bitter Cry, doth tell thee why; and thou thy felf within fome few Days, or Hours before, didft tell us why; and doft thou now ask us why? Didft thou not choose even that which thou now groaneft under? and wert willing to put thy Soul in our Souls ftead, and bear the Sin of thofe which are now thy Burden? Certainly we may, with all Humility and Reverence conceive, that at the time of this bitter Cry, our Saviour's Soul was, for the prefent, overshadowed with fo much Astonishment and Sorrow, that it did for the prefent over-power and cover the actual and diftinct Senfe of the Reafon of it; at least in that measure and degree in which he fuffered. This Cry of our Saviour was about the ninth Hour, a little before his Death, and having fulfilled one Prophecy in this terrible Cry, contained in the very Words of Pfalm 22.. he fulfils another, he faith, I thirst, John 19. 28. And presently they give him Vinegar to drink. And between this and his Death there intervene thefe Paffages. 1. His proclaiming to the World, that the Work of our Redemption was finished, John 19. 30. When be received the Vinegar, be faid, It is finished. 2. A fecond Cry with a loud Voice, Mat. 27. 50. The Words are not expreffed of his fecond Cry; only both Evangelifts, Matthew and Luke, teftifie it was a Cry with a loud Voice; to evidence to the World that in the very Article of his giving up of the Ghost, the Strength of Nature was not wholly spent, for he cryed with a loud Voice. 3. The comfortable Refignation of his Soul into the Hands of his Father, Luke 23. 46. Father, into thy Hands I commend my Spirit: And although, but even now the black Storm was upon his Soul, that made him cry out with that loud and bitter Cry, yet the Cloud is over, and with Comfort he delivers up his Soul into the Hands of that God, whom he thought, but even now, had forfaken him. It is more than probable, that that bitter Cry was uttered at the very Zenith of his Pains; and when he had taken the Vinegar, and proclaimed that it is finifhed; though they were all wrapt up in a very small time, about the end of the ninth Hour, yet now there remained no more, but for him to give up his Spirit,

Expectation of Salvation; when the Captain of it muft die, beflain, be crucified; it carries in it a kind of Victory of Death and Hell, over our Salvation, when the Inftrument thereof muft fuffer Death, and fuch a Death. When the Birth of Chrift was proclaimed, indeed it was a matter of Joy, and worth the Proclamation of Angels: Luke 2. 12. To you is born this day a Saviour, which is Chrift the Lord, and can the Death of that Saviour be a thing defirable to be known? The Birth of Chrift feemed to be the rifing Sun, that fcattered Light, Hope and Comfort to all Nations; but can the fetting of this Sun in fo dark a Cloud as the Crofs be the choicest piece of Knowledge of him? which feems as it were to ftrangle and ftifle our Hopes; and puts us as it were upon the Expoftulation of the difmay'd Difciples, Luke 24. 21. But we trusted it had been he which should have redeemed Ifrael.

But for all this, this Knowledge of Chrift Jefus Crucified will appear to be the most excellent, comfortable, ufeful Knowledge in the World, if we fhall confider these Particulars: 1. Who it was that fuffered. 2. What he fuffered. 3. From whom. 3. From whom. 4. How he fuffered. 5. For whom he fuffered. 6. Why, and upon what Motive. 7. For what End he fuffered. 8. What are the Fruits and Benefits that accrue by that fuffering. All these Confiderations are wrapt up in this one Subject; Chrift Jefus and him crucified.

1. Who it was that thus fuffered. It was Chrift Jefus the Eternal Son of God, cloathed in our Flesh; God and Man united in one Perfon; his Manhood giving him a Capacity of fuffering, and his Godhead giving a Value to that fuffering; and each Nature united in one Perfon to make a compleat Redeemer; the Heir of all things; Heb. 1. 2. The Prince of Life; Acts 3. 15. The Light that lightneth every Man that cometh into the World; John 1.9. As touching his Divine Nature, God over all, Bleffed for ever; Rom. 9.5. And as touching his Hu mane Nature, full of Grace and Truth; John 1. 14. And in both the beloved son of the Eternal God, in whom he proclaimed himfelt well pleafed, Matth. 3. 17.

D 4

Nature of him, a Lamb without Spot, Exod. 12. 5. Ifa. 53.7. in the time of his delivery over to Death, at the Feaft of the Paffover, and the very Evening wherein the Paffover was to be eaten: In the manner of his Oblation, not a Bone to be broken, Exod. 12. 46. Again, the manner of his Death, by piercing his Hands and his Feet, Pfal. 22. 16. The very Words ufed by him, Pfal. 22. 1. Mat. 27. 46. the Words ufed of him, Pfal. 22. 8. Mat. 27.43. the crucifying of him between Malefactors, Ifa. 53. 12. the Whippings, Ifa. 53. 5. the dividing of his Garments, and cafting Lots upon his Vesture, Pfal. 22. 18. the thirft of our Saviour upon the Cross, and the giving him Vinegar and Gall, Pfal. 69. 21.

2. A ftrange and miraculous Concuffion of Nature, giving Teftimony to the wonderful and unheard of Diffolution of our Saviour's Body and Soul, Darkness from the fixth Hour until the ninth Hour. And it is obfervable in the Night wherein he was born, by a miraculous Light the Night became as Day, Luke 2. 9. But at his Death a miraculous Darkness turned the Day into Night for three Hours; Mat. 27. 45. At his Birth a new Star was created to be the Lamp and Guide unto the place of his Birth, Mat. 2. 9. But at his Death the Sun in the Firmament was masked with Darknefs, and yielded not his Light, while the Lord of Life was paffing into the vale of Death. Again, another Prodigy that accompanied the Death of Christ, was an Earthquake, that rent the Rocks, and opened the Graves, and ftruck Amazement and Conviction into the Centurion, that was watching him, Mat. 27. 52, 53, 54. When our Saviour was entring into the Earth by Death, the Earth trembled; and so it did when he was coming out of it by his Refurrection, Matth. 28.2.

3. Again, the Graves were opened, and the dead Bodies of the Saints arofe: As the touch of the Bones of Elisha caufed a kind of Refurrection, 2 Kings 13. 21. fo our Saviour's Body, new fallen to the Earth, did give a kind of particular Refurrection to the Saints Bodies, to teftifie that by his Death, he had healed the deadliness of the Grave, and that the Satisfaction of Sin was accomplished, when

Death,

Death, the Wages of Sin, was thus conquered.

4. Again, the Veil of the Temple was Rent in twain from the top to the bottom, Mat. 27. 57. the Veil was that which divided the moft holy place from the reft of the Tabernacle, Exod. 26. 33. and in that moft holy Place were contained the myfterious Types, the Ark of the Covenant, and the Mercy-Seat; and within this Veil only the High-Prieft entred once a Year, when he made an Atonement for the People and for the Tabernacle, Lev. 16. 33. Heb. 9. 7. and now at our Saviour's Death, this Veil was rent, from the top to the bottom; and it imported divers very great Myfteries: 1. That now our great High-Prieft was entring into the moft Holy, with his own Blood, having thereby made the Atonement for us; Heb. 9. 12. By his own Blood, he entered once into the most Holy place,baving obtained Eternal Redemption for us. 2. That the means, whereby he entered into the most Holy place, was by rending of his Humanity, his Soul from his Body, typified by the rending of that Veil, and therefore his Flefh, that is, his whole Humane Nature was the Veil, Heb. 10. 20. Confecrated through the Veil, that is, his Flef. 3. That now by the death of Chrift all thofe dark Myfteries veiled up formerly in the moft Holy, the Ark of the Covenant, and the Mercy Seat, are now rended open, and their Mysteries unfolded; Chrift the Mediator of the Covenant, and the Seat of Mercy and Acceptation, unto all Believers, founded and feated upon him, and thereby that Life and Immortality, which was wrapt up in the Myfteries of the old Covenant, and yet thofe Mysteries veiled, and inclofed up, within the Veil, is now bought to light through the Gofpel, 2 Tim. 1. 10. and the Veil rent in twain, that as well the meaning of those My fteries and Types under the Law is difcovered. 4. That now the ufe of the Ceremonial Law is at an end, the greatest and moft Sacred Mystery of the Tabernacle, and indeed of the whole Ceremonial Law, was this that was within the Veil, the most Holy place, wherein were the moft Holy and Reverend Myfteries, the Ark and the Mercy-Seat ; But now the Veil is Rent, the Ufe Abolished, the Covenant

of

Thoughts. The time that he chofe for his Retirement, was the dead time of the Night; a Seafon that might the more contributes to the Strength of that Sadnefs, which the pre apprehenfion of his imminent Paffion must needs occafion. The place that he chofe, a folitary retired Garden, where nothing might or could interrupt, or divert the intensiveness of his Sorrow and Fear: And to make both the Time and Place the more opportune for his Agony, he leaves the rest of his Disciples, and takes with him only Peter, and the two Sons of Zebedee, Matth. 26. 37. And to these he imparts the beginning of his Sorrow, that they might be witneffes of it, Matth. 26. 37, My Soul is exceeding forrowful, even unto death; but yet commands their diftance, verfe 38. Tarry ye here and watch with me, and he went a little further. Watch with me: The Confufion of his Soul was fo great, that the only Son of God diftrufts his own [humar] Ability to bear it; and yet his fubmiffion to this terrible Conflict [was] fo willing, that he leaves them that he had appointed to watch with him. He went a little further. The three Disciples had doubtless a Sympathy with their Mafter's Sorrow, and yet the Will of God fo orders it, that their Excefs of Love and Grief muft not keep their Eyes waking, notwithstanding it was the laft Request of their for rowful Mafter. The Difciples flept, Matth. 26. 40. And thus every Circumftance of Time, Place, and Perfons contribute to a fad and folitary Opportunity for this most terrible and black Conflict. And now in this Garden the mighty God puts his Son to Grief, lades him with our Sorrows, Ifa. 53. 4. withdraws and hides from him the light of his Favour and Countenance; interpofeth a thick and black Cloud between the Divinity and the Human Nature, darts into his Soul the fad and fharp Manifeftations of his Wrath; overwhelms his Soul with one Wave after another; fends into him the moft exquifite pre-apprehenfions of those fad and fevere Sufferings he was the next Day to undergo, begins to make his Soul an Offering for Sin, and heightens his Sorrow, Confufion, and Aftonishment unto the uttermoft. In fum, the mighty God, the God of the Spirits of all Flesh, who knows the

way