A09998:477
Master Bezaes sermons upon the three chapters of the canticle of canticlesMaster Bezaes sermons vpon the three chapters of the canticle of canticles
Master Bezaes sermons upon the three chapters of the canticle of canticles wherein are handled the chiefest points of religion controversed and debated between us and the adversary at this day, especially touching the true Jesus Christ and the true Church, and the certain & infallible marks both of the one and of the other. Translated out of French into English by John Harmar ...Master Bezaes sermons vpon the three chapters of the canticle of canticles wherein are handled the chiefest points of religion controversed and debated betweene vs and the aduersarie at this day, especially touching the true Iesus Christ and the true Church, and the certaine & infallible marks both of the one and of the other. Translated out of French into English by Iohn Harmar ...
Oxford: printed by Joseph Barnes, 1587Oxford: printed by Ioseph Barnes, 1587
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
3 Such was the state and condition of the Church many times under the Judges, and especially in Heli's time, as when the ark was taken, there followed an horrible confusion. In the time of Samuel it had as it were some small refreshing under the beginning of Sauls reign. But by and by after, and especially during the time of the persecution raised against David, the massacring of the Priests, the discomfiting of Saul, the civil war between David, & Iphiboseth, whither shall we say the small number of the true faithful were brought, so long as god exercised his just judgements upon the whole country? In what estate was then this dove-house, that is to say, the tabernacle & the whole service of God, Silo being destroyed, & the Ark placed in a private mans house, to wit, Abinadab's, 1. Sa. 6.22. separated from the tabernacle which was in Nob, 1. Sam. 21.1. & from thence was brought unto Gibeon, 2. Chro. 1.3. And this separation of the Ark from the tabernacle dured until the time of Solomon, who (being a figure of this bridegroom) set up that goodly temple as it were a dove-house, whither he inviteth this dove in this place: whereunto it is no doubt, but this text ought to be referred, especially the same being twice specified in the history, 1. Sam. 7.1. &. 2. Sam. 6.3. namely that the house of Abinadab from whence the Ark was brought by David unto Jerusalem, was seated within an hill: which it may be Solomon meant expressly to note unto us, making mention of the clefts of the rock, whither this ⟨p. 279⟩spouse retired herself during this tempest. But there is nothing letteth but that we may extend this yet farther. For during the kingdom of Solomon himself, was she not in part as it were driven from her dove-house by the Idols which Solomon set up? And what was she afterward? So that the condition of the Church is here represented unto us, not as it is once, or five, or six, or moe times, but as being an ordinary and customary thing unto this spouse, whom notwithstanding her Bridegroom in his good time calleth down again into the plain. So then after Solomon, by the division of the ten tribes, how many dove-houses, I mean synagogues, were ruined & plucked down, to lodge Jeroboam's calves in?