For as some of Gods promises are made with the condition of faith and perseverance so his threatnings are denounced with the exception of repentance which though concealed for the most part is always included and sometimes expressed as in that place of Jeremiah At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdome Jer. 18. 7 8. to pluck up and to pull down and to destroy it If that nation against whom I have pronounced turn from their evil I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them Be we admonished from hence First What to practise in reference to God to wit Truth in our promises to and covenants with him that so our returns may be answerable in kinde to our receits All his ways are mercy and truth Psal 25. 10. to us-ward therefore all ours should be truth and faithfulness towards him Thrice happy we whatever our outward condition prove if we be able to profess in the sincerity of our hearts as they did in Psalm the fourty fourth All this is come upon us yet have we not forgotten thee neither have we dealt falsly in thy Covenant Our principal comfort flows from Gods keeping his Covenant of grace with us it should therefore be our principal care to keep touch with him § 8. Secondly What to look for in reference to our selves To wit an exact fulfilling of all promises and threatnings that are conditional according to their severall conditions Hath the faithfull and true witness said He that beleeveth and is baptized shall be saved but he that beleeveth not shall be damned Let no unbeleever then whilest he continueth in that estate expect salvation neither any that beleeveth and walketh in Christ fear damnation seeing he hath Truth it self engaged for his safety and seeing the faith of Gods Tit. 1. 1 2. elect according to St Pauls doctrine should go hand in hand with the hope of eternal life which God that cannot lie promised before the world began Let all that wish well to Zion make full account that in due time The mountain of the Isai 2. 2. Lords house shall be established in the top of the mountains and shall be exalted above the hills and all nations shall flow into it because it hath been promised of old Let them also know assuredly that the Lord will consume Antichrist with the spirit 2 Thess 2. 8. of his mouth and destroy him with the brightness of his coming because this commination standeth upon the file in holy Scripture and is not yet completely verified Former ages have seen Antichrist Nascent when the Bishop of Rome first usurped authority over all the Churches Antichrist Crescent when he began to maintain the doctrine of adoring Images and praying to Saints departed Antichrist Regnant when he exalted himself above Kings and Emperours setting up his mitre above their crowns yea Antichrist Triumphant when he once became Lord of the Catholick faith so as none might beleeve without danger more or less or otherwise then he prescribed To this observation made by one of our own learned countreymen let me add we our Dr Crakanthorp in his Vigilius dormitans chap. 13. § 24. selves have seen him Antichrist Cadent falling and waining ever since Luther Calvin Perkins and others were set on work by God to unmask him And no Exerc. 4. doubt if we do not our posterity shall see him Antichrist morient dying and giving up the ghost for the Lord faithfull and true hath not onely threatned his ruine but foretold that his day is coming EXERCITATION 4. Keeping mercy for thousands explained Men exhorted to trust God with their posterity Luthers last Will and Testament Iniquity transgression and sin what Six Scripture-expressions setting out the pardon thereof Gods goodness therein Faith and repentance the way to it Pardon in the Court of Heaven and of Conscience The equity and necessity of forgiving one another We are to forgive as God for Christs sake forgiveth us viz. heartily speedily frequently throughly A twofold remembrance of injuries in cautelam in vindictam § 1. THe sixth branch of divine goodness is the Lords keeping mercie for thousands which phrase admitteth of sundry notions worthy of diligent consideration First Keeping it as in a store-house God is said to be rich unto all that call upon Rom. 10. 12. him and we reade of the riches of his goodness These riches are laid up with him and kept as in a magazine to be made use of upon all occasions according to the emergent necessities of his people Whence it is that we also reade of their obtaining mercie and finding Hebr. 4. 16. grace to help in time of need Secondly Keeping it for the present age as well as having dispensed it formerly to predecessours Our fathers were all liberally supplied out of Gods forementioned Treasury as it is in Psalm the two and twentieth Our fathers trusted in thee Psal 2◠4 5. They trusted and thou didst deliver them They cried unto thee and were delivered they trusted in thee and were not confounded This should be no disheartning to us as if his Treasury were exhausted but encourage us rather as Pauls example did succeeding beleevers For this 1 Tim. 1. 16. cause I obtained mercie said he that in me first Jesus Christ might shew forth all long-suffering for a pattern to them which should hereafter beleeve on him to life everlasting Which is the next observable Thirdly Keeping it for time to come as well as dispensing it at present God hath mercy in hand and mercy in store We now say as it is in the Lamentations It is of the Lords mercy that Lam. 3. 22. we are not consumed because his compassions fail not The same will they have occasion to profess that shall come after us God keepeth mercy and mercy keepeth us Created goodness indeed being limited may be justly suspected of penurie Esau might have somewhat to plead for his saying Hast thou but one blessing my father But Divine goodness is like an ocean without either banks or bottome Our heavenly Father hath blessings reserved as well as bestowed many more blessings then one yea for many more persons then one as it followeth Fourthly Keeping mercy for thousands and that not of persons onely but as it is in the Chaldee for thousands of generations One generation goes saith the Preacher and Eccles 1. 4. another generation cometh but the earth abideth for ever Not one of all these generations but coming and going tasteth of mercy and the whole earth during Psal 33. 5. the time of these revolutions are still full of the Lords goodness When the ark rested Moses said Return O Lord unto the many Numb 10. 36. thousands of Israel He that charged his providence with the thousands of Israel is ready to charge it with the thousands of England both in this and after ages if they do not apostatize from him and so forsake
expressions setting out the pardon thereof Gods goodness therein Faith and repentance the way to it Pardon in the Court of Heaven and of Conscience The equity and necessity of forgiving one another We are to forgive as God for Christs sake forgiveth us viz. heartily speedily frequently throughly A twofold remembrance of injuries in cautelam in vindictam EXERCITATION 5. Pag. 223. The latter clauses of Exod. 34. 7. so translated and expounded as to contain an eight branch of divine goodness viz. Clemency in correcting Equity in visiting iniquities of the fathers upon the children Clemency in stopping at the third and fourth generation A lesson for magistrates A speech of our Queen Elizabeth Gods proclamation in Exodus 34. Improved by Moses in Numbers 14. EXERCITATION 6. Pag. 234. Job 11. 7 8 9. expounded of divine Greatness Three reasons of that Exposition with the resolution of a question about it The height of Gods universal unaccountable omnipotent Sovereignty proved and improved EXERCITATION 7. Pag. 253. The depth of Divine Omniscience seen in discerning the deep things of man yea of Satan yea of God Our Nescience discovered and acknowledged The longitude of Gods perfection stated Eternity proper to him Not assumed by or ascribed to men without blasphemy EXERCITATION 8. Pag. 263. Divine Immensity shadowed out by the breadth of the Sea Divine Omnipresence cleared and vindicated The proposal hereof as an antidote against sinning in secret Five practical Corollaries from the greatness of God in general APHORISME V. Pag. 277. The Goodness and Greatness of God are both abundantly manifested by his decrees of Election and Preterition together with his works of Creation and Providence EXERCITATION 1. Pag. 277. How predestination cometh to be treated of here Election described from the Nature Antiquity Objects Products and Cause of it Rom. 11. 33. 2 Tim. 1. 9. with Tit. 1. 2. Ephes 1. 4. with Matth. 25. 34. opened Of Acts supposing their objects Of acception of persons what it is and that Predestination doth not import it Acts 13. 48. Expounded and vindicated Whether one Elect may become a reprobate The negative maintained and 1 Cor 9. 24 25 26. cleared Ephes 5. and 11. enlightned Concerning the good pleasure of Gods will and the counsel thereof EXERCITATION 2. Pag. 310. Preterition described The term defended Ephes 1. 4. compared with Revel 17. 8. Ephes 1. 9. and Rom. 9. 13. expounded God not bound to any creature except by promise The parable in Matth. 20. urged The three consequents of negative reprobation Dr Davenants Animadversions against Mr Hoards book recommended The goodness of God manifested in Election as in a most free peculiar ancient leading and standing favour EXERCITATION 3. Pag. 327. An Introduction to Romans 9. Most part of that chapter expounded together with sundry passages in chapter 10 and 11. for proof of these two conclusions 1. That Paul in Rom. 9. doth upon occasion propound and prosecute the doctrine of Predestination 2. That he derives the Decree of preterition from the Sovereign greatness of God A Consectary shewing how usefull the said doctrine is to sober mindes EXERCITATION 4. Pag. 359. Creation what Pythagoras and Trismegist Hebr. 6. 3. opened Scripture-Philosophy Ex nihilo nihil fit how true Creature what Gods goodness in works of creation particularly in the framing of Adam The consultation upon which pattern after which parts of which he framed Two histories one of a Priest the other of a Monk The original of body and soul improved EXERCITATION 5. Pag. 381. The same and other attributes of God declared from his providential dispensations the interchangeableness whereof largely discoursed of and applied from Ecclesiastes 7. 14. A gloss upon Isaiah chap. 10. 11. Chearfulness a duty in six respects Crosses how to be considered APHORISME VI. Pag. 400. Providence extends it self not onely to all created beings and to all humane affairs especially those that concern the Church but even to the sins of Angels and men EXERCITATION 1. Pag. 400. Introduction concerning the contents of this Aphorisme Providence over all created beings Preservation of men to be ascribed to God himself not to good men yea not to good Angels in whom heart-searching and patience wanting Providence reaching to humane affairs Oeconomical Civil Military Moral and Ecclesiastical Anastasius his design frustrate Rome and our nation instanced in J. G. castigated EXERCITATION 2. Pag. 415. Deuteron 11. 12. opened Gods care over the Church proved from the provision he makes for inferiour creatures From Israels conduct From the experiments and acknowledgements of Saints in all ages Experiments of the virgin Mary Rochellers Musculus acknowledgements of Jacob David Psalmist Austin and Ursin From Gods causing things and acts of all sorts to cooperate unto the good of the Saints Isaiah 27. 2 3. explained The Church preserved from in and by dangers EXERCITATION 3. Pag. 438. Hard-heartedness made up of unteachableness in the understanding untractableness in the will unfaithfulness in the memory unsensibleness in the conscience and unmoveableness in the affections Metaphors to express it from the parts of mans body stones and mettals A soft heart Mischief searedness and virulency attendants of hardness Gods concurring thereunto by way of privation negation permission presentation Tradition to Satan Delivering up to lusts and infliction EXERCITATION 4. Pag. 463. Objections against and Corollaries from the foregoing propositions The least things provided for Luthers admonition to Melancthon Maximilians address Plinies unbelief The Psalmists stumble at the prosperity of the wicked His recovery by considering it was not full was not to be final The superintendency of Providence over military and civil affairs in particular The Churches afflictions Promises cautioned Duty of casting care upon God He no authour of sin The attestation of this State and of this writer A CHAIN OF THEOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES Or An orderly concatenation of Aphorismes and Exercitations Wherein The chief heads of Christian Religion are asserted and improved APHORISME I. Mans blessedness consisteth not in a confluence of wordly accommodations which are all vanity of vanities but in the fruition of God in Christ who onely is the strength of our hearts our portion for ever EXERCITATION 1. Aph 1. Psal 144. end opened Blessedness what Solomons scope in Ecclesiastes Why he stiles himself Coheleth His testimony concerning the creatures Their threefold transcendent vanity Intellectual accomplishments brought under the same censure by reason of the folly enmity anxiety and insufficiency that attend them An apostrophe to the world § 1. THis is a case which hath long since been determined by the Prophet David who in Psalm the hundred fourty fourth after he had twice charged those whom he calls strange children with a mouth speaking vanity once in the eighth and again in the eleventh verse goeth on to record as good Interpreters ancient and modern do conceive Augustin Genebrard Ainsworth Jo. Baptist Folengius in Psal 144. the substance of their vain talk in a way of boasting about
the product of both sums be not soul-satisfaction and blessedness but vanity and vexation of spirit How often is the sword put into mad mens hands the bramble advanced to rule over better trees and walls of mud shined upon while marble pillars stand in shade How often do goats clamber up the mountains of preferments whilest the poor sheep Ambitio te ad dignitatem nisi per indigna non ducit Senec. Natural quaest in Praefat. lib. 1. Ambitio charitatis simia Charitas patiens est pro aeternis ambitio pro terrenis Didac Stella de Contemptu mundi part 1. pag. 88. of Christ feed below yea how often is greatness acquired by base and confounded by weak means Flattery held Absolons stirrup He that is every ones master now was a while since at every ones service Well might Stella call Ambition Charities ape for it also beleeveth all things hopeth all things yea and beareth all things too till what it hoped for be attained then grows intolerable it self It may further be observed that God usually taketh a course to break the staff of such pride by confounding the power of worldly Potentates not with Lions and Tigres but as Pharaohs of old by frogs and lice The Apostle I remember saith An Idol is nothing and yet the silversmiths cried out Great is Diana of the Ephesians Diana then was a great nothing Such are those men of place idolized by common people when the Lord begins to blow upon them in his wrath like those nobles of Idumea concerning whom Isaiah said All her Princes shall Isa 34. 12. be nothing § 9. Secondly as for those saints whose wings are still somewhat clogged with the birdlime of this world I humbly desire them to consider how ill it becomes the offspring of heaven to go licking up the dust of this earth the womans seed to content it self with the serpents food Any one of the posterity of Japhet after he hath been perswaded into the tents of Sem to bring on himself Canaans curse A servant of servants shalt thou be by subjecting his soul to that which God made to serve its servant the body Verily if this present world or any thing in it be over precious in thy sight O Christian thou Cujus anima in oculis ejus est pretiosa in ejus oculis mundus est parvus Dictum Hebraeorum apud Buxtorf in florileg p. 225. Pecuniam habes vel teipsum vel pecuniam vilem habeas necesse est Senec. art become vile in the eyes of God yea in thine own for none can set an high price upon things without him till he have first undervalued his soul Time was when Satan shewed our Saviour all the kingdomes of this world and the glory of them If ever the world appear unto thee temptingly glorious suspect it for one of Satans discoveries Sure I am the Scripture useth diminishing terms when it speaks of creature-comforts as in styling the pomp of Agrippa and Act. 25. 23. 1 Joann 1. 17. Bernice much phansie no reality in calling mens temporal estates this worlds Matth. 13. 22 goods not theirs but the worlds deceitfull 1 Tim. 6. 17. Habak 2. 6. Amos 2. 7. and uncertain riches thick clay and dust of the earth winde grass and the flower of grass the least things hardly things Solomon Eccles 5. 16. James 1. 11. Luke 16. 10. 15. brings them down to the lowest degree of entity yea to nullity saying Labour not to be rich wilt thou set Prov. 23. 4 5. thine eyes upon that which is not § 10. Let Diotrephes then say It is good for me to have the preeminence Judas It is good for me to bear the bag Demas It is good for me to embrace this present world But do thou O my soul conclude with David It is Psal 73. 28. good for me to draw near to God Thou art now as a bird in the shell a shell of flesh which will shortly break and let out the bird This crazy bark of my body ere long will be certainly split upon the fatal rock of death then must thou its present pilot forsake it and swim to the shore of eternitie Therefore O everlasting creature see and be sure thou content not thy self with a transitory portion I do not Lord thou knowest I do not Of a small handfull of outward things I am ready to say It is enough but that which I long so passionately for is a large heart full of God in Christ Thou art my sun the best of creatures are but stars deriving the lustre they have from thee Did not thy light make day in my heart I should languish for all them in a perpetuall night of dissatisfaction There are within me two great gulfs a minde desirous of more truth and a will capable of more good then finite beings can afford Thou onely canst fill them who art the first truth and the chief good In thee alone shall my soul be satisfied as with marrow Psal 63. 5. and fatness and my mouth shall praise thee with joyfull lips APHORISME II. We are conducted to the fruition of God in Christ by Christian Religion contained in the divine oracles of holy Scripture EXERCITATION 1. The safe conduct of Saints signified by the pillar Exerc. 1. in Exodus performed by the counsel of God himself the abridgement whereof we have in the doctrine of Christian Religion How that tends to blessedness § 1. THere is no possibility of arriving at Blessedness without a safe conduct nor at glory without guidance No infallible guidance but by the counsel of God himself All which the Psalmist is like to have had in his eye when in his humble address to God he expresseth himself in this manner Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel Aph. 2. and afterward receive me to glory The Psalm 73. 24. husbands duty in relation to his wife is to be the guide of her youth Such Prov. 2. 17. hath Christ one of whose names is Counsellour been to his Church in former Isa 9. 6. times is at this day and will continue to the end of the world In Exodus we meet with the history of the Jewish Church her youth and her strange manner of guidance which when the Levites in Nehemiah came to Nehem. 9. 19. commemorate they do it thus Thou in thy manifold mercies forsookest them not in the wilderness the pillar of the cloud departed not from them by day to lead them in the way neither the pillar of fire by night to shew them light and the way wherein they should go It was not onely a seasonable act of mercy to them in that age but may be looked upon as an emblem of that safe conduct which the Church in all ages may expect from Jesus Christ For as in that cloudy-fiery pillar there were two different substances the sire and the cloud yet but one pillar So there are two different natures in
oracles for their use then that they have God for their authour Many large volumes have been written for to make good this assertion It is a thing wherein the Spirit of God who indited the Scripture gives such abundant satisfaction to the spirits of godly men as to make other arguments though not useless yet to them of less necessity He alone bearing witness to the divinity of holy writ and to the truth of his own testimony so putting a final issue to that controversie But because there is need of other reasons for the conviction of other men I have produced certain arguments Tâ—ctica Sacra lib. 2. cap. ult elsewhere and shall here make an addition of two more which are not mentioned in that discourse one from consent another from continuance § 6. From consent thus Writings of men differ exceedingly one from another which made Seneca say Philosophers Tunc inter Thilosophos conveniet quando inter Horologia would then be all of one minde when all clocks were brought to strike at one and the same time Yea it is hard finding an authour that doth not differ from himself more or less if he write much and at various seasons But here is a most harmonious consent The word since written fully agrees with that which in former times was delivered to the Patriarchs and transmitted by word of mouth As the word God is the same to day yesterday and for ever although not incarnate till the fulness of time came and then made flesh So the word of God although till Moses received a command to put it in writing there wanted that kinde of incarnation was for substance the same before and after And as the written word agreed with the unwritten so doth one part of that which is written harmonize with another The two Testaments Old and New like the two breasts of the same person give the same milk As if one draw water out of a deep well with vessels of different mettal one of brass another of tin a third of earth the water may seem at first to be of a different colour but when the vessels are brought near to the eye this diversity of colours vanisheth and the waters tasted of have the same relish So here the different style of the historiographers from Prophets of the Prophets from Evangelists of the Evangelist from Apostles may make the truths of Scripture seem of different complexions till one look narrowly into them and taste them advisedly then will the identity both of colour and relish manifest it self § 7. From continuance thus Notwithstanding all the confusions that have happened in the world all the fires that have been kindled the massacres that have been executed and the battels that have been fought against the true Christian Religion the store-house thereof hath continued to this day and these Oracles of God been preserved in spite of hell Solomons philosophical treatises which the world had no spleen against but a liking of are long since lost whereas his Canonical writings are extant still When the earth clave asunder to swallow up Korah his company there are that think some of his children were taken up by the hand of God into the air till the earth closed again then set down without having received any harm because in the titles of sundry Psalms mention is made of the sons of Korah whom Tirinus in Numer 16. notâ ultimâ they suppose then preserved to propagate these whose service the Lord had a purpose to use so long after How often hath persecution opened her mouth from age to age and swallowed up millions both of men and books Yet the bible hath been continued still by the over-ruling hand of heaven yea which maketh it more remarkable God hath so befooled the devil herein as to preserve his own Book many times by the hands of his and its enemies It is too well known how small friends the Jews are and have heretofore been to the truth contained in the old Testament yet of them did the Lord make use to keep it and they proved carefull feoffes in trust for making over the assurances of life to us Gentiles Concerning one book of the New Testament viz. the Apocalypse it is very observable that when the authority thereof was questioned of old the Church of Rome struck in with her testimony and was a special means to have it kept in the number of Canonical books not without a special providence God who made Pharaohs daughter a second mother to Moses whom he had appointed to bring destruction afterwards upon her fathers house and kingdome did then make the Romish Church a drie nurse to preserve this Book whose meaning she knew not that it might bring desolation upon her self and her children afterwards Well may we therefore conclude and say of the holy Bible as Gamaliel once did of the Apostles Acts 5. 38 39. preaching Had this work been of men it would have come to nought longere this but being it is of God the devil and his complices have not been able to overthrow it § 8. Learn we also from that hath been said to magnifie the grace of God who in order to the promoting of our blessedness hath brought us of this nation to the knowledge of Christian Religion for want whereof many millions in other parts still sit in darkness and the shadow of death It was a memorable act of Witekindus Sr H. Spelman in Aspilogia p. 71. one of the Dukes of Saxony who flourished about the nine hundredth year of Christ after his renouncing paganisme and receiving the faith of the gospel he caused the black horse which he had formerly born in his military colours to be laid aside and in stead thereof a white horse to be born in testimony of his triumphant joy for that great change perhaps because among Qui candore cum nive certabant Pompon Laetus the Romanes the manner was to make use of such coloured steeds in their triumphs It put me in minde of what we reade in the sixth of the Revelation verse the second where Christ is described as going out in the ministery of the Gospel which was then newly embraced by that Prince Behold a white horse and he that sat on him had a bowe and a crown was givne unto him and he went forth conquering and to conquer Yea whereas there are sundry modes of the Christian Religion we are therefore to have our hearts and mouths filled with the highest praises of God because we have it in the purest that is the Protestant way which allows the people in general a free use of Bibles in their native language In In Hispania in Indice librorum prohibitorum Regulae sexta sic habet Prohibentur Biblia in vulgari lingua cum omnibus suis partibus Azor. Instit moral Tom. 1. lib. 8. cap. 26. pag. 714. Anglia mons pons sons Ecclesia foemina lana sundry parts even of Europe
thou finde in thy self any beginnings of salvation any hopes that it shall be perfected Remember what that great asserter of free grace hath left upon record to all posterity By grace Eph. 2. 8. ye are saved through faith and that not of your selves it is the gift of God Remember it so as § 3. First to beware of receiving the grace of God in vain it being ordained for better ends to wit purging and cheering of such as receive it The grace of Titus 2. 11 12. God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts we should live soberly righteously and godly in this present world All partakers of grace should not onely denie that gross ungodliness of conversation which the very sons of moralitie decrie and abhor but also worldly lusts which others are secretly indulgent to Neither should they content themselves with a negative purity such as that of the Pharisee was I am not as Luke 18. 11. other men not as this publicane not an extortioner not an adulterer Logicians say of this particle Not that it is of a malignant nature Divines know that the malignant Church is much built up by such negatives but also practise positive holiness by living soberly righteously and godly and that too in this present world not putting on a vizard of these as the manner of some is on a sick bed or death bed when they can no longer look at themselves as men of this world but of another As for cheering remarkable is that prayer made in behalf of the Thessalonians Now our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God 2 Thess 2. 16 17. even our Father which hath loved us and hath given us everlasting consolation and good hope through grace comfort your hearts It implieth that whereas we cannot possibly raise from our selves any ground of hope or have any lasting much less everlasting consolation from the creatures Grace is a firm foundation for both And this is it which hath put the prince of darkness whose desire it hath always been to keep men in as hopeless and comfortless condition as he can upon using his utmost endeavours in all ages of the Church either to obstruct the doctrine of free grace as by Pelagian and Arminian tenents or to poison this fountain with corrupt deductions and inferences as by Antinomians and Familists Wherefore remember it so as § 4. Secondly In all thy tenents and discourses to magnifie and exalt that to which thou owest so very much indeed thine All that good is Think it not enough with some of a Non est devotionis dedisse prope totum sed fraudis retinuisse vel minimum thousand parts to ascribe nine hundred ninety and nine to free grace reserving but one for free-will for as Prosper resolves the case well It is not devotion to give almost the whole to God but deceit to retain the least part And again Grace is Gratia Dei tota repellitur nisi tota suscipiatur wholly repelled where it is not wholly entertained I list not now to dispute the point Onely let me have leave to commend to thy reading and observation a paper of verses inserted by certain Divines that were present at the Synod of Dort into their suffrage and comprehending a brief decision of the five Articles there debated with a pious inference from thence because with me they have ever been of great esteem since I first met with them in the Acts of that Synod Gratia sola Dei certos elegit ab aevo Acta Synod Dordrect in 4o. pag. 293. Dat Christum certis gratia sola Dei Gratia sola Dei fidei dat munera certis Stare facit certos gratia sola Dei Gratia sola Dei cùm nobis omnia donet Omnia nostra regat gloria sola Dei In English thus Free grace alone elected some to bliss Free grace alone gave Christ to death for some In some free grace works faith that saving is Some by free grace to perseverance come Since Gods sole grace doth all our good provide Let Gods sole glory all our motions guide § 5. A third branch of divine goodness is Long-suffering whereby God hath been pleased to put a notable difference between Angels that fell and the lapsed sons of Adam Of them Peter saith God spared not the Angels that 2 Pet. 2. 4. sinned but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved unto judgement This was quick and speedy work But the Lord saith 2 Pet. 3. 9. the same Apostle is Long-suffering to us-ward He exerciseth much patience very much even towards all though vessels of wrath For so Paul What if Rom. 9. 22. God willing to shew his wrath and to make his power known endured with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction How profane was the old world How wicked a place was Jericho yet was he one hundred and twenty years in warning those of that age before he brought the deluge upon them And he that made the world in six was seven days in destroying that one city The great Doctour of the Gentiles was not much more then thirty years old when God converted him yet we finde him looking at this as infinite patience as all long-suffering that he was born with so long I obtained mercy saith he that in me first 1 Tim. 1. â—6 Jesus Christ might shew forth all long-suffering How sensible then ought they to be of this Attribute whom God hath born with fourty fifty sixty years and still continueth to cry unto as it is in Habakkuk Wo to him that increaseth that Habak 2. 6. which is not his How long as in Jeremy O Jerusalem wash thine heart from wickedness Jerem. 4. 14. that thou maist be saved How long shall thy vain thoughts lodge within thee And again Wo unto thee O Jerusalem wilt Jerem. 13. 27. thou not be made clean When shall it once be All which places declare sufficiently that the long-suffering God doth in a manner long to see our conversion to him § 6. And that indeed is the most proper use we can make hereof according to Pauls expostulation Despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance Rom. 2. 4. and long-suffering not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance Verily we cannot meet on this side hell with a worse temper of spirit then that which inclines a sinner to despise the forbearance of God and to kick against the bowels of his goodness As that profane Arian did who was executed at Norwich concerning whom Mt Greenham acquainteth us with this strange and prodigious narration Mr Greenham in his treatise intituled A sweet comfort for an afflicted conscience on Prov. 18. 14. circa medium This hellish heretick saith he for so were the deniers of Christs Divinity accounted of in those days whatever thoughts be had of
his fancy and hit upon nothing the second did the same He then expected the youngest should go directly to the Crowned bed but he prayed the Emperour that he might be permitted to lie with one of his brothers and by this means not any of the three took the way of the Empire which was so easie to be had that it was not above a pace distant Anastasius much amazed well saw God would transfer the Diadem from his race as he did afterward to Justine Who can read and consider such examples without saying as he did Ludit in humanis Divina potentia rebus That is Divine power often dares Desport it self in mens affairs Remember Daniels four beasts and the seven heads of that beast in the Apocalyps conceived by interpreters to resemble the seven forms of Government which Rome was to undergo sucsessively from a Common-wealth to Kings from Kings to Consuls from Consuls to Dictatours thence to Decemvirs thence to Tribunes of the people thence to Emperours thence to Popes Reflect upon this Nation of ours which hath been governed at first by Britains then Saxons then Danes then Normanes one while in the way of an Heptarchy another while of a Monarchy and now of a Republick and if thou canst refuse to crie out O the depth § 4. III. Military such as belong to the managing of Wars It is not for nothing that God is so often styled Lord of hosts in the Old Testament We finde him so called no less then one hundred and thirty times in two of the Prophets Esaias and Jeremy Because in ordering of Martial affairs he in a manner doth all Captains and superiour Officers may and do consult but God determines They throw the dice he appoints the chance they set their men as it pleaseth them he in the issue plays the game as it pleaseth him Hear David in that Psalm of his which he made in the day that the Lord delivered him from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul speaking of his own experiments and celebrating God as assisting him both in the field and at sieges By thee I have run through a troop and by my God have I leaped over a wall giving him Psal 18. 29. strength activity skill It is God that girdeth me with strength He maketh my feet like hindes feet He teacheth my hands Verse 32 33 34. to war so that a bowe of steel is broken by mine arms Yea success and victory Thou hast girded me with strength to the Verse 39. 40. battel thou hast subdued under me those that rose up against me Thou hast also given me the necks of mine enemies that I might destroy them that hate me In the New Testament we seldome or never meet with that title That which comes nearest it is Lord God Almighty and this occurs twice in the Revelation when mention is made of the victories which it pleaseth God to give to the Reformed Churches against Anti-Christ and his adherents once in these words We give thanks O Lord Rev. 9. 17. God Almighty which art and wast and art to come because thou hast taken to thee thy great power and hast reigned And again in these Great and marvelous 15 3. are thy works Lord God Almighty just and true are thy waies Thou King of Saints IV. Moral such as belong to good manners or in more Gospel terms To living soberly righteously and godly in Tit. 〈◊〉 12. this present world The two former I well know are pretended to by men unregenerate yea by heathens Socrates they say lived so soberly as not to be discomposed by any outward emergency to shew himself alwaies the same man Fabritius so righteously as that it was commonly said of him To turn the Sun out of its course would be found more easie then to turn him from the way of justice But for godliness which is the third it were hard if any should pretend to that without strong impressions from God in Christ yet the Pelagians of old did asserting those virtues which appeared in Moral men who had not received Christ Jesus the Lord nor known what it was to walk in him for true graces for which very fault as S. Austin tels us above all others the Christian Church August contr Julian Pelag. l 4. ◠3. did most detest them yea a Christian Minister of late hath in print dared to collect from that saying of Paul All men have not faith an implication J. G. Preface to the Reader before Red. Redeemed fol. 6. à fine That men who act and quit themselves according to the true principles of that reason which God hath planted in them cannot but believe and be partakers in the precious faith of the Gospel But we have been taught and must teach that it is not in the power of any inferiour creature so to improve it's faculties as to raise up it self to a superiour rank No tree can make it self a beast no beast a man no man a Saint by the Omnis insidelium vita peccatum est nihil est bonum sine summo bono ubi enim deest agnitio aeternae incommutabilis voluntatis falsa virtus est in optimis moribus Prosper sent 106. bare improvement of his reason whence he comes to be a man Moral principles prove to such as relie upon them and seek no further Mortal principles We believe that of Prosper The whole life of an unbeliever is sin Neither is there any thing good where the chief good is wanting but false virtue in the midst of the best manners V. Ecclesiastical such as belong to the Church and the legitimate members of it In that Song of Loves Psal 45. 9. Upon thy right hand did stand the Queen in gold of Ophir is meant the Church Look as an indulgent Prince besides the common affection he bears and protection he gives to all his subjects hath a peculiar respect to and converse with his Princess so there is a peculiar providence of God toward his Church the handling whereof at large I refer to the next Exercitation EXERCITATION 2. Exerc. 2. Deuteron 11. 12. opened Gods care over the Church proved from the provision he makes for inferiour creatures From Israels conduct From the experiments and acknowledgements of saints in all ages Experiments of the Virgin Mary Rochellers Musculus acknowledgements of Jacob David Psalmist Austin and Ursin From Gods causing things and acts of all sorts to cooperate unto the good of the saints Isaiah 27. 2 3. explained The Church preserved from in and by dangers § 1. OUr third proposition is That divine Providence is seen more especially in such affairs as concern the Church and the members thereof In order to the clearing whereof I intend to insist upon two places of Scripture The first is that in Deuteronomy 11. 12. Where Moses describing the land of Canaan saith of it thus A land which the Lord thy