Selected quad for the lemma: evil_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
evil_n	good_a	life_n	tree_n	2,346	5	8.7759	4	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A60227	The life and death of Sir Henry Vane, Kt., or, A short narrative of the main passages of his earthly pilgrimage together with a true account of his purely Christian, peaceable, spiritual, gospel-principles, doctrine, life and way of worshipping God, for which he suffered contradiction and reproach from all sorts of sinners, and at last, a violent death, June 14. Anno, 1662 : to which is added, his last exhortation to his children, the day before his death.	Sikes, George.	1662 (1662)	Wing S3780; ESTC R19959	148,120	164

in his first creation as he came out of the hands of God had the Law of Nature or the ruling powers of natural Life in full perfection inherent and operative in his own person The same Law of natural or first created Life and perfection is renewed by Christ in men as to kind so as also to be inherent and operative in them in some degree but the deficiencies of inward personal sanctity and of inward and outward operations are made out by the compleat righteousness of the Law as wrought by another person for them and imputed to them for their justification before God upon the tearms of the first Covenant qualifying them for communion with God therein In this sence Paul was according to the Law blameless to wit under this comliness of God put upon him In the other sence as to inherent personal perfection 't is said 1 Iohn 1. 8. If we say we have no sin we deceive our selves and the truth is not in us 19. As to the whole bulk of the written Oracles of God there is frequently given the proper character both of the Law and Gospel Principle or state of Life in the old Testament as well as new but of the latter more eminently and plentifully in the new 20. There were true spirituall Saints both before and under the outward dispensation of the Law Enoch Noah Sem Heber Abraham David and many others and there are sowre narrow Pharisaical legal-spirited Christians under the outward dispensation of the Gospel at this day 21. Even the first Covenant or Legal state of first-creation Life and Principles renewed in men comes to them in the way of Gospel or through the glad tydings of the mighty Redeemer who was promised to Adams under the name of the womans seed that should bruise or break the Serp●●●s head Gen. 3. 15. This he did by dying through death destroyed him that had the power of death that is the devil Heb. 2. 14. Thus Christ died for all 2 Cor. 5. 14 15. to recover all again out of that dead sleep in trespasses and sins into which they were cast by Adams first transgression and to set them upon their first-creation ●e●t again in order to a new trial of their personal demeanour in that great point Adam first miscarried in as to the loosing the Life quiting the righteousness wisdom and lesser glory of their first-creation for that which excelleth in the second the tree of Knowledge that puffeth up for the tree of Life that edifieth Thus was Christ a propitiation not for the sins of his elect onely that of the whole world 1 Ioh. 2. 2. Here 's all the general Redemption the Scripture holds forth 22. If these things be so what signify all the voluminous Controversies of the Pelagian and Antipelagian Arminian and Antiarminian Supralapsarian and Sublapsarian about Free-will general Redempton and the Like What Free-will is it the one pleads for the other denies Only such as Adam was created with the wavering Liberty of the sons of men the object whereof is natural good and evil As for spiritual new-creation things they were in themselves in their own naked essence clear out of sight to Adams discerning at best which was but natural They were onely representable and understandable to him in a riddle through some first-creation shadow the Tree of Life Neither of the above mentioned parties in all their warm digladiations and pickeerings once dream of a distinct superiour state of Life and Liberty that should swallow up all that of the first creation into victory bring it forth again with u●ury and great gain by way of resurrection in the glorious Life and Liberty of the sons of God the spiritual eternal Life and Freedom to good onely and not at all to evil But whoever returns not into the exercise of his retified first-creation Principles and Liberty as a general fruit of Christ's death 't is his own voluntary default He sins against God and wrongs his own soul he hates Christ and loves death Prov. 8. 36. He refu●es the righteousness and glory of his own humane nature and chuses to be a beast 23. But what lies in man to do towards the superiour and more excellent dispensation and way by which he should be led forward into the glorious Liberty of the ●●●s of God and eternal Life 'T is answered He hath power in the right use of his natural freedom not to resist it but upon experience of the insufficiency of the selfish spirit and wavering Principles of his first creation to submit all the Life and glory thereof to the fi●e-baptism in order to the being brought forth in a more excellent state that is unchangable 'T is not in man to do any thing towards his new creation as neither did he contribute any thing towards his first make But God makes such proposal and offer of this new-creation work to all mankind as not one man f●iles of being made a new creature but it will be most righteously interpreted by God to have befallen him through his own voluntary default in neglecting refusing and resisting that offer Where comes in the difference then A remnant according to the election of grace obtain it the rest are voluntarily blinded and fall short Rom. 11. 5. 7. That saying of Austin is not amiss God will not save any man whether he will or no but he will make that man willing to be saved that he resolves to save He may do what he will with his own Mans first-creation Liberty misused in this great point brings forth this sad truth Thy destruction is of thy self O man And Gods reserving singly to himself the forming up of the new creature and the prerogative● Liberty of effectually and irresistibly disposing of this great favour where when and to whom he pleases brings forth that excellent truth That our salvation is onely and meerly of God as Sir Francis Bacon observes in his Confession of Faith Who then maketh men to differ one from another the new creature from the old Man makes himself to differ from the new creature or spiritual man by his voluntary rejecting and despising this more excellent Life but God alone makes him that is a new creature to differ from the old And this indeed is the proper meaning of difference in such cases To differ is to excel Phil. 1. 10. That ye may approve things that excel or differ So 1 Cor. 15. 41. One star differs from or excels another star in glory Thou wilt say if the case ●e thus Why doth God yet find fault For who hath resisted his will Those that he hath elected and is resolved to save he will effectually and irresistibly make willing to be sayed and they will certainly be saved and no others Nay but O man who art thou that replict against Go● Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it why hast thou 〈…〉 He may make vessels of honour or dishonour as he pleases amongst Iewes or

Nature the true end of all Government in humane Societies turn their own Reason out of Doors and so turn beasts for their Governours to ride on That the Iews Greeks and Romanes the wisest States in the world have over and over used this Liberty of Changing their Government as they saw occasion and that often with very good success is undeniable Were it unlawful for a State in any case to depose remove Kings what Titles have any Monarchs now upon earth to their Crowns that are descended of those who were elected into the room of such as the people deposed How bruitish then and destructive even to the Interest and Title of the present Kings that hesought to gratify and flatter is Belloy's Assertion That a Family once setled in the Crown though they prove never so wicked vitious and abominable yea though they go about to destroy the Common-wealth must yet be sacred to us and permitted to keep their Seat without any direction restraint or punishment from the Common-wealth but from God onely At this rate all the Carlees in France were Usurpers because Pepin the first of that Race came to the Crown upon the deposition of Childeric the Third and so wiped out the Merovees or Pharamonds Line The like is to be said of the Capevingiens who have now sate in the French Throne almost seven hundred years since the deposition of Charles of Lorain last of Pepins race into whose room Hugh Capet was elected by the People The same thing is to be seen in the Spanish Histories and where not Four Races of Kings have been there since the expulsion of the Romans The first was from the Goths The second from Don Pelago The third from Don Sancho Mayor The last from the House of Austria England has had more changes of this kind that both these neighbour Monarchies together in the same space of about twelve hundred years They all three got loose from the Romane Yoke so long ago This blessed Witness and Assertor of the Fundamental Rights Truths and Liberties of Christs Kingdom as also of the Common-wealth of England and that has sealed his Assertions in both kinds with his blood was not onely well skilled in setting the right bounds to civil and spiritual Power in the outward government of Worldly States but he did yet more clossly distinguish between natural whence civil springs and spiritual Power as to the inward regulation of particular persons You may take a glance into his larger Discourses on this Subject by a short glosse on the two Trees in Eden that of Life and that of the Knowledge of good and evil These two Trees were the first significant Types in and by which man was instructed in this doctrine which rightly divides the word of Truth Christ the living and Scriptures the written Word of God between the natural and spiritual man alotting unto each their proper portion and character One of these Adam might yea ought to have fed upon the Tree of Life the other not By the Devils suggestion to the Woman and hers to him he made a contrary choice He did eat of that he should not to the loss even of that he thought to gratify himself in his temporary Life of righteousness and communion with God and neglected to eat of the other and so of Christ in spirit the Antitype thereof for the feeding and building him up into eternal Life and true blessedness These two Trees were an Allegory of like significancy with Sarai and Hagar Isaac and Ishmael Old and New Testament or Covenant c. One of them signified the first Adam with his living Soul and freedom to good and evil the other the second Adam with his quickning spirit and freedom to good onely which he communicates and builds men up into the life and exercise of in fellowship with himself Adam chose to gratify his primitive natural constitution and freedom to good and evil which together with the things that feed it were typically stated and represented in the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil The new-creature Life and the glorious Liberty of the sons of God together with the things thereof not seen to man in the former capacity things eternal were typically stated and represented to Adams natural discerning in the tree of Life with instruction what was his concern to do or not to do as to that or the other But although these Types were given and expounded also by Christ unto Adam before hand yet was there room left after his fall for the exercise of a distinguishing dispensation of mercy towards him and his posterity from that of severity which was forthwith put in execution against the apostate angels excluding them from any possibility of ever entring into Gods Rest. This argues that the Angels who excel in strength and are higher than man had a clearer understanding in that point as to the requisiteness of a transition for themselves and for men out of the mutable state of life and righteousness received in their first creation into the unchangable Life and everlasting righteousness of the second Their fall therefore was more knowing wilful fatal and irrecoverable upon any tearms whatsoever That which Paul said of himself may be said of Adams first transgression comparatively with the first sin of the Angels that he did it ignorantly and so obtained mercy 1 Tim. 1. 13. But let man after renewed ad revived look to it for if after all this warning he sin again after the similitude of Adams transgression he becomes a Tree twice dead and will be pluckt up by the roots This second fall of man is as fatal and irrecoverable as the Angels first ● Adam's eating the forbidden fruit imported no less than a pleasing himself in the single Liberty Righteousness● Life and Enjoyments of his first-creation state in preference to what was attainable for him in the second He preferred the creature or glory of man in the first to the glory of God that rests upon men for ever in the new-creation state He preferred the Law of works or the natural power of working righteousness set up in him by the first creation to the Law of Liberty Grace Faith that heavenly power of working righteousness that is set up in man by the new creation which can do all good and no evil so that against such there is no Law Gal. 5. 23. This is the glorious liberty of the sons of God Iam. 1. 25. and 2. 12. To prefer the lesser glory of the first creation the glory of man to the greater glory of the second the glory and righteousness of God is to worship serve and value the glory of the Creature more than that of the Creator who is blessed for ever Rom. 1. 25. They that prefer the lesser glory to the greater the righteousness and glory of man's first-creation to that of the second will prove hypocrites and persecute A hypocrite is not onely he that makes a shew of righteousness and

Deut. 32. 19 21. and Christ after him Mat. 9. 12 13. Cleansedness from the pollutions of the World corruption of Nature revival from their death in trespasses and sins hinders not but Satan may re-enter old sins recover dominion and so the members of that building on the sand that kingdom or heaven that may be shaken Heb. 12. 26 27. may come to be trees twice dead fit only to be plucked up by the roots cast into the fire and burned Iude 12. and Heb. 6. 8. 2 Pet. 2. 20 22. Mat. 7. 22 27. and Chap. 12. 43 45. Ezek. 16. 38. And as it is not the present freedom from natural pollution so neither is it the ornament of excellent gifts supernatural or infused humane learning much less natural parts and acquired humane learning the tongue of men and angels all dexterity of expressing ●heir conceptions either intuitively or by a sound of words incident to those two choicest ranks of treasures in their first-creation-capacity that can secure them from being but as sounding brass or tinckling cymbals 1 Cor. 12. 31. and 13. 1. Ezek. 16. 1 15. A great noise they may make a great repute they may have as the onely compleat interpreters of the Oracles of God yet all amounts but to an indistinct uncertain sound No man can tell thereby how to prepare himself to the battel 1 Cor. 14.7 8. and Ezek. 33. what weapons or what armour to provide They give no right character of those spiritual weapons mighty through God for the pulling down of strong holds in our selves and others 2. Cor. 10.4 or of that whole armour of God Ephes. 6. 11. wherein alone the true believer is able to wrestle it out not onely against flesh and blood but against Principalities Powers Rulers of the darkness of this world and spiritual wickedness in high places vers 12. The onely new-creature spirit in man that is greater than he that is in the world 1 Iohn 4. 4. is set at naught by those that warrant the first building secure is contradicted blasphemed called the devil The wisdom of God is by them tearmed the wisdom of the Serpent Did not matters go thus between Christ and the Master-builders in Religion amongst the Iews They reject the chief corner stone Psal. 118. 22. Mat. 21. 42. and how is their house like to stand it may indeed be emptied of filth swept cleansed garnished with excellent gifts and ornaments Mat. 12. 44. 2 Pet. 2. 20. 1 Cor. 12. 31. Ezek. 16. 9 13. Yet in all this flourish there may be a deep unsuspected ignorance or inadvertency of the more excellent way the way of love or state of divine Life wherein the stones of their building members of their Churches are capable to be brought forth by being broken and formed up anew into an unchangable harmony and indissoluble union of spirit with the Lord 1. Cor. 6. 17. If this be gain-said the onely spirit and spiritual harness that accommodates men for a successful contest with the devil and all the powers of darkness is wholly laid aside How then shall we fight the battels of the Lord when that very faith is decried as a diabolical fiction that is the onely principle of Life in men whereby to undertake resist conquer triumph over the devil and swallow up death it self into victory Let us no longer be flattered by our crafty over-reaching adversary into a security and satisfaction in such armour and weapons as he knowes he can strip us of at pleasure and re-enter The renewed spirit of man however accomplished and adorned with spiritual gifts the wisdom the righteousness of man are not the spirit the weapons the armour of God nor can secure any man from the most fatal and irrecoverable apostacy Many stars of the first magnitude as to all this glory and ornament have often been known to fall from this kind of Heaven or Kingdom of man's righteousness Besides all the sad instances in former ages for this have not the late years of Englands deliverance brought upon this stage of ours and exhibited to our view multitudes of teachers and professors who have notably shined forth in this glory wisdom and righteousness through the knowledge of Christ after the flesh accompanied with excellent gifts and yet through a spirit of enmity and contradiction a root of bitterness springing up in them Heb. 12. 15. against the more excellent way the Life of Faith the Cross of Christ the true Circumcision which worship God in the spirit Phil. 3. 3. have most evidently apostatized from and lost even that they had yea and have been the meanes of betraying the whole Nation afresh and rolling all back again into more insufferable bondage than ever We may say and hear this with weeping And moreover do we not yet daily experience an instability in such principles ornaments weapons armour Are not multitudes of professors at this pass still yea and nay off and on with God and so with sin and satan to And will it alwayes be so well Will these wavering Principles this unstable kind of life and righteousness if not quitted for a better be ever able to secure us from a final parting with God and entire closing with the devil as one spirit with him The unstable nature of man's first-creation at best must either ascend into a fixed union with Christ in spirit and so contract an everlasting disability to any thing which is evil 2 Cor. 13. 8. or else it will descend into a fixed union with the devil and thereby contract an everlasting inability to any thing that is good The first created freedom of man's will to good and evil the liberty of the sons of men however renewed again by Christ will be finally swallowed up either into a diabolical freedom to evil onely and not at all to good or into a divine freedom to good onely and not at all to evil which is the glorious liberty of the sons of God wherewith Christ makes those that receive him free indeed John 1. 12. and Chap 8. 36. Let us then put off the armour of man even of the renewed old man as David did Sauls and put on the whole armour of God the new man which after God is created in wisdom righteousness and true or everlasting holiness Ephes. 4. 24. Then the spiritual Goliah will certainly fall before us 'T is the divine new-creature-Life onely with spiritual weapons can over set all his power of darkness and detect all the crafty stratagems and methods of delusion to the last period of his mystery of iniquity Professors in the first-building flourishing in the wisdom glory and righteousness of the Law or of the ruling activity of renewed humane Nature and rectified rational Powers though received from Christ himself as no mean fruit or benefit of his death if they oppose contradict and blaspheme the true fighting conquering and reigning principle of divine Nature in the second they do thereby become worse than those foolish and contemptible

crime He was stedfast in the Covenant they turned aside like a deceitful Bow The criminous party had the Sword and innocency suffered Even so it is now To omit his rejection and confinement by the Long Parliament after their return to take their Seats afresh in the HOUSE 1659. his last Scene of Sufferings was under the present Powers Under this variety of Persecutors and Persecution he notably experienced the truth of that Apostolical Argument for the Resurrection If in this Life onely we have hope in Christ we are of all men most miserable 1 Cor. 15.19 He took that course in the face of all affronts and contradictions of sinners of one kind or other from first to last which shewed the invincible steaddinesse and chastity of his spirit What he vigorously prosecuted when he was active he ratified and sealed with his blood and all the tendencies thereunto by witnessing a good Confession since he was passive He stood up for the defence of the Lives and Liberties of his Country-men and lost his own Liberty 〈◊〉 Life for his paines As a true lover of his Nation he boldly asserted the Rights thereof at the last push to the faces of those that have sufficiently declared themselves enemies thereunto in condemning him What he could do or suffer more for his Countrey than he did is somewhat difficult to say His two years imprisonment under this power was by meer will and pleasure no particular crime being laid to his charge in direct contradiction to the fundamental Laws and Liberties of Englishmen stated in MAGNA CHARTA Chap. 29. Festus a heathen Judge deemed this unreasonable in Paul's case Act. 25.27 It seemeth to me unreasonable saies he to send one as a Prisoner and not withal to signify the crimes laid against him 'T is against the Law of nature the conscience and common light of Reason in all mankind that any man should be so dealt with For their most injurious underhand-dealing in picking up a charge while he was kept two years close-prisoner and procuring Witnesses against him by threats or promises together with their proceedings about him at the Grand Jury and Kings Bench I do once for all refer you to the Narrative of his Tryal I reserve onely a liberty of speaking something in general as to the difficulty of his circumstances in the tryal and for particulars to lay before you the main passages of the Iews proceedings with Christ trusting them and you together to make the application I take hint for this latter branch of my liberty from one of his occasional speeches recorded in his Tyral Mention being made by a Friend of the cruel proceedings against him Alas said he what a-do they keep to make a poor creature like his Saviour He was an able Common-Wealths-Man and a true Believer two dangerous qualifications to Church and State as this world goes He had remarkable insight in the Politie of the true Common-wealth of Israel the Holy Ierusalem that will shortly come down from God out of Heaven Rev. 21. This gave him no small aime at what he ought to be doing in the Common-wealth of England as preparatory thereunto What was done in the day of small things when the Nation was delivered from its taskmasters was not despicable in its season though a cloud be now drawn over it 'T was a usual saying with him● Come what would every thing was upon the right Wheel in the wise contrivement of God for the accomplishing of his righteous designs in the world But considering matters betwixt man and man that expostulation Eccles. 2. 15. Why was Libe●●●re wi●e● may seem to be fairly in●erpretable into this sence● That true wisdom is a great disadvantage to a man in this disordered world where 't is the fashion for lust will and pleasure to bear sway against Scripture Law and Reason Persons of the best rational abilities and most conscience have usually been destroyed in Courts of Judicature so called throughout the world in all times A man of Reason and Conscience called forth to declare his mind cannot afford to gratifie the corrupt humors lusts of men that put good for evil and evil for good light for darkness and darkness for light Esay 5.20 much less become one in spirit and principle with those that so do and then he must die When truth failes and every thing is called by a wrong name good evil and evil good men abhor him that speaketh uprightly they hate him that reproveth in the gate Amos 5. 10. If the foundations be destroyed what can the righteous do Psas. 11. 3. Yea or what can he say when the Soveraignty and infinitely most Supream Legislative power of God and Christ himself is set at naught there 's the m●in Foundation gone as to the righteous man's defence amongst his fellow mortals If Judges that have no fear of God before their eyes be on the Bench then long schrowls of I know not what must be formed up and read against the most faithful Patriots and choicest Christians as not having the fear of God before their eyes and sentence accordingly must be pronounced against them by one r●ful wight or other that 's an enemy to all true Law and right Reason This sort of Cattel have not been wanting in any place or time Queen Iezebel could find them in Iezreel Judges and witnesses of Beliat against Naboth and away goes his Life and she not long after to the Dogs 1 King 21. and 2 King 9. Such Judges as have no fear of God before their eyes what will they stick at All inferiour and subordinate Foundations of the righteous mans safety all the Laws Rights and Liberties of any Nation will signify little with Judges so qualified and fitted to abuse and murder any righteous men that are brought before them See the boldness of the Kings Rulers and People of the earth not onely in slighting but down-right bidding defiance to the Soveraignty of God and Christ Father and Son with the Laws of both Psal. 2. 2 3. The Kings of the Earth set themselves and the Rulers take Counsel together against the Lord and against his Christ there 's their Soveraignty affronted Then they say vers 3. Let us break their bands asunder and cast away their cords from us there are their Lawes rejected Then if the antient fundamental Lawes or Liberties of any Nation be slighted laid aside or pulled up by the roots and mischief established by some new one with this advantage the basest of men may gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous and condemn innocent blo●● Psal. 94. 20 21. If over and beyond all this there be such wicked Judges to be found that neither fear God nor regard that which is the man in man Reason but onely that corrupt State Reason that lies in point blank contradiction thereunto if such be to be found who will venture by their superadditional glosses to stretch a mischievous new Law beyond the proper

lick'd Nab●ths blood they lick'd his 1 King 21. 19. and Chap. 22. 38. If any Magistrates yet stout it out in their cruel and oppressive courses whereinsoever they deal proudly God will be above them Exod. 18. 11. They are nothing in his hands They are but little in an Angels hands And not much in man's You were but little you know in the hands of men Those whom you have valiantly executed after they had layne a good while in their graves together with those whom you have killed and cut in pieces single were two hard for you when they were alive and together There is a generation amongst us oh how lofty are their eyes Prov. 30. 13. but what have they done The honest party of England are as 't was once said of Germany triumphed over but not conquered Well you have been but little in the hands of men that 's undeniable You are as nothing in the hands of an angel You are accounted as less than nothing to God Esay 40. 17. What may be performed upon you by the invisible strokes of angels you may learn from what is recorded for your instruction 1 Kings 19. One hundred eighty five thousand were slain by an angel in one night in the camp of the Assyrians Some prodigious alarms of their approach to undertake you on the behalf of betrayed abused Saints have of late been given What ever you have heard of in former times as to the exploits of Angels in this kind you will find to have been but type to what God will perform by those angelical hosts in the last dayes when all visible reliefs fail his praying People See O King the honest and justifiable boldness plainness and freedom of speech that Daniel and other Prophets have used to greater Monarch's O thou King saies Daniel to Belshazzar the most high God gave thy Father a Kingdom and glory and honour But when his heart was lifted up and his mind hardned in pride he was deposed from his kingly Throne and they took his glory from him And thou his Son O Belshazzar hast not humbled thine heart though thou knewest all this but hast lifted up thy self against the Lord of heaven and abused his Saints the Vessels of his house and the God in whose hard thy breath is and all thy waves hast thou not glorified Then he interprets MENE MENE TEKEL UPHARSIN God has numbred thy kingdom and finished it c. Dan. 5. 18 28. Daniel was highly honoured by the King for thus dealing with him vers 29. See the commendable stoutness as well as honest boldness of Saints in their conferences and parting-blows with Kings Pharaoh in a fume bid Moses get him gone and take heed to himself for in the day he saw his face again he should die Well saies Moses I le see thy face again no more Who had the worst on 't The King would need Moses help before he the King 's He had sent for him with all speed before time and time in several distresses under the plagues that were upon him and his People Moses needed nothing that he could do but that that would be done whether he would or no Israels deliverance from bondage All these thy servants saies Moses shall come and bow themselves to me saying Get thee out and all the people that follow thee and I will go out And he went out from Pharaoh in a great anger Pharaoh was wrckedly and proudly angry and stout in ridding his hands of Moses and Moses was meekly and justly angry and stout in a resolved quitting of Pharaohs company for ever Exod. 10. 28 29. and Chap. 11. 8. The Oracles of God delivered by Moses though accompanied and ratified with miracles were called by that vain King vain or lying words Exod. 5. 9. Those Kings that will do as Pharaoh did refuse all Messages from the Lord delivered to them scoffe at and persecute the messengers must look for Pharaoh's wages and that dispensed to them from such a hand as can tear them in pieces so as none can deliver Kings have usually had a great antipathy to true Prophets and their messages but bin very kind and friendly to false flattering Prophets who speak smooth pleasing things About four hundred false Prophets with one mouth encourage Ahab to go to Ramoth-Gilead a City of Israel and recover it from the Syrian They saw he had a mind to it and they all prophesied success and Victory At Iehoshaphat the king of Iudah's motion Michaiah a true Prophet is called in Ahab had no mind to him I hate him saies he for he does not use to prophesie good concerning me but evil that is did not use to gratify his present humour and lust as the others did He deals truly with Ahab warnes him that if he go he dies for 't and so it fell out The false Prophets no doubt had incouraging rewards Michaiah's recompense is a Prison and the bread and water of affliction But the Kings following the pleasing counsel of the false Prophets was his ruine and the listening to Michaiah had been his safety Who were the Traitors the four hundred false Prophets or the one true The true Prophet and Subject is handled as the Traitor and the false Traitors go currant away with gratuities and favours Why do not Kings consider such instructing paterns It highly concerns them both in point of honour and safety 1 King 22. Nebuchadnezzar sets up a stately piece of Popery an Image of gold thirty yards high The Princes Governours Captaines Judges Treasurers Counsellours Sheriffs all the Rulers of Provinces c. come to the dedication of it A Herald solemnly proclaims That when they hear the sound of the Cornet Flute Organ Harp Sackbut Psaltery D●lcimer and all kinds of M●sick they must all fall down and worship the Image and that those who refuse are to be cast into he midst of a burning fiery furnace The generallity of the Governours and People obey the Decree Shadrach Meshach and Abednego are traduced before the King as Rebels and Hereticks for slighting his Commands not serving his God's nor worshiping the golden Image which he had set up The King in a fury sends for them tells them he will try them once more and if they refuse the second time to the fiery Furnace they go They tell him he need trouble himself no further about trying them they are resolved what to do We are not careful O King say they to answer thee in this matter God will deliver us out of thy hand O King Or if he will not yet be it known to thee O King we will not serve thy Gods nor worship thy golden Image Then his fury is exercised upon them for a while till he sees their executioners fall down dead upon the place while they scape This quite turns his mind and he makes a Decree That if any speak against the God of Shadrach Meshach and Abednego they shall be out in pieces and their houses made a