Secondly, Consider the shame of it. There is a place in the best of Orators that expresses the detestableness and shame of this death of the Cross. Facinus, &c. Cicero Lib. 5. in Verrem. See what a gradation there is, it is hardly to be expressed in English. Its a great fault to bind a Citizen of Rome and a Gentleman, what is it to beat him? What to crucify him? His Eloquence failed him there, as being not able to express the detestableness of it, and therefore the chief Captain was afraid because he had bound Paul, after he had heard he was a free-man of Rome, Act. 22.29. but then it's worse to beat him; but what was it to crucify him? Our blessed Saviour went through all these indignities. First they come against him with swords and with staves, as against a Thief. They sold him for a base price. They beat him with rods, pricked him, and after all they crucified him. Consider then the shame of it: he that was to be crucified, was stripped naked, as naked as ever he came out of his mothers Womb: However the Painters may lye in it. And was not this a shame thus to be stripped before thousands? Wherefore it was a custom among the Romans, that the greatest King, if he were baptized, was to be stripped naked, which they did as a memorial of the shame of our Saviour. So shameful a thing it was, that they thought him unworthy to suffer within the walls. Christ that he might sanctify the people, suffered without the walls. Hebr. 13.13. Let us go with him out of the Camp bearing his reproach. He was a man unfit to suffer within the walls. Pilate thought he would meet with them, when they were so violent to have him crucified, and therefore he joins Barabbas with him, the vilest Thief in the Country, and a Murderer: So that Peter cast this in their teeth, That they preferred a Murderer before him. He was reckoned with the Transgressors, as it was prophesied of him before. Isa. 53.12. They crucify him between two Thieves, as if he had been the Captain of them. Pilate thought by naming of Barabbas, to have saved Christ; but so enraged was their blind malice, that they preferred the release of Barabbas, before the exemption of Christ. Wherefore (as St. Luke saith) Pilate released unto them him, that for sedition and murder was cast into prison, whom they had desired; but he delivered Jesus to their will. Luk. 23.25.
Secondly, Consider the shame of it. There is a place in the best of Orators that expresses the detestableness and shame of this death of the Cross. Facinus, &c. Cicero Lib. 5. in Verrem. See what a gradation there is, it is hardly to be expressed in English. Its a great fault to bind a Citizen of Rome and a Gentleman, what is it to beat him? What to crucifie him? His Eloquence failed him there, as being not able to express the detestableness of it, and therefore the chief Captain was afraid because he had bound Paul, after he had heard he was a free-man of Rome, Act. 22.29. but then it's worse to beat him; but what was it to crucifie him? Our blessed Saviour went through all these indignities. First they come against him with swords and with staves, as against a Thief. They sold him for a base price. They beat him with rods, pricked him, and after all they crucified him. Consider then the shame of it: he that was to be crucified, was stripped naked, as naked as ever he came out of his mothers Womb: However the Painters may lye in it. And was not this a shame thus to be stripped before thousands? Wherefore it was a custome among the Romans, that the greatest King, if he were baptized, was to be stripped naked, which they did as a memorial of the shame of our Saviour. So shameful a thing it was, that they thought him unworthy to suffer within the walls. Christ that he might sanctifie the people, suffered without the walls. Hebr. 13.13. Let us go with him out of the Camp bearing his reproach. He was a man unfit to suffer within the walls. Pilat• thought he would meet with them, when they were so violent to have him crucified, and therefore he joyns Barabbas with him, the vilest Thief in the Countrey, and a Murtherer: So that Peter cast this in their teeth, That they preferred a Murtherer before him. He was reckoned with the Transgressors, as it was prophesied of him before. Isa. 53.12. They crucifie him between two Thieves, as if he had been the Captain of them. Pilate thought by naming of Barabbas, to have saved Christ; but so enraged was their blind malice, that they preferred the release of Barabbas, before the exemption of Christ. Wherefore (as St. Luke saith) Pilate released unto them him, that for sedition and murder was cast into prison, whom they had desired; but he delivered Jesus to their will. Luk. 23.25.
