more ado, the season pleadeth for this
effectually," &c. Sermon on Col. iii. 1, he saith, That "there is no day
in the year so fit for a Christian to rise with Christ, and seek the
things above, as Easter day." Sermon on Job. ii. 19, he saith, That "the
act of receiving Christ's body is at no time so proper, so in season, as
this very day." Sermon on 1 Cor. xi. 16, he tells us out of Leo, "This is
a peculiar that Easter day hath, that on it all the whole church obtaineth
remission of their sins." Sermon on Acts ii. 1-3, he saith of the feast of
Pentecost, That "of all days we shall not go away from the Holy Ghost
empty on this day, it is _dies donorum_ his giving day." Sermon on Eph.
iv. 30, he saith, "This is the Holy Ghost's day, and not for that
originally so it was, but for that it is to be intended, ever he will do
his own chief work upon his own chief feast, and _opus diei_, the day's
work upon the day itself." Sermon on Psal. lxviii. 18, he saith, That
"love will be best and soonest wrought by the sacrament of love upon
Pentecost, the feast of love." Sermon on Acts x. 34, 35, he saith, That
the receiving of the Holy Ghost in a more ample measure is _opus diei_,
"the proper work of this day." Sermon on James i. 16, 17, he calls the
gift of the Holy Ghost the gift of the day of Pentecost, and tells us that
"the Holy Ghost, the most perfect gift of all, this day was, and any day
may be, but chiefly this day, will be given to any that will desire."
Sermon on Luke iv. 18, he saith of the same feast, That "because of the
benefit that fell on this time, the time itself it fell on, is, and cannot
be but acceptable, even _eo nomine_, that at such a time such a benefit
happened to us." Much more of this stuff I might produce out of this
prelate's holiday sermons,(501) which I supersede as more tedious than
necessary; neither yet will I stay here to confute the errors of those and
such like sentences of his; for my purpose is only to prove against Bishop
Lindsey, that the festival days, whereabout we dispute, are not observed
as circumstances of worship, for order and policy, but that, as the chief
parts of God's worship are placed in the celebration and keeping of the
same, so are they kept and celebrated most superstitiously, as having
certain sacred and mystical significations, and as holier in themselves
than other days, because they were sanctified above other days by the
extraordinary works and great benefits of God whi