A SERMON Of Good Works annexed unto Faith. No good work can be done without faith. John xv. Heb. xi. IN Now, by God's grace, fhall be declared the fecond thing that before was noted of faith; that without it can no good work be done, acceptable and pleasant unto God; For as a branch cannot bear fruit of itself, faith our Saviour Christ, except it abide in the vine; fo cannot you, except you abide in me. I am the vine, and you are the branches: he that abideth in me, and I in him, he bringeth forth much fruit: for without me you can do nothing. And St. Paul proveth, that Enoch had faith, because he pleafed God; For with out faith, faith he, it is not possible to please God. And Rom. xiv. again, to the Romans he faith, Whatfoever work is done without faith, it is fin. Faith giveth life to the foul; and they be as much dead to God that lack faith, as they be to the world whofe bodies lack fouls. Without faith, all that is done of us is but dead before God, although the work seem never fo gay and glorious before man. Even as the picture graven or painted is but a dead representation of the thing itself, and is without life, or any manner of moving; fo be the works of all unfaithful perfons before God: they do appear to be lively works, and indeed they be but dead, not availing to the everlasting life: they be but shadows and fhews of lively and good things, and not good and lively things indeed: for true faith doth give life to the works, and out of fuch faith come good works, that be very good works indeed; and without faith no In Præfat. work is good before God, as faith St. Auguftine. We Pfal. xxxi. muft Pfal. xxxi. muft fet no good works before faith, nor think that before faith a man may do any good work; for fuch works, although they feem unto men to be praiseworthy, yet indeed they be but vain, and not allowed before God.. They be as the courfe of a horfe that runneth out of the way, which taketh great labour, but to no purpose. Let no man, therefore, faith he, reckon upon his good works before his faith; whereas faith was not, good works were not. The intent, faith he, maketh the good works; but faith muft guide and order the intent of man. And Chrift faith, If thine eye be naught, thy whole body is full of darkness. The Matt. vi. eye doth fignify the intent, faith St. Auguftine, wherewith In Præfat. a man doth a thing: fo that he which doth not his good works with a godly intent, and a true faith that worketh by love, the whole body befide, that is to fay, all the whole number of his works, is dark, and there is no light in them. For good deeds be not measured by the facts themfelves, and fo difcerned from vices; but by the ends and intents, for the which they be done. If a Heathen man clothe the naked, feed the hungry, and do fuch other like works; yet, because he doth them not in faith for the honour and love of God, they be but dead, vain, and fruitless works to him. Faith is it that doth commend the work to God: for, as St. Auguftine faith, whether thou wilt or no, that work, that cometh not of faith, is naught; where the faith of Chrift is not the foundation, there is no good work, what building foever we make. There is one work, in the which be all good works, that is faith, which worketh by charity: if thou have it, thou haft the ground of all good works; for the virtues of ftrength, wildom, tempe rance, and juftice, be all referred unto this fame faith Without this faith we have not them, but only the names and fhadows of them as St. Auguftine faith, All the life of them that lack the true faith is fin, and nothing is good without him that is the Author of goodness: where he is not, there is but feigned virtue, although it be in the best works. And St. Auguftine, declaring this verfe of the Pfalm, The turtle hath found a neft where the may keep her young birds, faith, that Jews, Hereticks, and Pagans do good works; they clothe the naked, feed the poor, and do other works of mercy: but because they be not done in the true faith, therefore the birds be loft. But if they remain in faith, then faith is the neft and safeguard of their birds, that is to fay, fafeguard of their good works, that the reward of them be not utterly loft. And De vocatiothis matter (which St. Augustine at large in many books ne gentium disputeth) D 4 lib. i. c. 3 difputeth) St. Ambrofe concludeth in few words, faying, He that by nature would withstand vice, either by natural will or reafon, he doth in vain garnish the time of this life, and attaineth not the very true virtues; for without the worfhipping of the true God, that which feemeth to be virtue is vice. And yet moft plainly to this purpose writeth St. In fermone John Chryfoftom in this wife, You fhall find many which de fide, le- have not the true faith, and be not of the flock of Christ, ge, et SpiSanto, and yet, as it appeareth, they flourish in good works of ritu John vi. mercy; you fhall find them full of pity, compaffion, and given to juftice; and yet, for all that, they have no fruit of their works, because the chief work lacketh. For when the Jews afked of Chrift, what they fhould do to work good works, he answered, This is the work of God, to believe in him whom he fent: fo that he called faith the work of God. And as foon as a man hath faith, anon he thall flourish in good works; for faith of itself is full of good works, and nothing is good without faith. And for a fimilitude, he faith, that they which glifter and fhine in good works, without faith in God, be like dead men, which have goodly and precious tombs, and yet it availeth them nothing. Faith may not be naked without good works, for then it is no true faith: and when it is adjoined to works, yet it is above the works. For as men, that be very men indeed, firft have life, and after be nourished; fo mult our faith in Chrift go before, and after be nourished with good works. And life may be without nourishment, but nourishment cannot be without life. A man muft needs be nourished by good works, but firft he must have faith. He that doth good deeds, yet without faith, he hath no life. I can fhew a man that by faith without works lived, and came to heaven: but without faith, never man had life. The thief, that was hanged when Chrift fuffered, did believe only, and the most merciful God juftified him. And because no man fhall fay again, that he lacked time to do good works, for elfe he would have done them: truth it is, and I will not contend therein but this I will furely affirm, that faith only faved him. If he had lived, and not regarded faith, and the works thereof, he fhould have loft his falvation again. But this is the effect that I say, that faith by itself faved him, but works by themselves never juftified any man. Here ye have heard the mind of St. Chryfoftom, whereby you may perceive, that neither faith is without works, (having opportunity thereto,) nor works cau avail to everlasting life, without faith. are that The Second Part of the Sermon of Good Works. OF three things which were in the former Sermon fpecially noted of lively faith, to be declared unto you, the firft was, that faith is never idle, without good works when occafion ferveth: the fecond, that good works acceptable to God cannot be done without faith. Now What to go forward to the third part, that is, what manner of works they works they be which fpring out of true faith, and lead spring faithful men unto everlasting life. This cannot be known of faith. fo well as by our Saviour Chrift himself, who was asked of a certain great man the fame question; What works shall I Matt. xix. do, faid a Prince, to come to everlasting life? To whom Jefus anfwered, If thou wilt come to everlasting life, keep the commandments. But the Prince, not fatisfied herewith, asked farther, Which commandments? The Scribes and Pharifees had made so many of their own laws and traditions, to bring men to heaven, befides God's commandments, that this man was in doubt whether he fhould come to heaven by thofe laws and traditions, or by the Law of God; and therefore he asked Chrift, which commandments he meant. Whereunto Chrift made him a plain anfwer, rehearsing the commandments of God, faying, Thou shalt not kill, Thou Matt. xix. fhall not commit adultery, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear falfe witnefs, Honour thy father and thy mother, and, Love thy neighbour as thyfelf. By which words Chrift declared, The works that the laws of God be the very way that doth lead to heaven, be everlafting life, and not the traditions and laws of men. the works So that this is to be taken for a moft true leffon taught by of God's Chrift's own mouth, that the works of the moral com- commandmandments of God be the very true works of faith, which lead to the bleffed life to come. But the blindness and malice of man, even from the beginning, hath ever been Man from ready to fall from God's commandments: as Adam the his firft fallfirst man, having but one commandment, that he should ing from not eat of the fruit forbidden; notwithstanding God's com- mandmandment, he gave credit unto the woman, feduced by ments hath the fubtile perfuafion of the ferpent, and fo followed his ready to do own will, and left God's commandment.. And ever fince the like, that time, all that came of him have been fo blinded anddoth dethrough original fin, that they have been ever ready to of his own fall from God and his Law, and to invent a new way unto fantasy to falvation by works of their own device; fo much, that al- please God most all the world, forfaking the true honour of the only eternal that lead to ments. God's com ever been vife works withal. try of the Gentiles. tries of the eternal living God, wandered about their own fantafies, The devices worshipping fome the fun, the moon, the ftars; fome Juand idola piter, Juno, Diana, Saturnus, Apollo, Neptunus, Ceres, Bacchus, and other dead men and women: fome, therewith not fatisfied, worshipping divers kinds of beasts, birds, fish, fowl, and ferpents; every country, town, and house, in a manner being divided, and fetting up images of fuch things as they liked, and worshipping the fame. Such was the rudeness of the people after they fell to their own fantafies, and left the eternal living God and his commandments, that they devifed innumerable images and gods. In which error and blindness they did remain, until such time as Almighty God, pitying the blindness of man, fent his true Prophet Mofes into the world, to reprove and rebuke this extreme madness, and to teach the people to know the only living God, and his true honour and worfhip. But the corrupt inclination of man was so much given to follow his own fantafies, and, as you would say, to favour his own bird that he brought up himself, that all the admonitions, exhortations, benefits, and threatenings The devices of God could not keep him from fuch his inventions. For and idola- notwithstanding all the benefits of God fhewed unto the Ifraelites. people of Ifrael, yet when Mofes went up into the mountain to fpeak with Almighty God, he had tarried there but a few days, when the people began to invent new gods: and, as it came into their heads, they made a calf of gold, and kneeled down and worshipped it. And after that they followed the Moabites, and worfhipped Beelphegor, the Moabites' God. Read the book of Judges, the books of the Kings, and the Prophets; and there you fhall find how unsteadfast the people were, how full of inventions, and more ready to run after their own fantafies, than God's moft holy commandments. There fhall you read of Baal, Moloch, Chamos, Melchom, Baalpeor, Aftaroth, Bel, the Dragon, Priapus, the brazen Serpent, the twelve Signs, and many others, unto whofe images the people, with great devotion, invented pilgrimages, precious decking and cenfing them, kneeling down and offering to them, thinking that an high merit before God, and to be efteemed above the precepts and commandments of God. And where, at that time, God commanded no facrifice to be made but in Jerufalem only, they did clean contrary, making altars and facrifices every where, in hills, in woods, and in houses, not regarding God's commandments, but efteeming their own fantafies and devotions to be better than they. And the error hereof Exod. xxxii. was |