day, for you know not whether this day shall have two minutes or no, that is, whether his Spirit, that descends upon you now, will tarry and rest upon you or not, as it did upon Christ at his baptism.

Therefore shall every one that is godly make his prayer unto

10 Prov. i. 28.

21 Isaiah XLVI. 6.