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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	according_a	king_n	law_n	1,830	5	4.8875	4	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A55028	The necessity and encouragement, of utmost venturing for the churches help together with the sin, folly, and mischief of self-idolizing applyed by a representation of 1. some of the most notorious nationall sins endangering us, 2. the heavy weight of wrath manifested in our present calamities, yet withall, grounds of 3. confidence, that our church shall obtain deliverance in the issue, 4. hopes that the present Parliament shall be still imployed in the working of it : all set forth in a sermon, preached to the honorable House of Commons, on the day of the monethly solemn fast, 28. June, 1643 / by Herbert Palmer ...	Palmer, Herbert, 1601-1647.	1643 (1643)	Wing P243; ESTC R21704	67,757	76

he found what arrerages he and his land were in for the forfeitures of their Forefathers Though he had begun to put himself and them into a better posture of service and duty toward God their great Landlord So should we also be affected even with the sins of our Ancestours 2. Specially if in any thing we finde that any worldly commodity we enjoy is the fruit of their sin Whereas Humane Politicks excuse or justifie or commend those sins that redound in appearance to worldly security or advantage as the letting evill men or evill practises alone which might have been redrest and supprest if not at one time yet at another had there been a true and through zeal for God and faith in God Divine wisdome commands humiliation for and reformation of if yet to be done as endangering evils Therefore holy Hezekiah who trusted in the Lord with all his heart after his humble acknowledgments of manifold transgressions ventures to pul down all the high-places even superstitious as well as idolatrous which all former Reformers even Asa and Jehoshaphat in their times medled not with And holy David though perhaps he had not power enough to punish the treacherous murthers of the great Generall Joab yet cannot die in peace till he hath left a charge upon his son Solomon to pay that debt for him 1 Kings 2. which therefore he carefully fulfilled without delay 3. Yet more It is required that we be humbled for our forefathers sins lest as we are too apt we either approve of the evill of them which else we could not but in our consciences condemn even because it was their practise to do thus and they went no further in reforming and this we usually think excuse enough Or 4. Lest we should make it an argument also that God is well pleased with such and such things because our forefathers did so and were not severely plagued but rather flourished in those wayes Which also is a common pretence for the continuance of evill practises Or 5. Last of all Lest even after we had forsaken their sins we should again by temptation be drawn to return to them Against all which there is no better antidote under the grace of Christ then a sad and serious and oft repeated and renewed humiliation even for our forefathers sins as well as those of the present generation in our nation and people 3. But to all this we must be sure to adde or rather to premise it first in our hearts though my method leads me to name it last the humiliation for our own personall sins As many as we do or can by strict enquiry know by our selves And this generally for the reasons noted at the first Gods honour our own reformation and our escaping wrath through Gods mercy in Christ And this we must do even after we have resolved or begun to reform and also after we have reformed how perfectly soever and even have our pardon sealed never so sure That thou mayest remember and be confounded and never open thy mouth any more when I am pacified towards thee for all that thou hast done saith the Lord God Ezek. 16. 63. And to the like purpose Ezek. 36. 31 32. Because also while we are but resolving or beginning to reform our selves we may suddenly revolt even to worse then before if a through Humiliation shame sorrow and fear keep us not And after we have reformed most compleatly still some taints remain in our own hearts and much more many times in others tainted by us which need this mortification Pharaohs often revolts and even Israels too all Moses time are sad confirmations of this We read them often relenting but never solemnly making it their businesse to humble themselves for their transgressions 3. Moreover against the spirituall danger of sin a holy example an exact unblameable conversation may be greatly helpfull and is infallibly needfull St. Peter supposes even ungodly men may thereby be constrained to glorifie God 1 Pet. 2. and prophane Paganish husbands converted even without the Word by the conversation of the wives 1 Pet. 3. 1 2. It shews ungodly men that godlinesse is a possible thing to be practised as well as worded And where it is wanting no word can do so much good as that want doth harm as I shall again touch anon 4. Finally against sin and judgment both an active endeavour of reformation is specially helpfull and beyond controversie needfull 1. Against judgment as appears by the promise of pardoning that is sparing for the present Jerem. 5. 1. If but a man were found that did execute judgment and seek the truth And by the assigning this the cause of Gods indignation powred out upon them Ezek. 22. 30 31. because God sought for a man that should stand in the gap and make up the hedge before him for the land but found none that is never a man of note active for reformation For else there were godly men that mourned and prayed Ezek. 9. but none stood up strongly for God that would have helped much 2. Against sin by using all the authority any hath As a Governour of a family Parent Master Minister or Magistrate to bring sinners to repentance and keep others from sinning This no man will no man can in generall deny to be a helpfull and necessary duty therefore I add no more of it for the present but shall meet with it again in some following Uses of other Points I now come to the second Doctrin which is this Private self-respects prove great hinderances to most necessary duties It had like to have done so here with Esther it did so at the first bout till Mordecai's divine arguments of faith and despair dreadfull frights and glorious hopes quickned her to the heroick resolution expressed in the following verse I will go in to the King which is not according to the Law and if I perish I perish Thus she overcame at last and was no longer hindered from her duty But too many are every where as sad experience proclaims to all ears This turned Peter for a fit from a Champion of Christ in the garden to a Renegado in the Palace It was not indeed a necessary duty indeed to follow Christ thither at that time Nor perhaps to make answer at all to the questions then put to him if silence would have satisfied But it was absolutely necessary for a Disciple of Christ not to deny his Master anywhere much more not to forswear him with cursing and banning that he knew no such man but contrarily to professe himself his if he could not without such horrid lying conceale it yet this private self-respect put him upon not onely to neglect his duty but to do quite contrary He conceited that the owning of his Master would at this time endanger his own personall safety and if he denied him he might escape unknown and untoucht out of the high

30. 19. And for any thing I know or any man else as we that are here before God this day do chuse even this day we may fare our selves and all our Israel with us at least in the Good the Blessing held forth But I Preface no longer THe words contain summarily The necessity and encouragement of utmost venturing for the Churches help in time of danger The Jews at this time Gods onely visible Church on earth were now in one of the greatest dangers that ever threatned a Nation The story is well known I cannot spend time to decipher it It is my great comfort in that and the whole of my Discourse that I speak to wise men else the multitude of matters to be crowded together within the allotted compasse of time for this holy Exercise would suffer prejudice among us by my necessary hast Therefore also I shall give you no other division of the Text then into the Points that thence offer themselves to our present instruction I will name them all together and shew you the Rise of the severalls as we go along The first Doctrine is Every one of Gods professed people owe their endeavours with the utmost hazard of themselves to help the Church in time of danger The second this Private self-respects prove great hinderances to most necessary duties The third Those whom private and self-respects hinder from the Churches help can have no assurance what ever seeming advantages they may hope upon that they shall escape more then others The fourth is Though those who are most hopefull to be instruments of the Churches help fail her in time of need yet deliverance shall not fail her some way or other according to Gods promises The fifth is Though the Church be delivered another way yet a destruction is owing to them and theirs that have neglected their utmost endeavour for her help The sixth is There is great hopes that those who are extraordinarily raised up to a speciall opportunity of serviceablenesse to the Church are intended by God to procure her help if they will themselves and be faithfull All these Points will appear to be most naturally raised from the scope and words of the Text and all of singular use for our edification according to the present condition of things among us As the sequell will shew The first Doctrin is this Every one of Gods professed people owe their endeavours with the utmost hazard of themselves to help the Church in time of danger Mordecai's former charge to Esther and this re-inforcement in the Text supposes this Doctrin fully It had been too presumptuous to put so great a Person too injurious to presse so dear a Friend to so desperate a piece of service if upon this generall ground it had not been a certain and indispensable duty It was hers therefore all others respectively all ours particularly Nothing could discharge her nothing can acquit us Consider and compare 1. Her Person and ours 2. Her perill 3. Her small likelihood of prevailing 4. And the certainty of the businesse to be done without her 1. Her Person Which of us even the highest matches her greatnesse how extreamly below are the most who hath so much to lose if we lose all as she Those we venture for are our equalls or neer it some of them and many are superiours to the most She was far above all her Nation of whom the best were distressed tributaries and multitudes little better then slaves She ventured alone none with her none for her wee have many engaged as well as far as we and we have cause to be glad of them as well as they of us If then it were her duty to endeavour and venture it is ours without all peradventure 2. What was the hazard she must rush upon or what is the utmost venture Death This was hers And what death more certain or usually more reproachfull then for breaking through the known Law of an Imperious Monarch This she must expose her self to While yet this charge and threatning of her tells us that it is no sinne but a duty of necessity to prefer the regard of a peoples of Gods peoples safety before any such formality of a humane Law Yet contrarily had she forborn this her danger in humane appearance had been none at all because though she were a Jewesse yet not known to be such And now can our hazard by endeavor be worse at the worst or more certain or more reproachfull though the reproach lesse just then hers or to any of us can there be lesse hazard if we forbear altogether any endeavour If then she must not forbear because of perill no more may we without the greatest perill of sinne 3. How unlikely was it she should prevail with one who in thirty dayes had not called for her though his wife and now pressing upon him against his Law and appearing in opposition to his so doted on Darling Haman and of a Decree already sent forth into all his Dominions which also by the Law of the Medes and Persians seemed unalterable and so the Case remedilesse altogether this way Is there any thing we are to Endeavour let it be what it will so unlikely to prosper as this undertaking of hers yet for this must she pawn her life And what may we then refuse 4. Was it not pity to drive her forward against such a Canons-mouth when though she sate still the Businesse should be done himself tells her so in which she might be lost and do nothing at all to it What greater certainty can we have or what equall that what we are called to Endeavour and Venture for will prosper if we do altogether nothing How many would then indeed resolve to do nothing and think themselves excusable too But so might not she nor so may not we without sin can be excused For it appears that according to the Doctrin Every one of Gods professed people owes c. Let us confirm it by a few other Examples and then by some Reasons 1 Joh. 3 16 We ought to lay down our lives for the Brethren Here is the Doctrin and Duty fully asserted The Brethren the Church have a right to our utmost endeavour with what hazard soever we owe it to them we ought to venture our lives and when the pinch comes actually part with them And here is an example beyond example in the words foregoing of God himself Christ God and Man both laid down His humane life for His Church Hereby perceive we the love of God towards us in that he layd down his life for us This ought to be Reason sufficient to us to hold our selves obliged to the same hazard in our measure in thankefulnesse to Him and imitation of Him and to testifie the truth of our love which we professe to bear to the Church as the Apostle was now exhorting to love Love denies nothing of endeavours ventures all things of

good and so for his own glory They then that have not so imployed them have been sacrilegious by perverting them to their own private use Such have been dead members having been altogether uselesse and so fit to be cut off or worse then dead disappointing and putting to pain both at once like a broken tooth Prov. 25. 19. and so it is fit to be rid of them They have been barren trees fit to be cut down even for cumbring the ground Luk. 13. 7. And Mar. 11. 13. we read of the fig-tree cursed even because it was a late-ward tree and came behinde the usuall time of other trees So every way is it most just with God to deal with such persons as have not been fruitfull for the Churches help And particularly if any pretend and professe extraordinary zeal and forwardnesse and yet have secret reservations and give not God and his Church all even though they pretend so and would have the credit of so doing Let them remember the direfull vengeance on Ananias and Sapphira his wife for such hypocrisy Acts 5. 3. Destruction is owing to those that help not the Church in danger because they that forsook her in extremity are altogether unworthy to rejoyce with her in prosperity This is reserved by promise only for her mourners and helpers Esay 57. 18. 66. 10. and Psal. 122. 6. They shall prosper that love thee No love in such as forsook her when she had most need of their help Therefore they may be justly deprived of the comforts of her Mercies which she finds at last He shall have judgement without mercy that hath shewed no mercy Jam. 2. 13. Spoken of not relieving the necessity of particular Christians in poverty and want as the context before and after shewes How much more then will this fall heavy upon the forsakers of a Nation of Christians 4. Unlesse God convert such effectually by an inward work bringing them to speciall repentance for their sinfull neglects Though they may after shew great affection and zeale for the Church in her prosperity yet they still bear false and treacherous hearts would betray the second time in like extremity Therefore the Iews did wisely that they would not suffer the Samaritans to build with them Ezr. 4. For that their fashion was to claim kindred of them when they saw the Jewes in favour and prosperous and contrarily to renounce them when they saw them in a low condition Such Hypocrisy God abhorres and owes them a vengeance for it 5. Even during the Churches prosperity they will never doe God and the Church any faithfull service But onely still breake for their own lusts This God discovers from the first men sometimes see it a while after And therefore sometimes in graciousnesse to his people whom he hath delivered and is about to reform further he takes away such drosse and purges away such tinne such reprobate silver as they are cald Jer. 6. last which may well be understood of persons as well as things as the next words also help to confirme Esa. 1. ver. 25 26. 6. Gods jealousie for his Church both in reference to the evills that they have been accessary to in not helping her and to prevent others from following such ill example here after will not suffer such to escape altogether scot-free God saw more evill in their wayes and heart then man could he saw upon the same principles urged by stronger temptations they would have proved enemies though now they were only Neuters or false and hollow hearted left handed friends It is I say but the same principle of wicked selfe-love wrought upon by Satan and men with other opportunities that makes some men Neuters and others desperate enemies which God seeing though men doe not or will not or cannot counts all such a generation of vipers and a brood of Serpents and devotes them to destruction Yet even the omission of duty is directly threatned with damnation Mat. 25. And if some did not smart sometimes even for omissions in this world the Church would have a great many fewer helpers then now she hath 7. Finally the extending of this destruction by God to the families and friends of such as help not his Church is most just whensoever he pleases so to deale and that according to the proportion of humane justice in many cases 1. Because Men oft forbear their duties for their children and posterities sake as well as their own and so they stick not to say oft-times Therefore their children shall pay for their neglects together with themselves 2. They oft engage them according to their capacity in the sinne as well as themselves and train them up even from children in Neutrality and Lukewarmnesse and a spirit of selfe-love and selfe-seeking therefore God cuts off sometimes the children too as a corrupted generation 3. At least because men take themselves to be punished in their families and friends ruine Therefore that the feare of that may help to antidote them against the sinne of neglect and provoke them to the utmost of duty God both threatens ever and punishes sometimes the families and friends as well as themselves And so I have dispatched the doctrinall part of this point also I come now to a joynt Application of all the three points together which will afford a threefold Use 1. Of Examination 2. Of speciall and re-inforced Humiliation 3. Of Exhortation All which have relation also to the first doctrine of all as will easily appear to any observant minde To begin with the first We have here a just ground of Examination of our selves every one of us how farre we have helped the Church in her distresse and danger and whether any selfe-respects have hindred us more or lesse And this will dispose us to Humiliation and afterwards to Reformation and amendment specially the more faults and the more aggravations we finde in our selves Of whom we ought in this case to be most jealoufly inquisitive even more then we need be of others and yet those that are publike persons whether Ministers or Magistrates seeing wrath upon a Nation and so setting upon a Reformation of necessity ought to make as much enquiry after others also within their spheares as they can But let me speak chiefly to every ones conscience for themselves in particular Herein according to the help we might and should have afforded shewed in the former use let us examine 1. What outward help we have neglected particularly since the late greatest dangers of our Church and Nation and the calamities of Ireland And let our consciences withall tell us what we intend resolve to do in case more should be needed Which as it may cleare many very much though they have not yet altogether ventured so much as others so it may condemne those greatly that may seem to have done a great deal If any thinks what he hath done or ventured for the

their simplicity and knew not any thing but when he had them there he soon turned them into conspirators and rebells like himself and then to prevail so far to endanger the most faithfull of the Land 3. Contrarily if both sides can be thought to mean faithfully and onely disagree through mistakes and misunderstandings Is not this a prodigie of Gods displeasure against us Is not this most emphatically a filling us with drunkennesse as before that we kill our friends as foes and they us in like sort Like the terrible vengeance on the enemies of God and his Church 2 Chron. 20. 23. till they had utterly destroyed one the other But God never did thus to his faithfull people since the world was Therefore sure this cannot be the case with us Yet still as before take it which way you will it is a most horrible and dreadfull wrath against our Kingdom and Nation even in this respect 7 7. The time when this evill befell us is greatly observable as proclaiming still more wrath 1. In civill respects In how fair hopes of setling were we Specially this Parliament being continued by an Act and so many good Acts made besides And now for God to deal so as to undo all threaten this Parliament with the worst kinde of dissolution by the sword which may kill all Parliaments for ever What is it but the heavy wrath threatned Jer. 18. 9 10. At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom to build and to plant it If it do evill in my sight that it obey not my voyce then I will repent of the good wherewith I said I would benefit them 8 8. The time 2ly in spirituall respects pronounces the indignation more hot and heavy against us For God to do this not onely to a Nation but a Church not onely to a people but His people To blast and offer so to dash in pieces all the hopes he had given them of a Reformation by them laboured for at least with great seeming earnestnesse and in stead hereof to threaten the totall ruine of the Church and true Religion among us by the hands of her most cruell Popish enemies How enraged is God when he so refuses to reform us who pretended such desire of Reformation Like that most terrible threat of vengeance Ezek. 24. 13 14. I have purged thee and thou wast not purged thou shalt not be purged from thy filthinesse any more till I have caused my fury to rest upon thee I the Lord have spoken it it shall come to passe and I will do it I will not go back neither will I spare neither will I repent according to thy wayes and according to thy doings shall they judge thee saith the Lord 9 9. The obedience we would yeeld to him in yeelding help to our brethren of Ireland according to the duty of this Text and many other places adds to the manifestation of his wrath against us and Ireland both He here threatens destruction for not helping and gives hopes to those that will How angry is he then that will not afford us leisure or means nor them any help by us But as this shewed his heavy wrath against Israel when he would not regard them seeming willing to trust and obey him after their rebellious distrust Numb. 14. And as Esay 31. threatens both the helpers and the helped together ver. 3. So God seems to deal with us and Ireland as if he also meant to fulfill the very word of the Irish rebells many Moneths ago That they hoped to finde us so much work at home as we should have no leisure to send much help thither And as though God meant to destroy his Church in England and Ireland both together Thus all things proclaim his exceeding fierce wrath against us 10 10. One thing yet further adds exceedingly to the notification of Gods fierce wrath against us The means we have had and used to make our peace with God Never so much fasting and prayer in England eighteen Moneths solemn fasts by Authority besides all voluntary ones by the liberty that there is now of so doing with so many millions of prayers daily and continually and all these as it were rejected or at least in a great degree according to the sad complaint Psal. 80. 4. How long wilt thou he angry against the prayer of thy people and the more sad threatning Jer. 14. 12. When they fast I will not hear their cry when they offer burnt offering and an oblation I will not accept them but I will corsume them by the sword and by the famine and by the pestilence What will God regard if he turn away his eye from such solemn services from such out-cries of prayers How greatly must we needs say he is provoked against us Specially also when we have had also some beginnings of Reformation restoring liberty to many faithfull Ministers and encouraging Preaching repressing the prophanation of the the Lords Sabbath and pulling down Images and Crosses and yet our miseries still continue and work higher rather then otherwise For all this his anger is not turned away but his hand is stretched out still as the Prophet And now Honourable and Beloved when you have heard all these tokens of Gods displeasure against us and our Nation can you chuse but tremble and humble your souls greatly before your God this day Certainly we cannot beleeve Him to be just but we must needs acknowledge our sinnes to be very grievous and hainous that have provoked such a wrath as these things discover to be kindled against us So that if we could spend all the remaining part of this day in bewayling and bemoaning the vilenesse of our transgressions If we could wear out all our strength and spirits in dolefull lamentation If we could weep out our eyes and distill all the moisture of our bodies into tears of blood we yet should not sufficiently mourn for our iniquities nor make an acknowledgment answerable to our demerits or to the just indignation manifested against us God Almighty grant for Jesus Christs sake that we may all think of these things more then ever yet we have done and be more affected and grieved and humbled for our own and our Nations sins and shares in wrath then formerly we have been that so we may be disposed the better to embrace the exhortation to amendment of our selves and reformation of others to the uttermost of our power ever hereafter Meanwhile in a day of solemn humiliation and time of such danger and being specially called to deliver Gods Message at this time in this place and all Ministers being charged by the religious Ordinance set forth divers Moneths ago in their severall Auditories specially on the fast dayes most earnestly to perswade and inculcate the constant practise of this publike acknowledgement and deep humiliation Let me take leave to discharge

speciall weight comes to be put upon the meer using it And while a root of superstition is nourisht in men Idolatry will soon be graffed upon it with a little help Besides that a little of this leaven will greatly sowr Mens Consciences and in stead of the power of godlinesse leave nothing but a Form I may not amplify this but I hope it will be considered and consulted of 5 5. Make all men feare an Oath 1 by a more ready and certain penalty for rash swearing 2 by taking away unnecessary Oaths My soul blesses you blesses God for you for the taking away the Oath of Churchwardens as well as that Ex Officio and the late Canonicall Oath Oh doe the like to other Officers and in Universities and Corporations and Courts by causing a review to be made what Oathes are unnecessary and how the use of them may be other wayes supplyed 3 And what Oathes you see necessary to be continued or added make them dreadfull Let them be administred ever in an awfull manner that they may consider what they doe when they pawn their souls and all things else that they speak truth and will doe as they say 4 And let no ignorant person be trusted to swear more then a childe But of that a word more anon I will use no other motive then that one Jer. 23. 10. Because of swearing the Land mourneth the pleasant places of the wildernesse are dryed up and their course is evill and their force is not right So that you do not help the Church if you remedy not this what you can if you did all things else 6. Make a Law for preaching There was never any yet that I could ever hear of in this Kingdome since the Reformation which is such a prodigy such a peece of Laodicean Lukewarmnesse as I beleeve the like was never heard of in a Reformed Christian Kingdom or Church unlesse Ireland perhaps too What the effects have been of the want of it all the world fees And to me it sounds among the worst of Omens that I have heard of some disputing against such a law I will say but this 1. If God have not had dishonour enough by some mens preaching against Preaching because our Law commanded it not and by all the reproach cast upon his faithfullest Ministers for their double diligence which hath also been prohibited thē by those that ought to have promoted it And 2 if the people of God have not by this been sufficiently scattered abroad as sheep without a Shepheard and torn by dogs for seeking their food abroad when they had none provided for them at home And 3 if enough have not gone to hell under unpreaching Ministers in more then eighty yeares And 4 finally if God have not put more weight upon this one ordinance under the N.T. then all other Ministeriall works together to teach all that have Authority under him to doe the like to make them beshrew themselves that preach not the Gospel Then let there be still no law to enjoyn it nor for any thing else belonging to the worship of God and mans salvation by as good reason But if all be contrary then once more let me call to Humiliation for this neglect these eighty yeares and upward and promise my selfe that a Reforming Parliament will not cannot but compose such a law as shall be abundantly sufficient for ever hereafter 7. Make Simony impossible To swear the Clerk is to swear the buyer to prevent a dearth It is to forbid those that fear an Oath and set open the door to those that dare be wilfully false And the present penalties of the statute doe seldome reach cunning chapmen This I will be bold to say if every Minister that hath the charge of soules and discharges that duty conscionably be not worthy of all that due which the law anywhere allowes him take it away in Gods name and employ it to a better use if you can find it out But if he be worthy of it by the sentence of God and man both a high way-robber or one that breaks into a house at midnight is not so great an offendor as a Simoniacall Patron whether he presents a man otherwise worthy or one that is altogether unworthy and if you make not as sufficient a law against the one as the other I say not for the penalty but which may be as effectuall or rather more and so it may be I durst undertake you will no more answer it to God then if you made not a sufficicient law against those outrages if there were none 8. Make Clandestine Marriages impossible They are so in the Reformed Churches in France they may be so here when the King and you please It is meer humane law the common law among us not Gods law that calls it a marriage if two be joyned by a Minister a Popish Priest hath served the turne in any house or room or place and at midnight or any time if with such and such words Why is such a wilde Authority given to robbe Parents of their children and Masters of their Apprentices and children of themselves against Gods expresse word and no Penalty that I know of in our law upon such a Minister or such Parties How many Noble Families besides others have been by this Licence and that which hath been next door to it in use the Licences of Ecclesiasticall Courts which last to this day where such disobedient children will goe seek them shamed and grieved and mischiefed This may be remedied instantly if the law ratify no marriage but Publike after Banes with Parents or guardians consent or some higher Power if they should be Tyrannicall and altogether unreasonable I am amazed that the Gentry having so smarted by this licence to their children to be disobedient have not long since in Parliament taken an order for it But I hope God hath raised up you at last to do him this piece of service among a great many others I may not enlarge my self upon any more particulars I will sum up all the residue that I have thought of in almost as few words as there be matters 9. Keep all the holy Ordinances of God from prophanation the Word read and preacht prayer singing Sacraments punishing sleepers and all other rude persons 10. Secure the Lords day fully from working and playing and buying or selling and as much as may be from apparent idlenesse 11. Encourage a faithfull Ministery particularly with sufficient maintenance for wives and children 12. Secure youth in the Universities and Schools with the utmost of care and even in Parents houses what you can specially the poorer sort The young ones are the hopes or the bane of the Church and State in the next 20 or 10. or 7. years 13. Represse drunkennesse by a better composed Law then any yet is extant and the haunting of the shops of that wickednesse 14. Suppresse

urge the continuance of this Parliament by a Law the onely possible means for leisure to reforme as also for legall power of defence against them if they should any more plots as now they have and the two Armies in the Kingdom no way else to be payed forced the yeelding to it 6. Before this They raised Souldiers to go against Scotland who did no other service in divers Countreys but to begin to pull down their innovations and play the reformers with a strangely sober wildnesse A Preludium not to be neglected though then it may be no man imagined any such thing that a warro must make further way for a further reformation 7. Their plottings and conspiracies and attempts against the Parliament and rapi●●es and spoilings of Countreys making the resolution for reformation appear the more necessary and so become the more strong From all which my Conclusions are three First This is indeed a time of Jacobs trouble but he shall be delivered out of it 2. The longer deliverance is delayed and the lower we are brought before we obtain Reformation the greater and more glorious will the one and the other be when the full time comes 3. Who ever abuses this to carelesse neglect is like never to see it or enjoy the good of it but they and theirs to be destroyed according to the Text But I must answer an Objection or two First,Object. 1. 1 In stead of a Reformation say some we see nothing but Deformation All in Confusion our Reformers unreformed in life and opinion unbridled in their fancies and wayes Heresies Schismes and Libertinisme abound This is the worst can be said Yet may be satisfied divers wayes 1 1. It was ever so where Reformation was working So in Luthers time so in the very Primitive Church yet God carried on the work and so he will how 2 2 Perhaps the cry is greater then the cause The distractions of the time leaving all at liberty all appear in their worst Posture yet there are many sober still and pious undeniably and most of them will be soon quelled by a good discipline These things are not long-lived but when they are let alone 3 3. Their shewing themselves will make the Reformation more compleat Ill manners causing good Lawes 4 4. God seemes on purpose to prolong the warre to cut off many that would abuse a peace The most earnest for Reformation say others are so divided in opinions as they will never agree and so all will come to nothing This is also a great grief and danger 1 But 1. For this the Assembly through Gods blessing may be and will be a happy remedy And whereas men object again that also as unlikely I bid them Pray pray and not prophesie 2 2. Since they all and all that pretend to Reformation professe to hold to the Word when things come to be debated by the Word there will I doubt not be found more agreement in the issue then any one thought of before or at least a modest resolution not to disturb the Churches Peace But what say you to the killing of the two Witnesses May not that be to come and even now comming and where is then your confidence and the promises you talk of 1 1. Whether the two Witnesses be slain or not I will not at the present so much as offer my Opinion for divers reasons The rather because I can fully answer that objection without it Namely by saying 2 2. If this be the time of their killing ere this warre end then is my confidence most certain and we have a most full verball promise which is more then I said before That England shall not quite lose the Gospel nor the Church at this time Their death is limited clearly to three dayes and a half that is so many years and then they certainly rise again and ascend into heaven which cannot signifie lesse then a most glorious and blessed Reformation at the close of all the foregoing evils which fully answers both my Doctrin and Application I have now onely the sixt and last Point to handle namely There is great hopes that those who are extraordinarily raised up to a speciall opportunity of serviceablenesse of the Church are intended by God to procure her help if they will themselves and be faithfull The phrase in the Text Who knows is usuall in Scripture to signifie great hope if not altogether certainty Jonah 3. 9. Joel 2. 14. And with this Mordecai intends to put courage and comfort into Esther to whom he spake before in a threatning strain not willingly but as apprehending a necessity And the bitternesse of that Pill he tempers and allays with this Cordiall That in all likelihood if she would venture her self for the people of God according to their necessity and her duty she should be the person used in the deliverance and that her extraordinary strange advancement to be Queen was intended by God for this very end And the Reasons are very fair for it 1. God is most wise and doth nothing in vain Now it would at least seem to be in vain that when a work is to be done He should extraordinarily fit an instrument for it and then not imploy that instrument unlesse there prove some to be some speciall failing in that instrument in the mean time Indeed if such an instrument warp or grow crooked He may with apparent wisedom lay it by altogether or for a time 1. That all such may be humble and ascribe nothing to themselves of their fitnesse strength or successe but all to God 2. And that those that look at the most hopefull instruments should not idolize them and forget God by trusting too much in them or applying our selves to them too much neglecting God as we are greatly apt to do But if they persevere in faithfulnesse no reason can by us at least be conceived why God should refuse to use them in that work which is to be done certainly namely the help of his Church in desperate dangers 2. God is pleased to do thus to shew that He hath no ficklenesse in him He is not weary of an instrument which he hath long used much lesse when the great time of using them comes Onely as before he will not have any think him tied to any that shall carry themselves untowardly specially in any visible manner And yet he also vouchsafes sometimes to overlook a great many failings in those that are his own Of which their humiliation repentance and amendment may be a happy pledge both to thomselves and others too as far as it is as visible as their failings have been visible So though God saw fit to lay aside Moses for a particular visible failing yet specially for the types sake to shew that the Law brings us not to Canaan but Joshuah Jesus yet raising up Joshuah in his stead he carries