of our prosperity that it will never be removed But we are often mistaken so was Asaph when he did thus expostulate Psa 77.7 Hath the Lord forgotten to be gracious hath be in anger shut up his tender mercy will the Lord cast off for ever will he be favourable no more is his mercy clean gone for ever and adds v. 10. I said this is my infirmity v. 14. Thou art the God that doest wonders And v. 19. Thy way is in the Sea and thy footsteps are not known Hear the moans of Sion and the answer given by God thereunto Isa 49.14 But Sion saith the Lord hath forsaken me my Lord hath forgotten me Can a woman forget her sucking child that she should not have compassion on the Son of her â—omb Yea they may forget yet will not I forget thee Behold I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands thy walls are continually before me ver 15 16. Little did the Israelites think when their task of brick was doubled that deliverance was at hand which sense became a Proverb Cum duplicantur lateres venit Moses but so it was but the Text saith The children of Israel hearkened not to Moses viz. prophecying of deliverance for anguish of spirit and for cruel bondage Exod. 6.9 Little did Abraham think that Isaac should be spared though he came so near unto being sacrificed as that he was laid upon the Altar whence sprung that consolatory saying Jehovah-jireh Gen. 22.14 In the Mount of the Lord it shall be seen I shall not extenuate the badness of our present circumstances it is too too evident that we look like a Land meeted out for destruction the face of things at this day is as it were facies Hippocratica as Physitians call it that is we look like death Never was poor Nation more convulst and pulled this way and that way backwards and forwards and other while made or endeavoured to be made more stiff and inflexible by a painful Tetanus as they call that kind of Convulsion that braceth the body so straight it can stir no way It must be confessed these are ill Symptoms but no grounds of despair possibly it is now a critical time with England and the Crises of diseases are often attended with horrid Symptoms even when Nature gets the upper hand at last Are we now in any more danger to be destroyed by our divisions then we were in 65. to be devoured by Plague but thence hath God delivered us He that hath said unto the Sword of War with other Nations Put up thyself into thy Scabbard rest and be still can say the same to the Sword of home divisions which are a kind of intestine war Surely England hath been in a worse condition then now it is and yet saved from thence First in the Marian daies when the weapons of warfare against the true Religion were no other then Fire and Faggot when the Scarlet Whore made her self drunk with the blood of Saints and Martyrs were not those daies shâ—rtned for the Elects sake Matth. 13.20 Afterwards in 88. when the Spanish Fleet called the Invincible Armado came against England in how desperate a case did it seem to be but how soon did that black Cloud blow over Then succeeded the hellish Powder Plot in the next Kings Reign which had it taken effect had rooted the Protestant Interest out of England as in the twinkling of an eye or whilst a small Paper could be burned but that also came to nothing that snare was broken and this poor Land delivered Who doubts whether Popish Archers have not shot at us many times since then and yet our Bow abideth in strength thorough the mighty God of Jacob O England so often saved by the Lord why shouldst thou despair of any more deliverances Is it because thy sins are so many and great call to mind what God saith Ezek. 36.33 In the day that I shall have cleansed you from all your iniquities I will cause you to dwell in the Cities and the wasts shall be builded v. 35. And they shall say This Land that was desolate is become like the Garden of Eden and the desolate and ruined Cities are become fenced and inhabited Look back to v. 32. Not for your sakes do I this saith the Lord God be ashamed and confounded for your own wayes O house of Israel See also v. 22 23 29 36 38. of the same Chapter Or is it because the Lord seemeth for a time to have forsaken thee having given thee up to flames that thou O London despairest of ever seeing good daies again I see not why thou shouldst cast away the Anchor of thy hope for all that what if thou shouldst cast it upon that Text and others of like import Psa 60.9 10. Who will bring me into the strong City wilt not thou O God which hadst cast us off And Lam. 3.31 For the Lord will not cast off for ever but though he cause grief yet will he have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies Who seeth not the inference plain from such Texts as those that God may cast off a people for a time and yet not cast them off for ever Is it from a fear of being burnt again that you have no heart to build that fear in all likelihood ariseth from a mistrust you have that the former burning came to pass by Treachery if so be of good chear God will discover it in due time it cannot be alwayes hid and when that secret if it be yet a secret shall be brought to light when the true Incendiaries shall once be known London is like to be more secured from fire then ever it was and that fire which consumed the old City will be as a wall of fire that is a defence about the new If the great divisions discontents and heart-burnings that are now in England be alledged as they have been as a main discouragement of the rebuilding of London I would take leave to say I hope one day to see an end of those things Surely there will come a time when passion and fury will hold their peace and give way to reason and conscience to interpose and when ever that time shall come such Rules and Principles as I would now suggest will be hearkened to and cannot but offer themselves being so obvious as they are and whensoever they shall take place we may expect to see England a quiet habitation and all good people therein of one heart though not of one mind The first principle which I would hope will be received in time is this That every man pretending conscience constraining him to what he doth or restraining him from what he refuseth to do if generally trusted and thought worthy to be believed in other cases ought to be trusted and believed in that also and not to be changed with pride prejudice interest faction as the true reasons of those actions for which he pretendeth conscience yea it may be exposeth
Ezek. 37.5 Thus saith the Lord God unto those bones behold I will cause breath to enter into you and ye shall live And I will lay sinews upon you and will bring up flesh upon you and cover you with skin and ye shall know that I am the Lord. DISCOURSE III. Of how great Consequence it is that the now wast and desolate City of London should be re-edified SUrely it was not without cause that London whilest standing hath always continued the Metropolis of England though no such promise were ever made to it as unto Judah of old that the scepter or principality should never depart from it and though an old prophecy hath been that London was and York should be Yea though London hath several times ceased to be its self for a while lying in ashes as now it doth once fourscore years together and other places have succeded in the Metropolitanship for that time yet no sooner was it raised again but other places as if but its Deputies and Viceroies did presently resign the preheminence to it and like to Nebuchadnezzar come from grass and turn'd man again it was presently re-inthroned and restored to its former dignity and Primacy This I say was not for nothing but did certainly imply there was something in the place the scituation I mean for sometimes little else hath been left that did render it much more fit then any other to be the Metropolis or head City of England so that as often as London was in being no other town or City would offer to come in competition with it It was the river Nilus made Egypt rich and fruitful and hath it not been the River of Thames hath alwayes under God made London what it was They that would utterly destroy London must dry up that River as the river Euphrates for the destroying of Babylon or set it at some greater distance from that City For whilst they two stand so near together London is like to be rich and fruitful like trees that are planted by the rivers of water or like meadow ground that is overflown What is said of Joseph is like to be verified of London Gen. 49.22 Joseph is a fruitful bough by a wall whose branches run over the wall By the side of London is planted that great trunk of the vena porta of the Nation I mean the great mouth and inlet of trade the river of Thames I mean which makes it so necessary for England that England cannot much better subsist without it that is to say in wealth and prosperity then a man can live whose mouth is sowed up and who can take no nourishment but as a glyster no breath but at his nostrils They are deceived that think England may be destroyed meerly and only by destroying London for a time for if England its self be not first destroyed it must and will God permitting always have another London let the former be burnt or demolished ever so often London is the heart of England and if it were not primum vivens it will be ultimum moriens at leastwise England if it do not die first must die not long after it for without a heart it cannot long live If London fall it must rise again or all England must fall too at leastwise into great misery disgrace and poverty London is the place to which those passages of the Prophet concerning Tyre are most applicable of any place I know Isa 23.4 Thou whom the Merchants that pass over sea have replenished the harvest of the river is her revenue and she is a mart of Nations c. v. 8. The crowning City whose merchants are Princes and whose trâ—ffiquers are the honourable of the earth At leastwise this she was fuimus troes nigens gloria and this with the blessing of God she is most capable to be again And is it not of great consequence that a City of so vast a concernment to the whole nation should be rebuilt Which of all our famous Cities is fit to make a Head for so vast and Noble a Body as England is London excepted There is much deformity and inconvenience in a Head that is much too little for the body as in one that is too big Besides if a head be not well scituated as suppose a mans head were placed upon his arm or back and not upon his shoulders such a posture would be not only inconvenient but monstrous And verily any other Metropolis for England besides London would be of like inconvenient positure and scituation the head would not stand in the right place either for commodiousness or decency I would know what great Kingdome there is in the world that hath not a Metropolis or Head City answerable to its self And why should England differ from all the rest should we be unlike all other Nations and become their scorn Is not some one City magnificent and splendid above all the rest like the Sun that out-shineth all the other stars greatly for the honor both of a King and Kingdome I had almost said England looks sneakingly whilst it is without a London it doth as it were hide its head in the dust and seemeth to be ashamed of its self if it have any head to hide Tell us not of the Suburbs Citizens know how inconvenient they are for their business over what the City is and besides both together are little enough for traders and other inhabitants else it might have saved them charge and trouble to have dwelt in houses built to their hands and well seasoned they durst not go after the declining Sun lest they themselves should decline also in their trade and business They found more warmth in the heart of London then ever they expect in the extreme parts as they say of arterial blood that is warmest for that it cometh immediately from the heart Cottages within the walls seem to please and accommodate them better then stately houses without He that thinks the rebuilding of London might well be spared if any man or woman can so think let him or her consider how many houses upon survey are said to have been consumed by the late fire viz. no less then thirteen thousand or thereabouts now many of those houses did contain two some three families apiece so that we may well suppose twenty thousand families most of them traders to have been by that fire dispossest now where shall so many thousand families of trading people be disposed of if London be not built again shall they go into the country and trade there how inconvenient and insignificant would that be besides that so to do were to eat the bread out of the mouths of country shop-keepers Whilst they live at a distance from them Citizens are helpful to tradesmen in the country as the sun when it is farthest removed from the moon shines full upon it and exhibits that which is called the full moon but when they two are in conjunction then doth the Moon disappear being
whereas some may think the new houses carry and are appointed to carry their heads too high and rise up to a greater altitude then doth become them after so humbling a judgment good reason may be assigned for that viz. That it was enacted they should do so in order to the gaining of more room and that so much the rather because a great deal of room hath and will be lost otherwise by the new model of the City and particularly by widening of the streets those Latitudinarian streets if I may so call them inforcing as it were altitudinarian houses Now from the three forementioned causes viz. The buildings being of brick the breadth of the Streets and the height of the houses greater then formerly thence I say principally if not only will spring that beauty and lustre which the new City or the major part of it is like to have above the old all which things being necessary for other reasons and having been done upon their account ought at no hand to be found fault with As men may fast and mourn and yet not disfigure their countenances whereby to appear to men to fast but may anoint their heads that day and wash their faces and Christ commendeth so doing as best Mat. 5.16 So may the outward visage of our City be handsome and beautiful and yet we our selves nevertheless truly sensible both of our sins and miseries I Should think a City of London outwardly more splendid then ever might in some respects increase our humiliation rather then inflame our pride even as a poor man clad in a rich habit might from thence have more sad and frequent reflections upon his poverty as thinking with himself how unsutable the fineness of his outward garb is to the meanness of his condition and how much otherwise it is really with him then by his habit strangers would take it to be But that a stately City raised in a short time out of a ruinous heap might conduce to stirr up in us more of thankfulness and admiration of Gods goodness I see not who can deny with this staff said Jacob passed I over Jordan and now the Lord hath made me two bands Gen. 32.10 Which surely he acknowledged with more thankfulness and wonder then he would have done if God had made him but one band no bigger then either of his two Moreover another London more magnificent then the former how great an eye sore would it be to the enemies of that City who most barbarously rejoyced at its flames and triumphed at its funeral and would if they knew how have rolled so great a stone over its grave that it should never have been capable of rising again I say when those envious persons shall come to see two staffes in the hand of London viz. Beauty and Bands that is State and Strength alluding to Zech. 11. neither of which they exspected how will that sight abate their pride confront their malice and confound their devices Lastly a stately City should methinks provoke the inhabitants to a generous emulation of being so wealthy and substantial as by it they seem or make shew to be If so goodly a City be to Londoners at the first erecting of it like a garment that is much to big for him that weareth it yet may it put them upon indeavouring to grow so fast that it may be fit for them if it be to them as raiment of needle work or of wrought gold such as the Kings Daughter is said to be Ps 45.13 may it not stirr them up to be like her all glorious within that their inside and outside may well agree together Now Lord though it may be it was not out of pride or affectation of pomp that we have designed to build so fine a City yet possibly we may be proud of so fine a City when it is once built and if so Lord humble us for that our pride but destroy us not again and if like those times of which it was said they had golden challices but wooden Priests it may be said of us we have a rich City but poor inhabitants we shall in that respect have great cause to be humble and Lord do thou make us as humble and lowly as we have cause to be DISCOURSE VIII That all persons imployed and made use of in and in order to the rebuilding of London ought therein more especially to use all care and good conscience WOrkmen do your office and do it like workmen that need not to be ashamed and like honest men If you take building by the great make no more hast with it then good speed but if you take it by the day make as much hast as will consist with good speed Do by Londoners as you would be done by build for them as you would build for your selves we may have a noble City God permitting if you will but play your parts Make no more faults then you needs must that you may make work for your selves to mend those faults which you have wilfully made and put those you build for to a greater charge and trouble The foolish builder is a name of infamy in the scripture and the knavish one is worse Be not you like smoak to the eyes of those you build for as Solomon speaketh of a sloathful messenger that he is so to him that sendeth him Build with such acurateness as Apelles is said to have painted for which he gave this reason Pingo aeternitati so do you build as it were once for all Let London by the universal care and honesty of its builders one and all be made so excellent a structure that it may both now and hereafter be a praise and a renown to any of you to have had a hand in the raising of that Fabrick or to have been any waies related to that work as it is said in reference to the Temple of Jerusalem Psal 74.5 A man was famous according as he had lifted Axes upon the thick Trees viz. in order to the building of that Temple Expresse your kindnesse to London to like effect with what is written in Cant. 8.9 If she be a Wall we will build upon her a Palace of Silver and if she be a Door we will inclose her with Boards of Cedar which are the Words of Christ and of his Church contriving some good for the uncalled Gentiles set forth under Metaphors taken from such improvements of small and rude beginnings as Builders are able to make In this building aim not only at private gain but at publique good at the honour and welfare of the Nation in which your selves will have a share get as little as may be either for work or stuff of them that have lost so much take the over-sight thereof not by constraint but willingly not for filthy lucre but of a ready mind which is the advice given to spiritual Builders in a higher case but not unapplicable to this purpose As for those who shall have the
enter not thou into their secrets that they cry out we shall ere long be invaded by the French other while we shall be massacred by the help of those disaffected forreigners which say they do swarm amongst us another while they cry we shall be burnt again what pannick fears are these I wish we could out the head of this Nilus those fears I mean which like another Nilus overflow the land but whence they spring I know not whether the cause be that people are hardly come to themselves since the great and dreadful fire or that our great surprise at Chattam hath brought these fears upon men or that those many lesser fires which have hapned since the great one have produced a habit of fear or all of these together or whither as I said at first some do make it their business to terrifie Londoners that they may have no heart to build It is hard to say which of these are the true cause But that which I mentioned last was the course which the enemies of Jerusalem took to hinder the building thereof Neh. 6.9 They all made us afraid saying their hand shall be weakned from the work that it be not done and v. 29. Tobiah sent letters to put me in fear But let the cause be what it will it is fit the cure should be thought of For fears and jealousies have been of pernicious consequence and may be so again Parents cannot indure to have their children frighted lest it bring them to convulsions or make sots of them None so cruel as cowards or frighted persons because they are most impatient till they have made sure of their enemies Desperation turns to valour It hath always been held good policy to secure a people against fears and jealousies though they were such as did arise from their own mistakes and weakness Achitophel taught Absalom to make the people sure of him that he never would or could be reconciled to his Father David and so leave them in the lurch by counselling him to lye with his Fathers Concubines in the sight of the people 2 Sam. 16.20 Was it not a meer jealousie and misapprehension which the Jews had entertained concerning Paul viz. As if he taught the Jews which were amongst the Gentiles to forsake Moses saying that they ought not to circumcise their children neither to walk after the customes Acts. 21.21 yet Paul was advised to take it off and did v. 26 We have four men which have a vow on them Them take and purifie thy self with them and all may know that those things whereof they were informed concerning thee are nothing but that thou thy self also walkest orderly and keepest the law v. 23 24. God himself such is his condescension to this kind of weakness in men hath provided all that may he against those groundless fears and jealousies as touching himself and the satisfying of his promise which is impossible for him to do which our misgiving hearts might expose us to And therefore it is that he hath confirmed his promise with an oath Heb. 6.18 God willing more abundantly it was indeed ex abundanti for him so to do to shew the immutability of his counsel confirmed it by an oath v. 19. That by two immutable things we might have strong consolation But the great difficulty will be to shew how and by what means the fears and Jealousies of men those terrible names sounding like Gog and Magog may be prevented or extirpated To indeavour to tye the tongues of men that whatsoever they think they should say nothing would be a fruitless attempt for out of the abundance of mens hearts their mouthes will speak That were at most but like the mowing of weeds without plucking them up by the roots which weeds would certainly spring again faster than ever they did before To tell men they have had many false alarms will not satisfie them neither for so souldiers use to serve their enemies before they fall upon them in good earnest and so the sheep in the fable heard it often said that the Wolf was coming when he was not but yet he came at last when he was not lookt for Some more effectual remedy must therefore be thought of against the dangerous and contagious disease of fears and Jealousies than were either of the two former Were I worthy to cast in a mite of advice in so arduous a case which had more need of a Priest to stand up with Urim and Thummim to direct in it I would say as followeth One way to take of fears and jealousies would be by manifesting an universal and impartial love to all sober peaceable and deserving persons even from Dan to Beersheba without respect of persons or parties upon any other considerations It is as natural for men to fear those that they think do hate them as it is to hate those they are afraid of If one part of a nation be Archers armed with bows and arrows and another look upon it self as not beloved and therefore aimed at so long fears and jealousies will continue whereas on the other hand we use to say we could put our lives into their hands of whom we are confident that they do truly love us If persons who are both in and under authority as was the Centurion we read of who are indeed the eyes and hands of Princes would please to manifest a constant care and zeal for the publick good suffering nothing to be wanting on their part that might conduce to publick safety giving no advantage to forreign or intestine enemies by their cowardize covetousness or carelesness committing no gross miscarriages and oversights like careless servants that leave their masters doors wide open in the night time that who will may come in and steal if they will see that all be safely bolted and barred from time to time I say if they please to do so by that means for one they may disperse fears and jealousies as the Sun doth scatter mists Timothy is much commended Phil. 2.20 For that he did naturally care for the state of others and they that shall do so and be known so to do will never be suspected they will adde to the hope and confidence of a nation but never to their fears and jealousies There is no better prevention or cure of fears and Jealousies than to win the hearts love and affections of a people otherwise subject thereunto men are as unapt to fear those whom they greatly love as they are to love those whom they are greatly afraid of love is fearful of nothing but to offend Perfect love casteth out fear viz. All that fear which hath torment accompanying it and needs it must do so because it is founded in and upon the assurance of their love whom we so love The Apostle saith of charity or love that it is not easily provoked that it thinketh no evil rejoyceth not in iniquity but in the truth believeth all things hopeth all things 1 Cor. 13. Those
to the generation following So may I say walk now about London mark yee well her pallaces c. that yee may tell the generation to come how many goodly buildings were in London within less than two years after the greatest part of it was burnt to the ground This is the Lords doing and should be marvellous in our eyes Have not men as instruments contributed something and that considerable towards the rebuilding of the City such I mean as had no houses there of their own to build and ought they not to be thankfully acknowledged for what they have done I doubt not but many had a hand in the forementioned Act that had no private concern in London So to eye men as to overlook God is the greater fault of the two but to overlook men when and wherein they deserve to be thankfully eyed is likewise a fault Ezra hath set us a good pattern Ezra 7.27 Blessed be the Lord God which hath put such a thing as this in the Kings heart to beautifie the house of the Lord v. 28. And hath extended mercy to me before the King and his counsellors and before all the Kings mighty Princes c. Here though the chief honour and praise was ascribed to God yet the King and his Counsellors and Princes were owned also The King is said to have beautified the house of God though God to have put it into his heart so to do Whensoever favours are received be they great or small thanks becomes a debt and it is but just to pay it How should they look to prosper who can pay what they owe and will not and when it is but thanks that is owing or expected who cannot pay it It is a perverse thing to withhold thanks from them that have deserved at our hands out of a conce it they might have deserved more They that do for us more than they might have done be it more or less have earned our thanks and more it is like they will do if they find us thankful Some will scatter their bread upon the waters by way of trial whether they shall find it again I mean they shew lesser kindnesses at the first to see if they shall find men thankful and when they have found them so they open the hands of their bounty much more wide and their latter favours are such as speak the former to have bin but a kind of earnest It is like that Leaper who alone of all the ten that were cured did return to give thanks had some favour above all the rest added to his cure it being usual with God to thank men I mean to reward them for their thanks And who knows but that our Rulers may have farther intentions of kindness towards the poor City exceeding all that they have done for it already I had almost said as the last cloud which Elijah saw did exceed the first 1 Kings 18. if such a thing were possible if they shall but experiment that they are owned and acknowledged as I hope they will be in and for what they have done already Tertullus that great orator spoken of Acts. 24. may inform us of the best rhetorick wherewith to prevail for future kindness who being about to court Felix to be his friend against Paul bespake him as followeth v. 2 3. Seeing that by thee we injoy great quietness and that very worthy deeds are done unto this nation by thy providence We accept it always and in all places most noble Felix with all thankfulness DISCOURSE XXXI That to seek much unto God by Prayer and Fasting for success would be one of the best wayes to promote the City ALL great undertakings and such is the building of our City should be usherd in and carried on with prayer and fasting In every thing by prayer and supplication let your request be made known to God is the rule given Philip. 4.6 And if by prayer in every thing then doubtless by fasting also in things of greater weight and moment ought our requests to be made known Prayer alone can do much but joyned with fasting it may prevail yet more Our Saviour speaking of a sort of Devils saith This kind can come forth by nothing but by prayer and fâ—sting Mark 9.29 He saith not by prayer only but by fasting also Satan is the great obstructer of every good work 1 Thes 2.18 We would have come unto you even I Paul once and again but Satan hindred us Never had that fowl fiend a greater mind to obstruct the building of any City in the world Jerusalem only excepted than I believe he hath to obstruct the building of London How shall we cast him out but by prayer and fasting Six other evil Spirits there are if I may not call them Devils which do vehemently oppose the rebuilding of London and must be cast out by the means forementioned First the spirit of Fear Discouragement and Despondency Nehemiah 4.10 And Judah said the strength of the bearers 〈◊〉 burthens is decayed and there is much rubbish so that 〈◊〉 are not able to build the Wall And our adversaries said they shall not know neither see till we come in the widst amongst them and slay them and cause the work to cease v. 11. This one spirit should it so rage and domineer as God might suffer it to do might utterly prevent the building of London But what think you of the Spirit of Envy and malice is not that as bad That Spirit opposed the building of Jerusalem and so it will of London so far as it can or dare Nehemiah 2.10 When Sanâ—allat and Tobiah heard of it it grieved them exceedingly that there was come a man to seek the welfare of the children of Israel Nehem. 4.9 The breaches began to be stopped then they were very wroth and conspired all of them to fight against Jerusalem and to hinder it Another evil Spirit which doth or may hinder the building of London is that of Jealousie and suspicion not only in but of and concerning that City This Sanballat made great use of to hinder the building of Jerusalem Nehem. 6.6 It is reported among the heathens said he that thou and the Jews think to rebel for which cause thou buildest the wall that thou mayest be their King c. So some men have the unhappiness to be jealous of their wives though as chast women as are in the world and others are so wicked as to perswade them to it now this impertinent as well as evil spirit must be kept or cast out by prayer and fasting that London may be rebuilt A spirit of anger and discontent may obstruct the building of London as much as any of the rest if God should leave that spirit to do its worst So sullen as the discontents of men do sometimes make them they will enterprize nothing but will hide their hands in their bosomes and not so much as bring it to their mouths again as is said of the slothful man Prov.
to see another London p. 360. Dis 50. Upon the rebuilding of our houses of Clay or the Resurrection of our bodies p. 364. Reader I intreat thee to correct these and such other faults as thou mayst find that have escaped the Press PAge 39. line 33. read ingens p. 42. l. 16. put only a Comma at the word Comet p. 68. l. 34. blot out That p. 78. l. 1. r. Empire p. 87. l. 34. r. were not true p. 89. l. 21. r. yea scorn p. 93. l. 30. r. mourning weeds p. 97. l. 17. r. when some c. and l. 32. r. father p. 136. l. 22. r. monet ut facias p. 145. l. 7. r. three kingdoms p. 146. l. 5. r. and that p. 161. l. 30. r. reasonable service p. 140. l. 10. put only a comma before methinks p. 184. l. 5. r. lispers out of Popery and l. 13. r. heterodoxe Sermons and l. 19. come forth p. 170. l. 15. r. falsifying his promise p. 202. l. 19. r. work p. 203. l. 4. r. one Aaron p. 212. l. 19. r. never any of all p. 228. l. 8. r. the missing of such a reward p. 232. l. 21. r. should we p. 264. 22. r. your want p. 280. l. 22. r. pose and puzzle p. 333. l. 12. blot out the parenthesis before ponds p. 328. l. 17. r. hairy skins p. 347. l. 22. r. precariously p. 352. l. 8. r. gourd to wither p. 340. l. 31. r. Sinagogues of Satan p. 352. l. 24. r. them p. 340. l. 10. r. as to see p. 359. l. 14. r. rebuked p. 84. l. the last adde and do it not cannot c. Sometimes you will find yet put for yea and the for that p. 331. l. 29. r. Nil habet infaelix paupertas durius in se p. 330. l. 29. dele si p. 324. l. 16. blot out the parenthesis at sense DISCOURSE I. Of the grounds we have to hope and expect the compleat rebuilding of the now Ruines of London 1. THe day of the Resurrection of London hath as yet but dawned at most the Sun thereof is yet but one hour high or thereabouts the new City is yet but in its Infancy if any thing more then an Embryo the beginnings of the new are not yet so great as the small remainders of the old as therefore it is too early at this time to congratulate it with acclamations of Grace Grace thereunto as if the top-stone were already laid so on the other hand it is not too late to signifie the hopes we have that in Gods good time it will be brought to a happy period and that it will shine forth more and more as the Sun doth till it come to the perfect day Sure I am if the grounds of our hope as to that matter be not vain and frivolous it cannot be vain and fruitless to divulge and publish them considering how many there are whose hearts would even fail them if they should utterly dispair of Londons ever being upon its legs again As David saith of himself that he had fainted unless he had believed to see the goodness of God in the Land of the living Psa 27.13 This hope if I mistake not is and must be a causa sine quâ non of all attempts for the rebuilding of the City that is such a cause as without which no man will undertake to build upon his own account for as the Apostle speaketh 1 Cor. 9.10 That he that ploweth should plow in hope as knowing that otherwise men would hardly plow at all so by the same reason he that soweth must sow in hope too nor can it be imagined that any man will throw the seed of his care and cost into those deep Furrows which the fire hath made unless he be competently perswaded that he or his shall in due time reap the benefit of it I profess my self to be sincerely of that perswasion which I now endeavour to cherish in others viz. that the ruinous heap or that Chaos which we now call London will thorough the good will of him that dwelt in the Bush the burning Bush be once again a goodly City And that no man may think this hope of mine to be as a Spiders Web that may soon be swept or blown away I am ready to render the reasons of it which are as follow First I think it not inconsiderable that there is no Decree of Heaven promulged or made known to the contrary which I the rather insist upon because it hath been usual with God to give notice of his purpose and pleasure that the places intended by him for a perpetual desolation should never be raised up again as if it had been for that very end and it is like it was that men might not labour in vain planting that which must immediately be pluckt up and so building up that which must have been forthwith destroyed Thus Joshua doubtless by Divine Commission as appeareth from Joshua 16. did adjure the people concerning Jericho saying Cursed be the man before the Lord that riseth up and buildeth this City Jericho he shall lay the foundation thereof in his first-born and in his youngest son shall he set up the gates of it Joshua 6.20 which was fulfilled in Hiel the Bethelite and his two sons 1 Kings 16.34 That Curse made such impression that for more then five hundred years after no man adventured to attempt the rebuilding of that City devoted to destruction until Hiel at length took the boldness to do it and sacrificed his two sons and as some think all his children upon that dangerous service A like terrible prophesie of perpetual destruction we find denounced against Mount-Seir Ezek. 36.9 I will make thee perpetual desolations and thy Cities shall not return And the reason given v. 5. Because thou hast had perpetual hatred and hast shed the blood of the children of Israel Moreover against Hazor we find it thus written Jer. 49.33 And Hazor shall be a dwelling for Dragons and a desolation for ever there shall no man abide there nor any son of man dwell in it Adding one instance more we shall have confirmed this truth out of the mouth of twice two Witnesses and that Zeph. 2.4 will furnish us with As I live saith the Lord surely Moab shall be as Sodom and the children of Ammon as Gomorrah even the breeding of nettles and salt-pits and a perpetual desolation c. v. 10. This shall they have because they have reproached and magnified themselves against the people of the Lord. Now if God had spoken against London as against Jericho Hazor Mount-Seir Moab Ammon there had been no hope saving as the threatning might have been interpreted but conditional as when God said Niniveh should be destroyed within forty daies but no such thing having been denounced against this City where is the ground of despair if there be no Divine Promise of and for the rebuilding of London to be sure there is no express or manifest threatning against it and
himself to considerable sufferings as for conscience sake or under that notion To put no trust at all in men of good and commendable lives were to decry the validity of all Humane Testimony and to raze the foundations of all Humane Society Now if we cannot trust men in this case why should we trust them in other things and if we can trust them in other things why not in this Secondly That all such persons who in the judgment and by the principles of Christian charity ought to be deemed and taken as acting from conscience and from a fear of offending God in doing otherwise should at no hand be treated with such severity and rigor as they justly might if we could be certain or rationally presume that what they did were from such base principles or sinister ends as pride contumacy interest or the like Who ever had the heart or the face to deal rigorously with any man pretending conscience for what he did or refused to do especially about indifferent things unless he did think or at leastwise make as if he thought that conscience was but meerly pretended in the case But if conscience be really interessed and ingaged as in the circumstances before put we should take it to be the Apostles tenderness towards those that had a zeal for God though not according to knowledge will tell us how we ought to carry towards them viz. not only with calmness but kindness Rom. 10.1 Thirdly That persons agreeing and consenting with us in the main points of Religion in the sum and substance of Christianity ought not to be punished for their unavoidable dissent from us in lesser matters at so great a rate much less at a greater then those that vary from us in Fundamentals and go about to subvert the faith if such be not temporally undone and deprived of all wayes of subsisting for their perswasion much less ought these so to be Fourthly That they who believe or profess to believe so much truth as to Salvation is necessary to be believed and who in their general course practise accordingly who are also peaceably disposed and will give or have given the highest assurances that men can give that so far as in them lieth they will preserve the peace of Church and State I say that such men should be accounted worthy to live and have wherewithall so to do they and their families and if able for publick imployment should be intrusted therewithall specially at such a time as the Church or State or both have apparent need of their service and for want thereof are forced to imploy many worse and less useful in their room Fifthly That men should make no more divisions in Church or State then are of absolute necessity and cannot be avoided and least of all such as tend to the ruine of others though to the raising of themselves considering what the Apostle saith Rom. 16.17 18. Mark them which cause divisions and offences for they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ but their own belly Doubtless the way to the Church and to the Communion thereof should be made plain and accessible as God appointed of old those wayes should be which led to the several Sanctuaries or Cities of refuge to be sure no needless stumbling blocks or unnecessary hindrances should be laid in that way neither ought any member principal member especially to be cut off from the Church without urgent and inforcing cause any more then an arm or leg or eye to be severed from a natural body if it and the body can possibly be preserved together Sixthly that no man should be tempted to separation or division by suffering such things as may seem if not more then seem to plead for such a practise as namely by allowing and intrusting ignorant insufficient and scandalous Ministers Divisions or rather Dividors will be quite out of countenance when they have no plausible thing to plead for themselves but if they can say the Blind are set to guide them and they to feed them who for bread gave them a stone and for fish a Scorpion who have neither the Urim in their doctrine nor Thummim in their lives so long will they divorce themselves and rest perswaded that in so doing they do God and their own Souls good service This notion is so obvious as may make us hope it will not alwayes be overlookt if not speedily taken into serious consideration Seventhly That the paying tithe of Mint Anniss and Cummin and mean time omitting the weightier matters of the Law Judgment Mercy and Faith for which Christ denounceth a wo to the Pharisees Mat. 23.23 that is a rigorous insisting upon lesser things whilst those of higher importance are slightly past over which is no other then a straining at Gnats and swallowing of Camels is a practise that will make any Church obnoxious not only to the all discovering eye of God but to the observing eye of men such especially as have little affection for them If they can say we do place the kingdom of God in meats and drink in which it consisteth not rather then in righteousness wherein it doth consist they think they have enough against us to justifie their separation that we make nothing of their Souls feed them with meer husks and chaffe and have zeal for nothing but unscriptural rites and traditions Eighthly A little time time cannot but discover that to prefer men according to the largness and hardiness of their consciences rather then the tenderness thereof is no good rule to proceed upon It was the commendation of Josiah that his heart was tender and of Nehemiah that he did not do as others because of the fear of the Lord. The worst of men have the widest consciences and such a faculty at swallowing that nothing can choake them like some bewitched persons I have read of they can swallow needles and bodkins and knives and when they see their time cast them up again in the faces of their owners Ninthly It cannot be long hid from the eyes of men who now do least see it that to lay more load upon the consciences of men even such as are thought best able to bear it then they needs must to cause them Issachar like to couch down betwixt several burthens to scrue up the strings of mens consciences till they are ready to crack again to increase their task as Pharaoh did by the Israelites as if they feared conscience would otherwise be idle in a word to gorge the consciences of men till they are ready to spue up all again is no good policy Consciences that are overstretched like cloth that is so will be apt to shrink again and Ostriches which they say can digest Iron have anill report as creatures more then brutish both for folly and unnaturalness Job 39.14 18. I say it cannot long be hid that that is no good policy and therefore if any such thing hath been a cause of division when a
vilifie others who are much their betters both as to gifts and graces which is so irrational a thing that one would think it should easily be apprehended and avoided We bring Religion its self even that which is truly so called into great dis-esteem whilst we refuse to own it in any dress but one for if all should do so Religion so and so modified would no where have the applause and suffrage of any more then one party of men if there be twenty and fall under the censure and condemnation of all the rest By that means the faith of such as are weak would be staggered and they would be tempted to question the truth of that Religion which is represented to them as peculiar to themselves though it be indeed common to all sound Christians and sober Protestants that is so much of it as the Church of God determineth to be de fide that is of absolute certainty and necessary to salvation That men of another Opinion then our selves are of in matters controverted are therefore of another Religion and that utterly vain is a principle that hath bred a great deal of strife and debate but a principle so fond and sensless so ignorant and arrogant that one would think it should easily be parted with and when ever men shall let it go the fire of our dissentions would slake presently and that if love to one another begin to kindle why should men say in opposition to one another Lot here is Christ viz. in the Desart or there viz. in the secret Chambers as it is Mat. 24.26 whereas Christ may be here and there too and hath said that wheresoever he recordeth his name thither he will come Surely there are not fewer different Opinions as to Religion openly professed in the Low-Countries then are in England neither are there fewer different modes and wayes in and of the exercise of Religion there then here yet there they are quiet and here we are all in an uproar And what is the reason but because here we are alwayes biting and devouring one another as if it were a part of our Religion to oppose and vilifie the Religion of others though but circumstantially differing from our own whereas we ought to have charity and Veneration for it as agreeing with our own in the most material things and as the Apostles rule is Phil. 3.16 Whereto we have attained already walk by the same rule and mind the same things Now the causes of our divisions being so manifest as they are and the cure so easie as appeareth by the obviousness and easie practicableness of those thirteen healing Principles which I have laid down why should we despair that those causes will ever be removed and our divisions and discontents at length healed Surely there is Balm in our Gilead Jer. 8.22 there is some Physitian there though the health of the Daughter of our people be not recovered nay give me leave to say that I think our wounds are not so great as great as they are but that they might be cured with Vnguentum Apostolorum if I may so call it I mean such as is prescribed Rom. 14. almost throughout that Chapter especially if for better digestion sake a little Basilicon were added thereunto All the Objections I have now left to answer against the building of London are those which were taken from the present poverty of the Nation and the fear of future troubles both from abroad and at home I much fear what was said of Cinna is true of London Cinna videtur esse pauper est pauper London doth not only seem to be much impoverished but is really so And how can it otherwise be all things considered But must Citizens therefore quit their trades How shall they ever be rich again but by means of trading yea how can many of them so much as subsist without it And if trade they must where should they trade but in the City and how should they trade there unless they build again Whereas the fear of future troubles hath been insinuated as an argument against building it cannot be denied but that our manifold sins and present distractions may cause us to exspect them But first of all may not the infinite mercies of God possibly prevent the confusions which we exspect and not suffer the things we fear to come upon us or may not the Divine patience reprieve the Nation for some considerable time as the old world was reprieved after sentence denounced and if so will it not be every mans wisdome to make the best provision he can for him and his in the mean time shall men certainly and forthwith undo themselves for fear of being hereafter undone Shall not men seek to live whilst they may for fear they may not afterwards be able to live if they would ever so fain Solomon saith He that observeth the wind shall not sow that is He shall never atchieve any thing who will adventure nothing like one that would not sow till he were sure of the wind and weather to continue such as he would have them and that he can never be Go which way you will to work to improve your estates you shall run an adventure He that layeth out his mony upon lands shall have little profit great taxes and it may be bad title he that will turn Merchant must run the hazard of winds and seas and shelves and sands and Pirats unfaithful servants at home unconscionable and uncontroulable Factors abroad He that shall put his mony to interest besides that some scruple the lawfulness of so doing shall if he fare no better then other men be in danger of loosing both it and his principal if he happen to loose neither six per cent is all the increase he can exspect whereas in the way of building upon the wast of London there are that hope to make almost double that improvement To them that shall say they are under hatches and therefore they have no heart to build I would propose what is written Jer. 29.4 5. Thus saith the Lord to all that are carried away captives c. Build ye houses and dwell in them and plant gardens and eat the fruit of them Who can say it is worse with them now then it was with the Jews when this advice was given them more I could say to incourage heartless builders but that these two first Chapters have swelled too much already for which I can make no Apology but this that these were strings most of all to be harped upon and that the rest of my discourses are like to prove like those that sprang up after the flood viz. much shorter liv'd then those that went before them upon the whole matter I shall take leave to apply to desponding Londoners those words of the Prophet Jer. 26.19 Awake and sing ye that dwell in the dust for thy dew is as the dew of herbs c. As also what was said of the dry bones mentioned
be more commodious for Trade and that with respect both to buyers and sellers Buyers will not have far to go for their commodities and sellers by that means will have the more customers more Chapmen Moreover to joyn the new part of the City to the old at both ends and on both sides of the way would make it more speedily to look like a City even as a quarter of an hours discourse upon new matter joyned to half an hours repetition of that which is good and old passeth for a Sermon whereas a quarter of an hours discourse by it self would puzzle men what to call it and be laught at for a short come off A new City joyned to the old would be the Embleme of a sober comprehension mannaged to the best advantage of Church and State and of all good men whereas the scattering of houses some here some there at some distance one from another and all at a distance from the old building would be more the Embleme of an universal tolleration taking in Papists Quakers and every body else and which is best of the two I leave to other men to judge not to joyn the new and old together were to make as if they were two distinct Cities whereas indeed they are but two distinct parts of one and the same City united under the same Governors and Government and comprized within the same wall Drunken men use to see things double which are but single and it is an ill design to make things seem to be more than they are I love unity and that it should be owned to be where it is though I shall not curse the number two as one of the Ancients did for first wording from it I have given my reasons why what was last in the execution of the fire burning both wayes should be first in the intention and prosecution of the builder I will but moralize this head and dismiss it Sin like the fire hath made the greatest havock in the midst of us I mean upon the middle part of our lives not guarded by a harmless ignorance as was our youth nor yet by a preventing impotency as old age is Now the main work of a Christian should begin at the two ends of his life for so the two extremes may be called and the phrase of our latter end seemeth to imply a former end In matter of examination confession c. a Christian should begin at the beginning or hither end of his life In sin was I born Psa 51. but in point of meditation it is good to begin at the further or latter end of our lives proceeding from thence to serious reflections upon the midst and worst of them as God spake by Moses Deut. 32.29 O that they were wise that they understood this that they would consider their latter end DISCOURSE XX. That it would much conduce to the rebuilding of London to have a through search made how and by what means it was burnt I Charge no body with the burning of London but him that charged it upon himself that confessed and died for it But let others produce what they have to say if men will confidently affirm that London was destroyed by the treachery and cruelty of more persons than that one forementioned miscreant it is pity but they were punished if they can produce no probable grounds and reasons for what they say But if they have things to alledge in the case which do amount at least to a strong presumption and just ground of great suspicion that so it was it is great pity but that sent should be followed those footsteps traced and the utmost sagacity of wise and impartial men Magistrates and others imployed to fathom and discover what is at the bottom As Samuel said to Saul what meaneth then this bleating of the sheep in mine ears and the lowing of the Oxen which I bear So say I what meaneth that doleful cry which is daily in our ears such and such have burnt our City That is soon said and may be as soon denyed but proof is all in all Some tell us There is a great cry but no wooll a great smoak of accusation but no fire or so much as a spark of guilt Still I say sub judice lis est When the law hath given a perfect lot in the case then and not till then shall we certainly know who is in the right That old dilemma will never be answered if it be enough to accuse who can be innocent if it be sufficient to excuse who will ever seem guilty Therefore there is a third thing that must of necessity be done and that is tryal to be made by sufficient Juries and the worthy Judges what validity there is in all and every the Allegations pro and con given in upon Oath what all the Plaintiffs can say against and all the Defendants can say for themselves do signify and amount to What moment all the circumstances produced and proved have and are of in the ballance of reason When that is done there is reason for every man to be satisfied and I hope it will be so Have our Laws provided that if the despicablest person that can be lye dead in the streets unknown to any body there present how he or she came by their death a jury shall be impanel'd and the Coroner shall sit upon it to give sentence what the cause of his or her death was And did not God himself by his servant Moses will and command the Isralites that if one were found flain in their land and it were not known who had flain him Deut. 21.1 All the elders of that City which was next unto the slain man should wash their hands over a Heifer that was beheaded and say our hands have not shed this bloud neither have our eyes seen it v. 6 7. And the Priests the sons of Levi shall come near and by their word shall every controversy and every stroke be tried v. 5. which last words seem to imply that the persons who came to the place where the dead body lay or the heifer instead of the dead body were not acquitted by thir meer washing their hands in token of innocency as Pilate did nor yet by professing themselves not to have shed that bloud or to have known who did but that the sons of Levi in those daies had a spirit of discerning given them whereby they were able upon seeing and hearing such passages to judge whether the persons who appeared to purge themselves were guilty or not guilty For the text saith By their word shall every stroke be tried Did the Law of God inquire so strictly after the death of every man the time and manner of whose death was unknown and do the laws of our land do the like at this day and is it not highly reasonable that the death and destruction of a famous City the greater part of which lies slain in the streets to this day and buried in its
own ruines and ashes I say that the means and causes thereof should be inquired into Nay how great a care did the Law of God take to satisfie those husbands one way or other upon whom the spirit of jealousie came though there were no witness to prove that against their wives which they were jealous of Yea if the husband were jealous of his wife and she were not defiled Numb 5.13 14. Though the thing he was jealous of could not be proved yea though the woman was not guilty nevertheless she was to offer the jealousy offering v. 18. to purg her self by an Oath v. 19. and to drink of the bitter water v. 18. and all this was no prejudice to the wife in case she were innocent nay it was an advantage to her for v. 28. it is said If the woman be not defiled but be clean then she shall be free viz. First from the curse or mischief which the bitter water would otherwise have brought upon her v. 19. If thou hast not gone aside to uncleanness be thou free from this bitter water which causeth the curse v. 19 Secondly from the jealousy and suspicion of her husband which would not otherwise have been taken off And one benefit more she was to have by it expressed v. 28. And shall conceive seed that is if she were barren before she should after that have a Child and if she had any formerly she should have more If so much were done to satisfie the jealousy of one private man may nothing reasonably be expected to satisfie and take off the jealousies of thousands if not millions of men and women in City and country in a matter of higher consequence than is that injury which a husband receiveth by the unchastness of his wife though that injury be very great yet this I say was greater For this was a fault not to be pardoned if proved whereas Joseph though a just man when he suspected his espous'd wife to have been unlawfully with Child thought to have past it by and not to have made her an example Mat. 1. How desirous were the Philistines that were smote with Emrods to know whither God had done them that great evil or whether it were not some chance that had hapned to them 1 Sam. 6.9 Was their Plague of Emrods greater than our plague of Fire If not why should we less inqure after this how it came than they after that To inform our selves how the Fire came to pass is not a point of curiosity but of great use For could it be made out at leastwise with great probability that it was the immediate hand of God and as it were Fire from Heaven that did consume our City that circumstance would so much promote our humiliation to think that rather than suffer us to go unpunished God should work a miracle to destroy us And then again upon other accounts it might make much for our comfort to know that men had no hand in the doing of it For if God himself did do it immediately we may hope the like will not be done again in many ages to come For as God after he had once drowned the world did presently promise he would do so no more so it is scarcely to be paraleld amongst the providences of God that he should burn the same City twice in a short time He useth to pause and as it were to deliberate long upon such strange acts of Judgment as those are expostulating with himself and with them as of old How shall I give thee up O Ephraim how shall I make thee like Admah and like Zeboim my bowels are turned within me c. But they that suspect it was burnt by men till that jealousie be removed will always be in fear that they whom they mistrust to have destroyed it once if undiscovered will attempt to destroy it again as soon and as often as they can Now in case the bitter water of a through examination shall confirm the thing they were jealous of viz. that London was fired by Instruments and it shall come to light who those Instruments were it is all the reason in the world they should be made examples that others may hear and fear and do no more so wickedly I reckon the danger would be over for one Age at least as to that sort of men that should once be proved and owned to have burnt the City so firmly as they would be bound to their good behaviour and so watchful an eye as would be held over them from that time forward All opposition made to the sifting out that business doth vehemently encrease the jealousies of men for he that doth well cometh to the light that his deeds may be made manifest but they that have done evil hate the light lest their deeds of darkness should be reproved One would think that whotsoever is suspected being indeed innocent should be more earnest than any other persons to come to a strict scrutiny that themselves might be vindicated Methinks the chast Wife that had a jealous Husband should and could not but long for the bitter water as knowing it would be so far from causing her belly to swell and her thigh to rot that it would keep her name from rotting and make her of a sorrowful suspected Wife to become a joyful Mother If all men can wash their hands in innocency as from the burning of London I heartily wish that God would bring forth their righteousness as the light and their judgement as the noon day It is pity they should suffer so much as in their names who had no hand in it and if any had besides that poor Hubart who was executed upon that accompt the strangest instance that ever was if he burnt such a City alone to suffer in their names only is not sufficient But now I think of it there lately came down a Command or Commission to the City to take examinations upon oath of all matters relating to the fire which was done accordingly and the injunction to do it was I know accepted with all humble thankfulness and as well resented by many as ever any thing was That considered I must excuse what I have said with that of the Poet He that recommends what is done already thereby commends him that did it Qui monet facias quod jam facis ille monendo laudat What Solomon saith in another case I shall allude to in this After so much enquiry as hath been made already upon the oaths of sufficient persons many of whose depositions are now extant and after all that are like to be hereafter made by vertue of the Authority then granted if there be any guilt at the bottom Whosoever hideth it hideth the wind and the oyntment of his right hand which bewrayeth it self Prov. 27.16 DISCOURSE XXI That the countenance of Rulers expressing much zeal and earnestness to have the City up again and a sad sense of its present ruines would put much life
thing or things whereby they may render those that rule over them yet more confident and more highly assured of their love and loyalty than by what they have done already they are or might be let them have the security besides the former that they may be fully satisfied that in building a City for Londoners they build a London for themselves It is my humble and earnest motion that all that is lawful and possible to be done to secure and fortifie the minds of our Rulers against all suspicion and jealousie of any the least disaffection in the people towards them I say that all such things might be done that they may as willingly intrust them with a new and famous City carried on by their utmost countenance and assistance as they themselves are willing to be so intrusted How do I long to see the day in which Magistrates and People shall love one another no less than indulgent parents and good children use to do that Court and City shall set themselves to promote the happiness each of other should owe one another nothing but love should alwayes be paying that debt and yet confessing themselves to be still in debted as to that Concerning that mutual obligingness which was betwixt Solomon the wisest of Kings yea of men and his people we read in Ps 72. v. 12. He shall deliver the needy when he cryeth the poor also and him that hath no helper This was spoken of Solomon in type but of Christ as the antitype that he should do thus for his people but then in the 15. verse it is said To him shall be given of the gold of Shebah prayer also shall be made for him continually and daily shall he be praised which words express what the people should do for Solomon how they should oblige him who would be so obliging to them Now what is prophecied as the result of Solomon and his people thus vying which should oblige each other most I doubt not to apply to our City of London in reference to its great increase from its present small beginnings under the incouragements of an obliged magistracy There shall be a handful of corn in the earth upon the top of the mountains London is now as that handful of corn the fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon and they of the City shall flourish like grass of the earth v. 16. DISCOURSE XXIV That easing the burthens of Londoners all that may be till the City be finished would incourage the work CItizens may be pincht and yet not think fit to cry out They will bear more than they are well able rather than seem unable to bear Their credit is their livelihood and that is their life Some of them by making but a shew for the present hope in time to get substance Many are thought since the Fire to have made but few complaints not out of plenty but policy because it is their real interest to put the best side outermost Many of their hearts are sad as is believed in the midst of laughter It is our eye must affect our hearts with their condition rather than our ears They say little of it but we may see much Can an Old man to whom the very grashoper is a burthen carry as great a weight as can a young porter Could Sampson after his locks were cut in which his strength lay do as he had wont before no more can Londoners who have lost their metropolis their head City do as they were able before one hair of that head was singed May we not then hope and expect that they who are called Gods will in this case imitate him who is the true God of whom it is said Ps 13.14 That he knoweth our frame and remembreth that we are dust Londoners at this day are not only dust but dust in dust Here we must thankfully acknowledg the kindness of our Rulers in dispensing with Chimney-money as to the City for so many years to come which favour of theirs if duly resented may possibly usher in more When the Temple at Jerusalem was to be built Artaxerxes made a gracious decree touching the Priests Levites Singers Porters Nethinims or Ministers of the house of God it should not be lawful to impose toll tribute or custome upon them Ezra 7.14 It must be left to the wisdom and clemency of our Rulers to determine how far forth the same kindness or any other equivalent to it shall be extended to those who have sustained the damage of burning and must now be at the charge of building DISCOURSE XXV That to give a general content and satisfaction to men or so far as it can be done would help forward the City very much A General contentment would cause Religion to reflourish and consequently the City For what saith Solomon Prov. 14.34 Righteousness exalteth a nation and if a whole nation a City much more and in Ps 72.3 It is said The mountains shall bring peace to the people and the little hills by righteousness Now it being ordinary with scripture by righteousness to express that which we call Religion and by peace all manner of prosperity and rational in this place to understand it so I have by the mouth of two witnesses proved and easy it were to do it by many more that if a general satisfaction would promote Religion it would also promote the City And now my business is to prove that an universal contentment would be much to the furtherance and advancement of Religion and the want thereof would hinder the growth and increase of Religion as much as any one thing and consequently impede the building and exalting of the City For Contrariorum contraria est ratio contrary causes have contrary effects c. The Apostle speaks of godliness with contentment as great gain and usually they go together and so ordinarily do ungodliness and discontent What but discontent made Jobs Wife most blasphemously counsel him to curse God and die The same made Jonas so irreligious for the time as to say unto God I do well to be angry even to the death David himself as the text tells us was displeased because the Lord had made a breach upon Uzza 2 Sam. 6.8 And against whom was that his displeasure but against him that made the breach which was God himself yet more strange are those expressions Isa 8.21 It shall come to pass that when they shall be hungry they shall fret themselves and curse their King and their God and looke up Treason and blasphemy both in a breath and all from discontent like to that we meet with Rev. 16.21 And men blasphemed God because of the Plague of the Hail for the Plague of the hail was exceeding great A troubled sea will cast up little elfe but dirt and mire Sick bodies are not so fit for the service of God as those that are in health so neither are sick minds and such are all discontented ones Divines observe that men of melancholy
others is less accounted of and the humble person as the latter who shineth more with the raies of other mens commendation than a proud man that hath more brightness of his own Many kinds of sinners do love one another as such viz. Fellow-drunkards fellow-gamesters fellow-whoremasters but proud persons are great haters of their own order I mean one of another all hate pride in others but none hate it so much as they that have most in themselves We have heard of the family of love a sect so called but proud persons may go by the name of the family of hatred God having signified his hatred to them by leaving them above all other sorts of men to hate one another Proud men so far as such will not suffer God to dwell with them and in them and therefore may not presume that God will as much concern himself for them and for their dwellings as for those who invite God to dwell in them for so by their humility they do and in whom God himself delights to dwell Two texts will fully prove the several branches of this second reason viz. Ps 10.3 The wicked through the pride of his countenance will not seek after God God is not in all his thoughts Therefore I say proud persons will not let God dwell with them But as to others God saith I dwell with him that is of an humble spirit to revive the spirit of the humble Isa 57.15 God will provide dwellings for them with whom himself delights to dwell whilst others it may be shall go without God knows how little thanks himself shall have for building a City or any thing else he shall do for proud persons who will certainly overlook his hand and power and goodness and ascribe all to their own Deut. 8.12 14 17. Beware least when thou art full and hast built goodly houses and dwelt therein then thy heart be lifted up and thou forget the Lord thy God and thou say in thine heart my power and the might of mine hand hath given me this wealth When their hearts were lifted up then were they in danger to overlook the power of God and surely his goodness no less for what the Jews said to Christ touching the Centurion viz. That he was worthy for whom he should do this so proud persons are apt to think that they themselves are worthy of all that is done for them either by God or men and who will be so thankful for what he takes as a due as for what he takes as a curtesy and meer benevolence To do great things for proud men as to build a City for them were to increase their pride and to make them greater in their own eyes who are too great already therefore the text saith Beware least when thou hast built goodly houses and dwelt in them thine heart be lifted up Deut. 8. When God hath made men humble then and not till then he hath had his design in ruining them and therefore then it may be hoped he will go about to restore them Deut. 8.15 Who led thee through the great and terrible wilderness that he might humble thee and do thee good at thy latter end but first humble thee What should proud men do with goodly Cities set them on fire with contention for of pride commeth contention and make them less desirable than a wilderness as Solomon Prov. 21.9 It is better to dwell in a corner of the house top than with a brawling woman in a wide house Both from the promises and threatnings of God may humble men collect that they shall fare better than those that are proud The threatning saith that God resisteth the proud and he whom God resisteth is but in an ill case and unlike to prosper God seems to delight in crossing and carrying headlong the designs of proud persons as of those that went about to build the tower of Babel of Pharaoh and of Nebuchadnezar and it is the temper of not a few men and women to love to cross and set themselves against those persons whom they judg exceeding proud The word of promise is that the meek shall inherit the earth and therefore they have most reason to expect that God will build a City for them and for their sakes Why should proud men be more adorned they make too great a shew already and are like meat that is stuck with many scuers fairer to the eye but worse for spending and most apt to be fly-blown Pride and self confidence or confidence in those things which men are proud of usually go together Therefore the Apostle saith Charg them that are rich in this world that they be not high minded nor trust in uncertain riches and Solomon warns men not to lean to their own understanding viz. Such as are apt to be proud thereof now God delights to frustrate the designs and enterprises of those persons who trust in themselves or in any other creature and to shew them the weakness of an arm of flesh Jer. 17.5 Cursed be the man that trusteth in man and maketh flesh his arm for he shall be like the heath in the desert and shall not see when good cometh but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness in a salt land and not inhabited Proud men are apt to affront God and therefore it is not to be wondred at that God should not do as much for them as for those that are humble Give me not riches said Agur least I be ful and deny thee and say who is the Lord Prov. 30.4 How can men affront God more than in saying who is the Lord and so said Pharaoh in the pride of his heart who is the Lord that I should obey him Proud men must be crossed and frustrated least they should think themselves to be more than men Ps 9.20 Put them in fear O Lord that the nations may know themselves to be but men Considering then how many wayes God is obliged as it were to resist those that are proud them and their designs and how he hath obliged himself by promise to do great things for them that are â—â—mble viz. To teach them to dwell with them 〈◊〉 revive and comfort them c. These things â—â—sidered if you would up with your City down â—ith your pride proud looks words habits geâ—res manner of living and above all proud hearts â—hich are the cause of all the rest Consider those â—ords Lam. 3.29 He putteth his mouth in the dust 〈◊〉 so be there may be hope and that in James 4.10 Humble your selves in the sight of the Lord and he shall â—â—ft you up No misery but Hell nor that neither â—ill humble that person that is not humbled by the â—urning of such a City as London was himself being greatly concerned in it Till God have made us kiss his rod and so far forth accept the punishment of our iniquity as to acknowledg that he was righteous in burning so great a part of our City and had
tollerable evil rather than an indispensable good or rather as if all Religion were persecuted and driven into corners If Religion be exercised only in private places vice hath as much liberty as that comes to drunkenness and whoredom take their freedom in private houses and shall Religion appear no more publickly than they as if it also were a work of darkness and ashamed to shew it's head If I thought that all the reasons I have alledged would not prevail with men of estates to contribute freely towards the building of Churches I could upbraid them by telling them that which is no news for were it news I would not tell it them viz. that several places of good capacity have been erected by a sort of people that are generally none of the richest and who when they did it had cause to fear least some creature or other would cause their ground to wither and expose them to the scorching Sun I say some persons have adventured under those perillous circumstances to build larg places for the exercise of their Religion all their discouragements notwithstanding if then the people who are richer than they who have leave and incouragement to build publick Churches and may have many thanks for their labour who have the law of the land on their side and all the power of the nation divided amongst them whose Churches are as like to stand as the City it self is or will be when rebuilt I say if they have not so much love for the nation for themselves and for Religion as to build us more Synagogues in lieu of those that were burnt the Chappels of ease I spake of or shrines what shall I call them will rise up in judgment against you If you will not build publick Churches who are like to have the greatest interest in them when they are built I was about to say those poor people I mentioned but now as hardly as they are thought of would I am perswaded spare money from their backs and bellies to build more Churches if they might be sure they should be theirs as much as yours when they are built again nay be it how it will be such is the love the soberer sort of them do bear to publick ordinances that I question not but they will bear their full proportion whensoever trial shall be made what every man will freely contribute to the building of publick Churches If those that speak little of the Church should do more for it than some that have the Church the Church ever in their mouths as the Jews of old the Temple of the Lord the Temple of the Lord Jer. 7.4 it would be a woful shame But why should I seem to mistrust or doubt of the piety and bounty of the true sons and daughters of the Church towards their distressed mother who hath not heard of that noble Lady whether now living or dead I know not who out of her own estate hath given some thousands of pounds towards the rebuilding of the Church of S. Dunstans in the East now in a good forwardness and of what the liberal Minister of that place is said himself to have given towards that good work even more than many good Ministers have in all the world Their zeal I hope will provoke many I hope it will and I do earnestly desire it may for a sad climax runs in my thoughts and I am much perswaded if it should come to be tried it would prove to true viz. no publick Churches no legal maintenance no legal maintenance in time no able Ministers for who will study to be starved no good ministry no good preaching no good preaching no conversion no conversion no salvation But I hope beter things than that the Churches which are demolished should not be rebuilt much less the Churches that now stand should be demolisheâ— That sun of charity or piety rather which hath begun to rise in the East will I hope visit all the dark and desolate corners of Londons hemisphere for that I take to be the figure of it and not give over its circuit till having refreshed every dolesome and gloomy place at length it set in the west where the other Church of that name of S. Dunstans I mean is standing at this day I am loath to say that the rebuilding of Churches in London if it be not done by voluntary contribution and by way of free-will offerings it will certainly be done by constraint and compulsion from authority and if authority be forced to interpose in a matter of this nature it will be no small shame and reproach to us and seem to signifie that we would not be religious but upon force which is to be no more religious than they may be said to be honest who never pay their creditors but when they strain upon them or make distress which is indeed for creditors to pay themselves Time was when the bounty of men towards the Church was such and so great that Laws were made to limit and restrain it for that men were ready to say to a father or to a mother as the Pharisees did Mat. 15.5 It is a gift Corban viz. to the Church by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me and we find Moses was fain to set bounds to the sea of the peoples liberality towards the tabernacle in his time saying hitherto should it go and no farther Exod. 36.5 And they spake unto Moses saying the people bring much more than enough and Moses gave commandment and they caused it to be proclaimed throughout the camp saying let neither man nor woman make any more work for the offering of the sanctuary so the people were restrained from bringing I wish that at this day there were an overplus of liberallity towards the demolished Churches I mean more contributed than would serve to rebuild them that like as the oinment which was poured upon the head of Aaron ran down upon his beard and upon the skirts of his garment so that what is more than enough for the re-edifying of Churches might go to the rebuilding of Hospitals and publick Schools and of one place more viz. the late famous but now desolate foundation of Sion Colledge DISCOURSE XLVIII That the people of England are most unworthy to see another London THe rebuilding of London would be a national mercy but how unworthy is this nation of it Never did people more justly sorfeit a City and every other mercy than we have done As Africa is full of monsters in nature so is England in manners As if we had traded for vice instead of other commodities with all forreign parts we have amongst us the drunkenness of Germany the pride of Spain but not so grave the levity and lasciviousness of France the atheism hypocrisy reveng and the unnatural lusts of Italy We have much of the Indian disease amongst us for so some say it was at first and are forced to spend a great deal of their commodity I mean their Lignum
also acknowledg â—im the author of all the buildings which have been â—â—er since whether Cities Towns Villages or particular houses It is said we are Gods off-spring Acts 17.28 and why but because we are the children of Adam who was the Son of God Luk. 3.38 The â—ause of the cause is the cause of the effects By â—he same reason God having made men by whom â—ouses are built for every house is builded by some â—an Heb. 3.4 and given unto men all that wisdom which they have for building as for every other purpose Exod. 33.35 it being he that gives men leave to build when he could hinder it â—nd opportunity to build which he could easily with-hold and strength to build which he could â—ave denied and success in building which none â—ut himself could give these things considered we see great reason for what the Psalmist saith Psal 127.1 Except the Lord build the â—â—â—se they labour in vain that build it DISCOURSE L. Of the rebuilding of those houses of clay wherein we now dwell or of the Resurrection of our bodies OUr bodies are houses that must be demolished and it is as probable by fire as any how for feavers are a kind of fire and they destroy a great if not the greatest part of mankind Howsoever dust they are and to dust they must return Yet so surely as they shall fall so certain it is that they shall rise again there shall be a resurrection of the dead both of those just and unjust Acts 24.15 I doubt not of the possibility of a Resurrection sith I am sure of the truth of a Creation and to raise the bodies of men out of dust is not of more difficulty than to raise a world out of a Chaos and that Chaos out of nothing To say though such a thing as a Resurrection be possible yet it shall never be were to deny that principle which is common to most Religions in the world and which is the main foundation they are built upon viz. the doctrine of a future estate or of a life after this Christ told the Jewes that if they destroyed the temple of his body he would raise it up again in three daies and so he did and that he did so I say the evidence and assurance we have that he did do so is the great prop and pillar of our Christian faith therefore the scripture saith of Christ that he was declared to be the son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead Rom. 1.4 If Christ had not risen again the third day according to his promise his disciples had certainly renounced all confidence in him and taken him for an impostor and not for the Son of God and Saviour of the world but we are well assured that both they and many hundreds of others who lived about the same time or not long after them did strenuously assert that Christ did rise from the dead and did seal that truth with their blood that being the main article against them that they did so believe as S. Paul saith Act. 13.6 Of the hope and resurrection of the dead I am â—alled in question and Acts 25.19 They had certain â—uestions against him of one Jesus which was dead whom Paul affirmed to be alive But if there be no resurrection of be dead then is Christ not risen as the Apostle arguâ—th 1 Cor. 15.13 but that Christ is risen the suffeings of so many near unto Christ his time I say â—eir suffering unto death for the seal of Christ â—hom they had not known to have been the true Messiah if he had not risen again according to his â—romise do abundantly witness Canst thou believe that all mankind must perish 〈◊〉 it must be if Christ be not risen for saith the Apostle v. 17. If Christ be not raised your faith is â—ain ye are yet in your sins Canst thou believe that God will suffer the best â—en in the world to be of all men most miserable from first to last Surely such as have hope in Christ are men of the best lâ—ves of any in the â—orld But if Christ be not risen then they that â—â—ve hope in Christ are of all men most miserable The â—ive arguments which I have given may convince â—ny man that is not obstinate both of the possiâ—ility and futurity of a resurrection that is both that 〈◊〉 may and shall be But some will say how are the dead raised up and â—ith what body do they come To which objection or â—estion stated by the Apostle in those very words 1 Cor. 15.35 I answer that it doth not appear that the houses of wicked men their bodies I mean shall be any thing more beautiful at the resurrection than they were before or freed from those deformities which they carried to the grave with them but as those trees fall so they shall rise or if they should what would it signifie when neither they nor others could see it for want of light Did goodly houses or Churches look beautifully in the midst of flames when nothing but the wall of fire that was round about them could be seen but sure I am the houses of good men that is their bodies shall all and every of them be beautified at the resurrection and whereas some of them were like houses that are low built others like rooms that are shelving or garret-wise others dark like dungeons others slight and thin like paper-walled houses those and all other inconveniences shall be removed for then shall their vile bodies be changed and fashioned like unto Christ his glorious body according to the working whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself Phil. 3.21 Now the souls of men go about like snails carrying their shels upon their backs which maketh their motion slow but their houses or bodies after the Resurrection shall be no more clogs or impediments to their souls than wings are to the flight of birds Here our earthly houses that is our bodies do soil and stain the souls that inhabit them as the bare walls of new buildings use to do the garments of those that dwell in them but at the resurrection they shall no more do that than those rooms defile our cloaths which are hung with the newest and neatest tapistry Those houses which have no filthiness in themselves and such will our bodies then be can convey none to others How glad would the wicked be that these their houses of clay might never be rebuilt how much rather could they wish they might be annihilated For in these very houses must they dwell with consuming fire and everlasting burnings Consider the bodies of good men as the Temple of God for so they are called 1 Cor. 3.16 and as the members of Christ 1 Cor. 6.15 Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ consider them as sleeping in Jesus for so the expression is 1 Thes 4.14 as if the bosome of Christ were the Urne in which those ashes