and when it has conveyed it self into all the Recesses of their Souls seised on all their Powers infected their best and purest Thoughts and swoln up even their Zeal into vanity and ostentation 't is a less wonder they should be so insensible of their distemper when this Vice works like other poisons it stupifies whilst it infects and what in Nature so difficult as to convince a man of this inward Leprosie 'T is not like common diseases that discover themselves by outward spots and blemishes but 't is a Plague that lodges in the heart and vital Powers and sooner destroys than it appears The proudest man on Earth is insensible of this Illusion and though he is ready to burst with his own inward swellings yet he defies and disclaims this hated vice with as much confidence as the meekest Saint in Heaven and all the world knows his folly except himself But above all Pride Spiritual Pride is the most dangerous and incurable 't is an Apoplexy that dazzles the Judgment infatuates the Mind and intercepts all the passages of light and conviction and confounds all pure and impartial Reasonings and disables men from making any ingenuous Reflections upon their own Actions it makes them confident in their own Impostures and self-illusions and bears them up against all Reproofs by Zeal and Conscience and Religion Their Faith their Zeal their Prayers their Fastings their constant Communion with God their diligent Attendance upon Ordinances their Love of the Lord Jesus their hatred of Antichrist or their spleen against the Pope are impregnable Fences against all Assaults and Answers to all Arguments They are so dotingly enamoured of themselves for these signs of Grace and characters of God's People that you may more easily induce them to suspect the Truth of all things than their own Godliness And nothing in Nature so impossible as that such strict and serious Professors such humble melting and broken-hearted Christians should in the issue prove no better than Proud and Pharisaick Hypocrites And though their Pride discover it self in their opinionative Confidence in their bitter Censoriousness in their impatience of Affronts and Reproofs in their Rage and Revenge against all that undervalue them in their haughty and disdainful Comparisons and in their inflexible Waywardness especially to the Will of Superiours and Commands of Authority And though these are the most natural Results and most obvious Symptoms of this inward Plague yet are they not able to discern such certain appearances of them in themselves because they are aforehand from other accounts so abundantly satisfied in their own Humility and Broken-heartedness and the strength of this conceit so blinds their minds that they cannot see the clearest and most palpable Indications of this Vice But they are all adorn'd with soft and gentle Titles and those excesses and irregularities that in an unregenerate man must have been accounted Eruptions of Pride and Passion are now to be ascribed to the warmness and vehemence of holy Zeal § 3. In brief sad is the condition of those men that abuse themselves with this naughty Godliness 't is this and not moral Goodness that is the greatest lett to Conversion not only because it seals men up in impenitence by false prejudices and bars up their minds against all thoughts of Reformation by perswading them they are good enough already But besides that it prevents the efficacy of the means of Grace it does withal what is more mischievous directly oppose and contradict them It rots and putrifies the soul in its whole constitution it gangrenes all its faculties it breeds a base and caitive temper of mind it introduces a direct contrariety to all worthy and ingenuous inclinations and delivers the man over to the power and possession of the blackest and most accursed sins 't is detraction 't is spite 't is rancour 't is a malicious contempt to all wise and honest Counsels 't is a wilful frowardness to all sober and rational convictions and in a word 't is all spiritual wickedness And for this Reason it was that I profess't to despair of any success upon this sort of men I was assured that as long as Pride over-ruled their Consciences all Reproofs would certainly exasperate but could never correct the Fanatique humour and therefore what hopes could I conceive to make any breach upon their prejudices whilst they were guarded by such a sturdy and unyielding Principle For if it be so difficult either to convince men of this Vice or whilst this remains of any other it were a vain thing to expect that all the Reasonings and Attempts of conviction in the world should ever make any impressions upon such unapproachable minds And as long as Professors will continue regardless and insensible of this leading sin I shall never hope to see them reformed to a more calm and more governable temper But if instead of amusing themselves with experiences and phantastick observations about the unaccountable workings of the Spirit of Grace about the difference between the Convictions of the Spirit and those of natural Conscience about the degrees and due measures of Humiliation with innumerable other wise conceits of their modern Theology if I say instead of attending to these dreams and crazy fancies they would be at leisure to observe the risings and workings of this deceitful vice to study its symptoms and indications and to keep a constant and habitual restraint upon its motions and attempts we should quickly see the lovely fruits and effects of true Religion in the world instead of the unruly blusters and juglings of Enthusiasm But till men will be induced in good earnest to set themselves with a parcicular concern against the Inclinations of this Lust and till they will be careful to lay humility at the bottom of all their goodness instead of their yielding to the power of truth conviction shall only enrage their malice and all the requital they shall give you for disabusing them shall be to abuse you with incivility and foul language And here Sir give me leave to present you with a short account of their deportment towards my self and all that ever yet opposed or endeavoured to undeceive them which you may peruse as a further Character of their modesty and good humour § 4. I. Reproach and contumely is their first reply to all Arguments and to revile the Author the first Confutation of his Book whoever dares to despise or discover their wretched delusions is immediately answer'd with volleys of slanders and Calumnies and utterly oppressed with multitude of lyes and detracting stories Their dissolute and unruly tongues are let loose to tear in pieces his good name What abusive Tales and Legends do they invent With what bold and audacious slanders do they assail his Innocence and with what crafty and oblique ways of detraction do they undermine his Reputation with what eagerness do they listen to any spiteful and mischievous report With what zeal do they spread and propagate and improve
as the Capitol and you may sooner remove Mountains then shake their Confidence But is it not prodigious to see people so jocundly satisfied with a Book written with so much looseness as if its Author had either utterly forgot what I had utter'd or cared not what himself was to prove a Book wherein 't is hard to find a passage that is not coarsly false or impertinent and very few that are not apparently both a Book in which you shall meet with nothing singular and remarkable but horrid Untruths and Falsifications § 14. But however a Book he resolved to write without regard to Truth or Falshood and though he were not so lamentably costive as a late Brother of the scribling humour that was so far to seek for an Exordium that he was forced to take his rise at the day of the Moneth and the year of our Lord yet he was much more unhappy to make his entrance with such an awkerd acknowledgement as must for ever defeat and discredit the design of his whole performance by confessing that all his Pleas how solemn and serious soever he may appear are but dissembled and hypocritical Pretences When he tells us that 't is none of the least disadvantages of his Cause that he is enforced to admit a Supposition that those whom he pleads for are indeed really mistaken in their apprehensions But though this may seem a rash and unadvised Concession yet if you examine it you will find it a notable wily and cunning device For unless he will give place to such a Supposition or if he will rigidly contend that what he pleads in the behalf of is absolutely the Truth and that Obedience thereunto is the direct Will and Command of God there remains no proper Field for the Debate about Indulgence to be managed in For things acknowledged to be such are not capable of an Indulgence properly so called because the utmost Liberty that is necessary unto them is their right and due in strict Iustice and Law And yet the whole scope of his Apology and the onely Fundamental Principle upon which he builds is that they are obliged to do what they do out of Obedience to the Will and Command of God and by consequence the things they contend for are not capable of any Indulgence but are matters of indispensable duty and Divine right so that were the Government of Church-Affairs at their disposal they must establish the things that they desire to be indulged in as duties of strict Iustice and Law and restrain all other different forms and practices out of regard to the Divine Command and then to tolerate ours or any other way of Worship distinct from their own would be to permit men to live in open defiance to the direct Will and Command of God that has precisely injoyned a different Form of Worship So that it seems all pretences for Liberty of Conscience are but artificial Disguises for the advantage of farther Designs and when they gain it then the Mask falls off and the Scene is shifted and Petitions for Indulgence immediately swell up into Demands of Reformation So unfortunate is this Man in his whole performance that by all the Principles he has made use of to plead for Indulgence he is obliged to plead against it And there is not a more effectual Argument against Toleration of different Forms of Worship then their Fundamental Conceit that nothing ought to be practised or establish't in the Worship of God but what is precisely warranted and authorized in the Word of God For this restrains and disavows all Forms but one and ties all the Christian World to a nice and exact Conformity to that compleat and adequate Rule of Worship But suppose he were to speak to the Nature of the things themselves and not to the Apprehensions of them with whom he has to do Then farewel all soft and gentle Language and you shall hear nothing but Thundrings against Superstition Will-worship Episcopal Tyranny Popish Corruptions Rags of the Whore and the Dregs of the Romish Beast Then what is Prelacy but a meer Antichristian Encroachment upon the Inheritance of Christ And he that thinks Babylon is confined to Rome and its open Idolatry knows nothing of Babylon nor of the New Jerusalem the depth of a subtle mystery does not lie in gross visible folly it has been insinuating it self into all the Nations for 1600 years and to most of them is now become as the marrow in their bones before it be wholly shaken out these Heavens must be dissolved and the Earth shaken i. e. as he expounds both himself and the Text the setled and establish't Government of the West must be subverted Their Tall Trees i. e. Kings and Princes hewed down and set a howling and the residue of them transplanted from one end of the Earth to the other Or as the same Author expresses himself upon another occasion The Heavens and the Earth of the Nations must be shaken because in their present Constitution they are directly framed to the Interest of Antichrist which by notable advantages at their first moulding and continued insinuations ever since hath so rivetted it self into the very Fundamentals of them that no digging or mining with an Earthquake will cast up the Foundation-stones thereof And therefore the Lord Iesus having promised the service of the Nations to his Church will so far open their whole frame to the roots as to pluck out all the cursed seeds of the Mystery of Iniquity which by the craft of Satan and exigences of State or methods of advancing the pride and power of some Sons of Blood have been sown amongst them And then abundance of Scripture and dark Prophesie is pour'd forth to make good these mild and peaceable Doctrines It is the great day of the wrath of the Lamb. The Land shall be soked with blood and the dust made fat with fatness for it is the day of the Lords vengeance and the year of recompence for the Controversie of Zion All the Kings of the earth have given their power to Antichrist endeavouring to the utmost to keep the Kingdom of Christ out of the World What I pray has been their main business for 700 years and upward even almost ever since the Man of Sin was enthroned How have they earned the Titles Eldest Son of the Church The Catholick and most Christian King Defender of the Faith Hath it not been by the blood of the Saints And now will not the Lord avenge his Elect that cry unto him day and night will he not do it speedily Will he not call the Fowls of Heaven to eat the Flesh of Kings and Captains and great Men of the Earth Rev. 19.18 All this must be done to cast down all opposition to the Kingdom of the Lord Christ and to advance it to its Glory and Power That consists mainly of these three things that he there reckons 1. Purity and Beauty of Ordinances and Gospel-worship
exemplified by a particular Comparison of the Conveniences and Inconveniences that would probably ensue upon the exercise of these respective Jurisdictions shewing how in every Instance the advantage was still on the side of Morality as to the Plea of Exemption and that there was vastly less danger in yielding to its Pretences for Liberty from the Determinations of Humane Laws than in granting the same measure of Indulgence as to the Concerns of outward Religion most of which our Author has gently slipt over according to his prudent and laudable Custom of overlooking what he cannot answer And then lastly to improve the evidence of this Discourse beyond the Attempts of Cavil and Exception I explain'd as well as argued its Reasonableness by running a general Parallel between the Nature of Divine Worship and of Moral Vertue where I have more at large represented their Agreement in reference to the Power of the Civil Magistrate and shewn how the Exercise of his Dominion over both is extended to and restrain'd within the same Bounds and Limits viz. That in both there are some Instances of Goodness of an universal Necessity and unchangeable Usefulness and these God himself has bound upon our Consciences by his own immediate Laws of Nature and Revelation And that there are others whose Goodness is or may be alterable according to the various Accidents Changes and Emergencies of Humane Life and therefore the Government of these he has entrusted with his Deputies and Lieutenants here on Earth to setle and determine as the Circumstances of Affairs shall require and the Dictates of their own Discretion shall direct by which means he has admirably provided both for the peaceable Government of Mankind and for the inviolable security of Vertue and Religion in the World This is the scope and Contexture of my Argument to all which what is replyed by our Author Why in the first place he represents its sum and substance in his own words and then complains of the ambiguity of the Terms and this fills above half a Page full of Triumph to insult over the absurdity of his own Expressions In the next place he excepts against the Validity of the Consequence That because the Magistrate has Power over the Consciences of his Subjects in Morals that therefore he has so also in matters of instituted Worship Though this Objection was so pregnantly answer'd to his hand For did I not in that very Paragraph demand of him or any Man else to assign any tolerable Reason that should restrain the Authority of the Civil Magistrate from medling with one that should not much more restrain it from medling with both Did I not enquire whether the right practice of Moral Duties were as necessary a piece of Religion as any part of outward or instituted Worship in the World Whether wrong Notions of the Divine Worship are not as destructive of the peace and setlement of Commonwealths as the most vicious and licentious Debaucheries Whether the rude Multitude are not more inclined to disturb Government by Superstition than by Licentiousness And whether there is not vastly greater danger of the Magistrates erring in matters of Morality than in Forms and Ceremonies of Worship in that those are the main essential and ultimate Duties of Religion whereas these are at highest but their means and instruments and can challenge no other place in Religion than as they are subservient to the purposes of Morality What then should the reason be that God should be so much more tender of things of meer positive Institution than of the matters of natural and essential Goodness That whilst he trusts these great and indispensable Duties to the Disposal and Discretion of the Civil Power in order to the peace and security of the Common-wealth why should he not for the same regard commit the management of the less weighty Affairs of External Worship to the Wisdom and Jurisdiction of the same Authority To all which is it not think you a wise and satisfactory Answer to tell us there is or at least there may be a difference between matters of moral and positive Obligation without attempting to assign any particular Reason of it in reference to the Power of the Civil Magistrate For suppose it granted that there is some difference between the Nature of the things themselves yet what is that to our purpose unless it carries in it a special Relation to the matters in Controversie between us which is not of the Natures of the things themselves but of their Subjection to the Royal Supremacy So that supposing the difference of their Natures the demand of the Argument is what 't is in the Nature of instituted Worship that should exempt it from the Jurisdiction of the Civil Magistrate that is not as much or more discernable in the Nature of Moral Vertue And till this be assign'd the Argument stands firm as the Foundations of the Earth whatever other difference Metaphysick Wit may be able to descry between them But our Author adds in answer to one of the forementioned Enquiries viz. Whether there is not more danger of the Magistrates erring or mistakes about moral Vertue than about Rites of Worship that there is an especial and formal difference between them in that one depends as to their Being and Discovery on the Light of Nature which is certain and common to all the other on pure Revelation which may be and is variously apprehended But § 8.1 'T is certain that by what way soever God has reveal'd his Will to Mankind the Revelation is sufficiently clear and evident so that the Rules of Instituted Worship are after their Institution no less certain than the Laws of Nature 'T is the Wisdom and the Glory of a Law-giver to express his Laws with as much Fulness and as little Ambiguity as is possible and therefore 't is but an unmannerly Reflection upon the Divine Wisdom to conceive he has not declared any of his Commands with all the plainness imaginable so that all the Laws of God by what way soever discovered are after their discovery equally bright and evident as to the purposes of Life and Practice and the Precepts of the Gospel are as fully declared to the Consciences of men as the Laws of Nature And therefore the force and sense of this Answer if it have any at all resolves it self into that Popish Tenet of the darkness and obscurity of the holy Scriptures For this forsooth is the only Reason why Duties instituted in the Gospel should be exempt from the Power of the Civil Magistrate rather than those of a moral and natural Obligation because one is perspicuous and the other is not and if this be not his Intention he talks he knows not what and that is not impossible But grant all this that the Laws of Revelation are not so discernable as the Laws of Nature I understand not where the force of the Reason lies that therefore mens Perswasions about them should not be
with an opinion of the antecedent Necessity of the thing it self Now from hence how natural is it to conclude that the Yoke of the Mosaical Institutions consisted in their Imposition on the minds of men with an Opinion of their necessity antecedent to that Imposition when Heaven and Earth stand not at a wider distance than these Propositions No Train of Consequences nothing but Iacobs Ladder unless our Author be able to fly can ever convey him from one to the other And if he shall undertake to make good the Logick of his Conclusion I will cross my self at his Confidence but if he shall perform it I will fall down and worship for to me it would be Prodigie and Miracle and that man need not in my opinion despair of removing Mountains who thinks he can prove that because humane Authority cannot impair the Liberty of our minds but by pretence of an antecedent Obligation to its Commands that therefore when God himself abridges it he must do it by vertue of some authoritative obligation antecedent to his own Impositions when his authority is the first Fountain and original Reason of all Obligations and therefore 't is an infinite contradiction to the nature of things to talk of any Authority antecedent or superiour to the divine Law And this is the evident Reason of my Conclusion that the Nature of our internal Liberty relates to the power of God over the minds of men and so is in its self uncapable of being restrain'd or imposed upon by any other Jurisdiction and therefore whatever restraints our Superiours may lay upon our Practices provided they do not bind us with an Opinion of some necessity stamp't upon the things themselves antecedent to their Commands that is no abatement to the inward Liberty of our minds which nothing can abridge but the Authority of God himself and therefore unless they pretend an antecedent and authoritative Obligation tied upon the Consciences of men by his own immediate and explicite Command whatever they may bind upon them by virtue of their own Authority though it may be blameable upon other accounts yet it cannot be charged of offering violence to the Rights of Christian Liberty So that though their Laws cannot of themselves restrain it unless by pretence of an antecedent Necessity imprinted upon the things themselves by virtue of a Divine Command yet the Laws of God may because they are the formal Reason of their restraint and the ground of their necessity But he adds That when St. Peter disputes against the Mosaick Rites and calls them a Yoke which neither they nor their Fathers-were able to bear and St. Paul chargeth Believers to stand fast in the Liberty wherewith Christ hath made them free they respect onely Mens practice with regard unto an Authoritative Obligation thereunto which they pleaded to be now expired and removed Whereby however he intends to shuffle with his vulgar Reader he apparently grants all that is desired or demanded viz. That all the Apostolical Discourses upon this subject respect not the bare practice of these things but their practice upon the account of the Authoritative Obligation of the Law of Moses for nothing less was pretended by the Jews so that the onely thing that made them prejudicial to the Claims of Christian Liberty was an Opinion of their necessity by virtue of that antecedent Obligation which being repeal'd their practice upon other grounds and reasons was not thought to infringe or check with the Rights and Priviledges of the Gospel And for this we have the unquestionable warrant of their own Examples when they not onely submitted to Restraints in the Exercise of their own Liberty but prescribed it in some Cases and Circumstances as a Duty to other Christians that they would take heed lest their Liberty should become a stumbling block to them that are weak Though they were intirely free from any Obligation tied upon them by virtue of the Law of Moses yet did St. Paul se◠fresh restraints upon them by virtue of his Apostolical Authority And now were it not strange that Men should be bound to yield more to the humour of a peevish Jew than to the Commands of a Christian Magistrate For the first ground and reason of his imposing their Obligation was then nothing but meer prudence and condescension to their folly but in our case 't is matter of Duty and Obedience For in the days of the Apostles nothing less was pleaded by the Jewish Christians for the necessity of their Ceremonies than the unchangeable Obligation of the Law of Moses and yet for the sake of peace they would submit so far to their strong Prejudices as outwardly to comply with their weak demands though it were with some hazard of forfeiting their Christian Liberty for it was not impossible but that their complyance might have confirmed the Jews in their obstinacy and have drawn in the Gentiles to an imitation of their example and so have begun a Prescription for the necessary observance of the Law of Moses to all Ages of the Church of Christ. Whereas in our case the danger of that pretence is as much abolish't as Circumcision it self it being a granted and establish't truth among all the dissenting Parties of Christendom unless we may except the Judaising Sabbatarians who do somewhat more than squint toward Moses that the Ceremonial Law is for ever rescinded to all intents and purposes and no Magistrate pretends a Power of imposing things indifferent by virtue of a Divine and perpetual Obligation but onely by force of a transient and temporary Institution of Humane Authority for the ends of Discipline the Uniformity of Worship and the security of Government § 4. And therefore our Authors next Inference is either a woful impertinence to our present Enquiry or a bold Affront and Calumny to the publick Declarations of our Church when he concludes That if Christian Liberty be of force enough to free us from the necessary practice of indifferent things instituted by God it is at least of equal efficacy to exempt us from the necessary practice of things imposed on us in the Worship of God by Men. This implies as if the Church of England imposed the same necessity upon its own Determinations as upon the positive Laws of God notwithstanding it so industriously disclaims all Divine Impositions either for Legal or Evangelical Ceremonies and so expresly declares all its own Institutions to bind onely with an humane temporary and changeable Obligation Whereas they for so it still happens that their dearest Pretences are always the strongest and most unhappy Objections against themselves would needs obtrude upon us their own Fancies and singular Conceits as our Saviours own Commands and Institutions and call their separation from the Church of England their departure from Antichristian Idolatries and Whoredoms to the chastity of Worship and the purity of Gospel-Ordinances And as we are informed by I. O. they who hold Communion with Christ are
though it cost him the making his Bow quite naked Thus were all the Promises in the Bible engaged in the Parliament Service and not a Text left to attend his Majesty beside Threatnings and Judgments And there is not a remarkable Prophesie relating to the Jewish Nation or the adjacent Kingdoms that they have not accommodated by faith and boldness for both together can do much to the posture of Affairs in our late Troubles Thus were the Essex Committee delivered from the Cavaliers at Colchester It was foretold i. e. after their deliverance Hab. 3.3 7. God came from Teman and the Holy One from mount Paran Selah i. e. from Naseby and Marston-moor I saw the Tents of Cushan in Affliction and the Curtains of the Land of Midian did tremble i. e. the Enemy gathered at Chelmsford upon the coming of Fairfax his Army abated their Confidence Were the Parishioners of Coggeshal once in great danger of the Enemy The snares of death compassed us and the flouds of ungodly men made us afraid But the Lord thundred from Heaven the Highest gave his voice hailstones and coles of Fire yea he sent out his Arrows and scattered them and he shot out lightning and discomfited them he sent from above he took us he drew us out of many waters he delivered us from our strong Enemy and from them which hated us for they were too strong for us Do any Professours doubt the Event of the War Fear not thou worm Iacob and ye few men of Israel behold I will make thee a new sharp Instrument having Teeth thou shalt thresh the Mountains and beat them small and shalt make the hills as chaff thou shalt fan them c. Isa. 41.14 15. Are the Officers of the Kings Forces divided or irresolved in their Counsels The Princes of Zoan are become fools the Princes of Noph are deceived they have seduced the People even they that are the stay of their Tribes the Lord hath mingled a perverse Spirit in the midst of them they have caused the People to err in every work as a drunken man staggereth in his Vomit Isa. 19.13 14. Were the Rump to be encouraged in their design of altering the Government after the Murther of the late King against the Apostacy of the Presbyterians and the Attempts of the Royalists The Text was pat to the purpose Let them return to thee but return not thou to them And I will make thee unto this People a fenced brazen wall and they shall fight against thee but they shall not prevail against thee for I am with thee to save thee and deliver thee saith the Lord Jer. 15.19 20. Is Monarchy to be for ever abolish'd and the new Common-wealth establish'd Behold I create new heavens and a new earth and the former shall not be remembred nor come into my mind Isa. 65.17 But the Kingdom and Dominion and Greatness of the Kingdom under the whole Heaven shall be given to the People of the Saints of the most High whose Kingdom is an everlasting Kingdom and all Dominions shall serve and obey him Hitherto is the end of the matter Dan. 7.27 Do the Protestants covenanted Protestants that had sworn in the presence of the great God to extirpate Popery and Prelacy Do others that counted themselves under no less sacred bond for the maintenance of Prelates Service-book and the like as the whole Party of Ormonds Adherents it is a favour or rather a chance it was not plain Butler joyn with a mighty number that had for eight years together sealed their Vows to the Romish Religion with our bloud and their own If all these combine together against Sion shall they prosper No saith the Lord Iehovah and I. O. If Rezin and the Son of Remalia Syria and Ephraim old Adversaries combine together for a new enmity against Iudah if Covenant and Prelacy Popery and Treachery Bloud and as to that Innocency joyn hand in hand to stand in the way of the Promise yet I will not in this joyn with them says the Lord. Is the Royal Family together with the ancient Nobility to be for ever cashier'd upon his Majesties defeat at Worcester and are the Brewers and Coblers of the Army to commence new Lords All the Trees of the Field shall know that I the Lord have brought down the high tree and have exalted the low tree have dried up the green tree drawn out its sap by sequestrations and have made the dry tree to flourish by plunder and sacriledge I the Lord have spoken it and have done it Ezek. 17.24 This was the Text to the Thanksgiving Sermon before the Parliament for their Victory at Worcester And now is it possible for these men to be at a loss for Scripture to countenance their proceedings after this rate of imposing upon the Word of God If such loose and prophane Accommodations of Prophetick passages to present Affairs be sufficient to support Faith in its expectations of success I leave it to you to judge whether it can ever want grounds and encouragements for Rebellion as long as the Prophesies against Gog and Magog the Whore and the Beast the Pope and the Man of sin are not blotted out of the Bible But this is not all Faith has other Topicks to bottom its confidence upon And therefore 2. It has right to all Gods mercies and deliverances of his People in all past and present Ages It makes all Joshuahs victories present to every true Believer so that if O. Cromwel had but boldness or Enthusiasm enough to presume that the Almighty had as great favour for his Highness as he had for Ioshuah he was bound to enable him and his Army to dispatch Kings and Canaanites with as great expedition as Ioshuah and the Children of Israel did For the Good-will Free Grace and loving Kindness of God is the same towards all his People And the infinite Fountains of the Deity can never be sunk one hairs bredth by everlastingly flowing blessings So that past blessings and deliverances of Gods People are store mercies laid up for Believers against a rainy day and when we want present Refreshments what a comfort is it to chew the Cud upon the blessings of former Ages And thus they use the Records of sacred Story just as Don Quixot used his Books of Chivalry in accommodating the Exploits of the Knights of yore to his own ridiculous Adventures And here lay the folly of his Errantry in chewing the cud upon the Prodigies of old Romances And I am sure he had as wise and reasonable a ground for his folly when he besotted himself with a conceit of vying Adventures with the famous Knight Valdovinos as they had for their faith when they expected to equal the successes of Ioshuah But however by this means it was easie to befool and inveigle the Common-people and if they represented to them any act of Bloud and Cruelty with Allusion to Scripture Language and Story
that alone was enough to pass it for the work of the Lord and the Rabble imagined they were acting over again all the Wars and Battels of the Old Testament and pouring out all the Vials and fulfilling all the Prophesies of the New Beside Faith supports it self and engages Providence by chewing the Cud upon its own blessings as well as those of former Ages David esteemed it very good Logick to argue from the victory God gave him over the Lion and Bear to a confidence of Victory over Goliah Make use then of your past mercies deliverances blessings with promised incomings carry them about you by Faith use them or they 'l grow rusty where is the God of Elijah Awake awake Oh Arm of the Lord. Let former Mercies be an Anchor of hope in time of present distresses Where is the God of Marstone-moor and the God of Naseby is an acceptable Expostulation in a gloomy day O what a Catalogue of Mercies has this Nation to plead by in time of trouble God came from Naseby and the holy One from the West Selah his Glory covered the Heavens and the Earth was full of his Praise He went forth in the North and in the East he did not with-hold his hand So that in this gloomy day of their Persecution they are forced to support themselves and their hopes by chewing the Cud upon their Naseby-mercies and their Marston-moore mercies till God shall be pleased to give them in some stores of fresh Providences For however he may at present counterfeit a total departure to punish their Apostasie and their want of Zeal in his Work yet he will not he cannot utterly forsake them Because he is engaged in point of honour What shall he do for his great Name yea so tender is the Lord herein of his Glory that when he hath been exceedingly provoked to remove men out of his Presence yet because they have been called by his Name and have visibly held forth a following after him he would not suffer them to be trodden down lest the Enemy should exalt themselves and say Where is now their God They shall not take from him the Honour of former deliveranceâ— and protections In such a Nation as this if the Lord now upon manifold provocations should give up Parliament People Army to calamity and ruine would not the glory of former Counsels successes deliverances be utterly lost Would not men say it was not the Lord but Chance that hapned to them And thus when Providence was once drawn in it was bound to go through unless it would either lose the glory of all its former exploits or what was more dishonourable confess it was over-reach'd as the Presbyterians were by the Independent Hypocrisie By this Artifice they drew on each other to the height and perfection of Villany because they were so far engaged that they could not possibly retreat either with honour or safety and therefore resolved to secure themselves in the death of the King suspecting lest if he should ever be restored to his Crown and Royal Authority they might be called to an After-reckoning according to that Maxim so much taught and practised in the School of Rebellion that when men have run themselves into unpardonable disorders there remains no way of doing better but by doing worse And in this Lesson they must needs instruct Providence now you are engaged there is no way for you to retire with honour and if you do not justifie your own Actings in our former wickednesses by proceeding with us to greater Impieties you do not only condemn them and your self but lose the honour of all the Margarets Fasts and Thanksgivings What a mean opinion must these prophane Enthusiasts have of the divine Understanding that imagined they could impose upon the Almighty by such thin and shallow Fetches § 6.3 The third Maxime of Faith is to believe that Providence is really and in good earnest for them though it is seemingly and in outward appearance against them Thus whilst themselves sate at the Helm it befriended them from all Points of the Compass and into whatsoever Corner it shifted it self it still favoured their designs and fill'd their sails with success and victory When Affairs succâ—eded to their wishes then Providence drove them on with a full Gale but when there hapned any cross or changeable Dispensation so far was it from hindring their Progress that it gave them the greater advantage of a side wind For as the same Author informs us I have heard that a full wind behind the Ship drives her not so fast forward as a side wind that seems almost as much against her as with her And the reason they say is because a full wind fills but some of her sails which keep it from the rest that they are empty when a side wind fills all her sails and sets her speedily forward So if the Lord should give us a full wind and continual Gale of Mercies it would fill but some of our sails but when he comes with a side wind a Dispensation that seems almost as much against us as for us then he fills all our sails takes up all our Affections making his works wide and broad enough to entertain them every one then are we carried freely and fully towards the Haven where we would be And thus for that is the Application the imprisonment of the Committee of Essex was but a side wind of Providence that drove them on with the greater speed to the taking of Colchester So that while their Faith was resolute in the Belief of this Principle it was not possible for Providence to shake them off by any Affronts or Indignities but they served it just as Horace was served by the importunate Fellow he describes Serm. lib. 1. Sat. 9. from whose irksom Impertinency he could neither by Art nor Violence redeem himself Did he divert to salute a Friend It was his Acquaintance Did he pretend a visit He was at leisure to wait upon him Did he counterfeit any business He had Interest to assist him And thus did they tease and persecute Providence which way soever it turn'd they still would follow no rebukes could dash their bold-faced Faith out of countenance though it beat them off with open Affronts they would still insinuate and fawn upon it and though it knock'd off their hands an hundred times and sent them away with bloudy fingers they would not let go their hold but they would cling about him by faith do what he can they will not be shifted off And let him vary his dispensations as oft as he will they are resolved to follow him with their Songs upon Sigionoth Songs upon Sigionoth What are they I remember I am under the Obligation of a Promise to unriddle their meaning and therefore to be short they are a sort of Pindarick Psalms not tied to the same Rhime or Measure but to be sung with variety of Notes and interchangeable Tunes Now I.