Quote of the week

Son of a London solicitor, he was educated at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and in 1649 became a minister in Southwark. In 1650 he became a fellow of New College,Oxford and in 1652 received his M.A. 1655 he was appointed chaplain to Henry Cromwell, governor of Ireland, and won a reputation for preaching in Dublin. He returned to London in retirement, but from 1675 he ministered in Bishopgate Street Prebyterian Church, London as joint pastor with Thomas Watson. His sermons were published mostly after his death; they reflect the characteristic Puritan divine's concern for central Gospel themes; the most important work was entitled Existence and Attributes of God.

"His sonship makes his blood valuable. It is blood, and so agreeable to the law in the penalty; it is the blood of the Son of God, and therefore acceptable to the lawgiver in its value. Though it was the blood of the humanity, yet the merit of it was derived from the divinity. It is not his blood as he was the son of the virgin, but his blood as he was the Son of God, which had this sovereign virtue. It is no wonder, therefore, that it should have such a mighty efficacy to cleanse the believers in it, in all ages of the world, from such vast heaps of guilt, since it is the blood of Christ, who was God; and valuable, not so much for the greatness of the punishment whereby it was shed, as the dignity of the person from whom it flowed. One Son of God weighs more than millions of worlds of angels."