manna; so, for God's corrections, they have a different taste in different persons; and howsoever the serpent found nothing but judgment, yet we find mercy even in that judgment. The evening and the morning make up the day, says Moses12; as soon as he had named evening comes in morning, no interposing of the mention of a dark, and sad night between. As soon as I hear of a judgment, I apprehend mercy, no interposing of any dark or sad suspicion, or diffidence, or distrust in God, and his mercy; and to that purpose we consider the serpent's punishment, and especially as it is heightened, and aggravated in this text, Dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life. There are three degrees in the serpent's punishment; first, Super pectus, He must creep upon his belly; and secondly, Inimicitias ponam, I will put enmity, God will raise him an enemy; and thirdly, Pulverem comedes, Dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life. And, in all these three, though they aggravate the judgment upon the serpent, there is mercy to us; for, for the first, that the serpent now does but creep upon his belly, St. Augustine, and St. Gregory understand this belly to be the seat of our affections, and our concupiscences; that the serpent hath no power upon our heart, nor upon our brain, for, if we bring a temptation to consideration, to deliberation, that we stop at it, think of it, study it, and foresee the consequences, this frustrates the temptation. Our nobler faculties are always assisted with the grace of God to resist him, though the belly, the bowels of sin, in sudden surprisals, and ebullitions, and foamings of our concupiscences, be subject to him: for, though it may seem, that if that be the meaning, (which, from St. Augustine and St. Gregory we have given you) that the serpent hath this power over our affections, and that is intended by that, the belly, it should rather have been said, super pectus cestrum, he shall creep upon your belly, than upon his own, yet, indeed, all that is his own, which we have submitted and surrendered to him, and he is upon his own, because we make ourselves his; (for, to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants you are 13.) So that if he be super pectus nostrum, if he be upon our belly, he is upou his own. But he does but creep; he does not fly; he is not presently upon you, in a present possession of you; you may discern the beginning of sin, and the ways of sin, in the approaches of the serpent, if you will. The serpent leaves a slime that discovers him, where he creeps; at least behind him, after a sin, you may easily see occasion of remorse, and detestation of that sin, and thereby prevent relapses, if you have not watched him well enough in his creeping upon you. When he is a lion, he does not devour all whom he finds; He seeks whom he may devour; he may not devour all, nor any but those, who cast themselves into his jaws, by exposing themselves to temptations to sin. He does but creep; why, did he any more before? Was his form changed in this punishment? Many of the ancients think literally that it was; and that before the serpent did go upon feet; we are not sure of that; nor is it much probable. That may well be true, which Luther says, Fuit suavissima bestiola, till then it was a creature more lovely, more sociable, more conversable with man, and, (as Calvin expresses the same) Minus odiosus, Man did less abhor the serpent before, than after. Beloved, it is a degree of mercy, if God bring that, which was formerly a temptation to me, to a less power over me, than formerly it had; if deformity, if sickness, if age, if opinion, if satiety, if inconstancy, if anything have worn out a temptation in that face, that transported me heretofore, it is a degree of mercy. Though the serpent be the same serpent, yet if be not so acceptable, so welcome to me, as heretofore, it is a happy, a blessed change. And so, in that respect, there was mercy. It was a punishment to the serpent, that, though he were the same still as before, yet he was not able to insinuate himself as before, because he was not so welcome to us. So, the having of the same form, which he had, might be a punishment, as nakedness was to man after his fall; he was naked before, but he saw it not, he felt it not, he needed no clothes before; now, nakedness brings shame, and infirmities with it. So, God was so sparing towards the serpent, as that he made him not worse in nature, than before, and so merciful to us, as that he made us more jealous of him, and thereby more safe against him, than before. Which is also intimated pregnantly, in the next step of 11 Peter v. 8. his punishment, Inimicitias ponam, that God hath kindled a war between him and us. Peace is a blessed state, but it must be the peace of God; for, Simeon and Levi are brethren, they agree well enough together; but they are instruments of evil; and, in that case, the better agreement, the worse. So, war is a fearful state; but not so, if it be the war of God, undertaken for his cause, or by his word. Many times, a state suffers by the security of a peace, and gains by the watchfulness of a war. Woe be to that man that is so at peace, as that the spirit fights not against the flesh in him; and woe to them too, who would make them friends, or reconcile them, between whom, God hath perpetuated an everlasting war, the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent, Christ and Belial, truth and superstition. Till God proclaimed a war between them, the serpent did easily overthrow them, but therefore God brought it to a war, that man might stand upon his guard. And so it was a mercy. But the greatest mercy is in the last, and that which belongs most directly, (though all conduce pertinently and usefully) to our present occasion; Dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life. He must eat dust, that is, our bodies, and carnal affections; he was at a richer diet, he was in better pasture before; before, he fed upon souls too; but for that his head was bruised, in the promise of a Messias, who delivers our souls from his tyranny; but the dust, the body, that body, which for all the precious ransom, and the rich, and large mercy of the Messias, must die, that dust is left to the serpent, to Satan, that is, to that dissolution, and that putrefaction, which he hath induced upon man, in death. He eats but our dust, in our death, when he hath brought us to that; that is a mercy; nay he eats up our dust before our death, which is a greater mercy; our carnal affections, our concupiscences are eaten up, and devoured by him; and so, even his eating is a sweeping, a cleansing, a purging of us. Many times we are the better for his temptations. My discerning a storm, makes me put on a cloak. My discerning a temptation, makes me see my weakness, and fly to my strength. Nay, I am sometimes the safer, and the readier for a victory, by having been overcome by him. The sense, and the remorse of a sin, after I have fallen into it, puts me into a better state, and establishes 15 Gen. XLIX. 5. 18 better conditions between God and me than were before, when I felt no temptations to sin. He shall eat up my dust, so, as that it shall fly into mine eyes; that is, so work upon my carnal affections, as that they shall not make me blind, nor unable to discern that it is he that works. It is said of one kind of serpent, that because they know, by an instinct they have, that their skin is good for the use of man, (for the falling sickness) out of envy, they hide their skin, when they cast it. The serpent is loth we should have any benefit of him; but we have; even his temptations arm us, and the very falling exalts us, when after a sin of infirmity, we come to a true, and serious repentance, and scrutiny of our conscience. So he hath nothing to eat but our dust, and he eats up our dust so, as that he contributes to our glory, by his malice. The whale was Jonah's pilot": the crows were Elias' caters 1; the lions were Daniel's sentinels"; the viper was Paul's advocate"; it pleaded for him, and brought the beholders in an instant, from extreme to extreme, from crying out that Paul was a murderer, to cry that he was a god. Though at any time, the serpent having brought me to a sin, cry out, Thou art a murderer, that is, bring me to a desperate sense of having murdered mine own soul, yet in that darkness I shall see light, and by a present repentance, and effectual application of the merits of my Saviour, I shall make the serpent see, I am a god; thus far a god, that by my adhering to Christ, I am made partaker of the divine nature". For, that which St. Chrysostom says of baptism, is true too in the second baptism, repentance, Deposui terram, et cœlum indui; then I may say to the serpent, Your meat is dust; and I was dust; but Deposui terram, I have shaked off my dust, by true repentance, for I have shaked off myself, and am a new creature", and am not now meat for your table. Jam terra non sum, sed sal, says the same father, I am not now unsavoury dust, but I am salt; and, sal ex aqua et vento, says he; salt is made of water and wind; I am made up of the water of baptism, of the water of repentance, of the water that accompanies the blood of Christ Jesus, and of that wind that 16 Stellio. 19 Dan. vi. 22. 17 Jonah i. 17. 18 1 Kings xvii. 6. 20 Acts xxviii. 22 2 Cor. v. 17. blows where it list 23, and hath been pleased to blow upon me, the Spirit of God, the Holy Ghost, and I am no longer meat for the serpent, for Dust must he eat all the days of his life. I am a branch of that vine, (Christ is the vine, and we are the branches") I am a leaf of that rose of Sharon, and of that lily of the valleys; I am a plant in the orchard of pomegranates", and that orchard of pomegranates is the church; I am a drop of that dew", that dew that lay upon the head of Christ. And this vine, and this rose, and lily, and pomegranates, of paradise, and this dew of heaven, are not dust, And dust must thou eat all the days of thy life. So then, the prophecy of Esay fulfils itself, That when Christ shall reign powerfully over us, the wolf and the lamb shall feed together 28, (Saul and Ananias shall meet in a house, (as St. Hierome expounds that) and Ananias not be afraid of a persecutor). The lion shall eat straw like the bullock, says that prophet in that place, Tradent se rusticitati Scripturarum, says the same father, The strongest understandings shall content themselves with the homeliness of the Scriptures, and feed upon plain places, and not study new dishes, by subtleties, and perplexities, and then, Dust shall be the serpent's meat, says the prophet there, the power of Satan shall reach but to the body, and not touch a soul wrapped up in Christ. But then, it is tota vita, all his life. His diet is impaired, but it is not taken away; he eats but dust, but he shall not lack that, as long as he lives. And how long lives the serpent, this serpent? The life of this serpent is to seduce man, to practise upon man, to prevail upon man, as far, and as long as man is dust. And therefore we are not only his dust, whilst we live (all which time we serve in our carnal affections, for him to feed upon) but when we are dead, we are his dust still. Man was made in that state, as that he should not resolve to dust, but should have passed from this world to the next, without corruption, or resolution of the body. That which God said to Adam, Dust thou art, belonged to all, from the beginning, he, and all we were to be of dust, in his best integrity; but that which God adds there, Et in terram reverteris, (Dust thou art, and to it thou shalt 23 John iii. 8. 27 Cant. v. 2. 24 John xv. 5. 26 Cant. iv. 13. 29 Gen. iii. 19. |