lavished them upon their pride exhausted them by their luxury spent them upon their uncleanness which as so many Cormorants devoured that which might and ought to have been given to the poor I see then there are moral causes of evil as well as natural and these are some of them He is bruitish that thinks otherwise Do not the ends and interests of men sway the World next to God himself and what are they but moral causes and if such be to be taken notice of why not sin which is more considerable than all the rest Then O yee late Inhabitants of that famous City which is now in ashes as ever you desire it should flourish again repent of your pride fulness of bread abundance of idleness neglect of the poor and abominable uncleanness so many of you as were guilty of all or any of these for all were not and let others mourne over them that have sinned and have not repented that God may repent of the evil which he hath brought upon you and may build up your waste places in his good time Continue not in the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah lest their punishment be either not removed from you or if so again revived upon you MEDITATION II. Of destroying Fire procured by offering strange fire WE read concerning Nadab and Abihu that there went out fire from the Lord and devoured them and they died before the Lord Lev. 10.2 Why that heavy judgment befell those two Sons of Aaron the Saints of the Lord the preceding verse will tell us viz. because they took their censers put incense therein and offered strange fire before the Lord which he commanded them not Their fault was this God had sent down fire from heaven upon his Altar Levit. 9.24 It should seem it was the pleasure of God and doubtless they knew it that his sacrifice which one calls his meat as the Altar his Table should be kindled and prepared with that fire only which by continual adding of suel as need required was to be kept from ever going out as is supposed Levit. 16.10 There 't is said Aaron shall take a censer full of Coales of fire from off the Altar and his hands full of incense and bring it within the vaile Now they presumed to offer incense to God with common fire which came not from the Altar before the Lord and for this they were burnt to death Upon this passage Bishop Hall worthily called our English Seneca reflects thus It is a dangerous thing saith he in the service of God to decline from his own institutions we have to do with a power which is wise to prescribe his own worship just to require what he hath prescribed powerful to revenge that which he hath not required MEDITATION III. Of fire enkindled by murmuring IN Numb 11. the first and third verses I read these words When the people complained it displeased the Lord and the Lord heard it and his anger was kindled and the fire of the Lord burnt amongst them and consumed them that were in the utmost parts of the Camp And he called the name of the place Taberah because the fire of the Lord burnt among them It doth not much concern our present purpose to enquire what the cause of this their murrâ—uring was which yet is thought to have been want of meat in the Wilderness and thence the place where they were punished to have been called the graves of lust as our Margents do English kiberoth hattaavah neither need we be infallibly resolved what kind of fire it was that God sent amongst them for their murmuring it is all we need observe at the present that they were punished by fire and that murmuring was the sin they were punished for Our punishment I am sure hath been by fire as well as theirs ought we not then to examine whether cur provocation was not much-what by murmuring even as theirs was were we contented when the City was standing yea did we not grumble and repine at one thing or other every day and yet we think we should be more than contented that is to say very thankfull and joyfull if we had but London again if that great City Phenix-like might but rise out of the ashes and our places know us once more It should seem then we had enough then to be contented with and thankfull for but we knew it not as it is said of husbandmen Faelices nimium sua si bona norant If some were in worse condition than formerly would that justify their murmuring were not the Israelites in the Wilderness when they were punished for murmuring and had they not enjoyed a better condition than that in former times Do we murmurers think that men are to blame and was not Shimei to blame when he cursed Daivd and yet David looking higher viz. unto God submissively replied it may be the Lord hath bid him curse me The Robbers and spoilers of Israel were in fault Yet seeing it was God that gave Jacob to the spoile and Israel to the robbers that was reason enough why they should be dumb as a sheep before the Shearer and not open their mouths in any way of murmuring If we so remember our miseries as to forget our mercies if we aggravate our evil things and extenuate our good if we be so vexed and displeased with men as if they were sole authors of all our troubles and as if God who owes and payes us such chastisements had no hand in them If in our hearts we quarrel with God as if he were a hard master and had done us wrong if when we had food and raiment we were not content if when we had something and that considerable and how could our loss have been considerable if our enjoyment had not been so we were as unsatisfied as if we had just nothing If so do not these things plainly prove that we were murmurets many of us and whose experience doth not tell him that these things were so how many things have we repined at that men could not help as namely the pestilence now in such cases it is evident that we have not murmured against men but against the Lord Exod. 16.8 Nay if men be punished far less than their sinâ— deserve and yet will not accept of that their punishment but fret at him that inflicted it what must we call that but murmuring And was not that our case I had almost said that England even before this fire was so full of discontent whatsoever the cause were as if all the plagues of Egypt had been upon it and how after this iâ— can swell more without bursting is hard to conceive So little had we learn'd good Eli's note It is the Lord let him do what seemeth good to him Now if the Law of retaliation be burning for â—urning as we read it was Exod. 21.25 How just was it with the great God to send a Fire upon us for our grievous discontents and murmurings Murmurers are full of
with his earnest prayers that assisted by the spirit of God they may kindly co-operate together with the late judgment and all others upon the heart both of the writer and readers The Author doubts not but there is a great deale of hay and stubble in the superstructure of this work of his as in and with all other his performances and it may be thine too though not so much Pray for the pardon of his defects and miscarriages as he would do of thine cover them with love which covereth a multitude of infirmities if there be any passage in this work one or more that God shall make to thee as Gold Silver or precious Stones give God the glory of it for he it is must make it so and take to thy self these following words on the unworthy Author his behalf viz. that though all that hay and stubble which is found upon him or upon any service of his must be burnt up yet himself may be saved though as by Fire in which and all other needfull requests he desireth heartily to reciprocate â—â—â—h thee who is Yet an unprofitable Servant to Christ and his Church but desirous to be otherwise S. R. THE Heads of the ensuing Discourses Meditations and Contemplations PART I. Discourses 1. OF the great duty of Considering in an evil time Discourses 2. Of Gods being a consuming Fire Meditations 1. Of the sins for which God sent Fire upon Sodâ—m and Gomorrah Meditations 2. Of destroying Fire procured by offering strange Fire Meditations 3. Of Fire enkindled by murmuring Meditations 4. Of Rebellion against Moses and Aaron procuring a destructive Fire Numb â—6 Meditations 5. Of Sabbath-breaking mentioned in Scripture as one great 〈…〉 God 's punishing a people by Fire Meditations 6. Of Gods 〈…〉 by Fire for the sins of Idolatry and Sâ—â—â—r 〈…〉 Meditations 7. Of 〈…〉 Theft Deceit false Ballances mention◠〈…〉 Scripture as causes of Gods contending by Fire Meditations 8. Of lying sâ—â—aring and for-swearing as further causes of Gods contending by Fire Meditations 9. Of the abounding of Drunkenness as one cause of the Fire Meditations 10 Of Gods punishing a People by Fire for their great unprofitableness Meditations 11. Of the universall Corruption and Debauchery of a people punished by God with Fire Meditations 12. Of Gods bringing Fire upon a people for their incorrigibleness under other Judgments Meditations 13. Of the Aggravations of the sins of London PART II. Contemplations 1. COncerning the Nature of Fire and the use that may be made of that Contemplation Contemplations 2. Touching the Nature of Sulphur which is the principal matter and cause of Fire and how it comes to be so mischeivous in the World Contemplations 3. Concerning the true cause of Combustibility or what it is that doth make Bodies obnoxious to fire together with the improvement of that consideration Contemplations 4. Of Fire kindled by Fire Contemplations 5. Of Fire kindled by Putrefaction Contemplations 6. Of Fire kindled by the collision of two hard bodies Contemplations 7. Of Fire kindled for want of vent as in Hay c. Contemplations 8. Of Fire kindled by pouring on Water as in Lime PART III. Meditations 1. OF the weight of Gods hand in the destruction of London by fire Meditations 2. Upon sight of the weekly Bill since the fire Meditations 3. Vpon the discourses occasioned by the late fire both then and since Meditations 4. Upon the dishonest Carters that exacted excessive rates Meditations 5. Upon those that stole what they could in the time of the fire Meditations 6. Upon unconscionable Land-lords demanding excessive Fines and Rents since the Fire Meditations 7. Upon the burning down of many Churches Meditations 8. Upon the burning multitudes of Books of all sorts Meditations 9. Upon the burning of the Royal Exchange Meditations 10. Vpon the burning of Hospitals and Rents thereunto belonging Meditations 11. Vpon the burning of publick Halls Meditations 12. Of the burning of publick Schools Meditations 13. Vpon the burning of Tombs and Graves and dead bodies that were buried therein Meditations 14. Upon the burning of Writings as Bils Bonds c. Meditations 15. On the burning of St. Pauls Church and the unconsumed body of Bishop Brabrooke Meditations 16. Upon the visibleness of Gods hand in the destruction of London Meditations 17. Upon burning of the Sessions-house in the Old-Baily Meditations 18. On the Gates and Prisons of London that were burnt Meditations 19. Upon the Conflagration of the Universe Meditations 20. Upon the Fire of Hell Meditations 21. Upon the coming of that most dreadful Fire in so idolized a year as 1666. Meditations 22. Upon the Fire its beginning on the Lords day Meditations 23. Upon the place where this dreadful Fire began viz. at a Bakers-house in Pudding-lane Meditations 24. Upon the great pitty that ought to be extended to Londoners since the Fire Meditations 25. Upon those that have lost all by the Fire Meditations 26. On those that have lost but half their Estates by this Fire or some such proportion Meditations 25. Vpon those that have lost nothing by the Fire Meditations 26. Vpon those that were gainers by the late Fire Meditations 27. Upon the enducements unto rebuilding of London and some waies of promoting it Meditations 28. Upon the Wines and Oileâ— that swaâ—â— in the streets and did augment the flames Meditations 29. Upon the water running down hill so fast as that they could not stop it for their use Meditations 30. Upon mens being unwilling there should be no Fire though Fire hath done so much hurt Meditations 31. Upon the usefulness of Fire in its proper place and the danger of it elsewhere Meditations 32. Upon the blowing up of houses Meditations 31. Upon preventing the beginning of evils Meditations 32. Upon the City Ministers whose Churches were saved from the fire Meditations 33. Upon those Ministers whose Churches were burned Meditations 34. Upon the killing of several people by the fall of some parts of ruinous Churches Meditations 35. Upon the Fire it s not exceeding the Liberties of the City Meditations 36. Upon the Suburbs comming into more request than ever since the Fire Meditations 37. Upon the Tongue its being a Fire c. Meditations 38. Upon the Angels their being called flames of fire Meditations 39. Upon the Word of God its being compared to Fire Meditations 40. Upon the spoiling of Conduits and other Aqueducts by this Fire Meditations 41. Upon the retorts and reproaches of Papists occasioned by this Fire Meditations 42. On the pains which the Kings Majesty is said to have taken in helping to extinguish the Fire Meditations 43. Upon meer Worldlings who lost their All by this Fire Meditations 44. Upon that forbearance which it becometh Citizens to use one towards another since the Fire Meditations 45. Upon such as are said or supposed to have rejoyced at the comming and consequences of this Fire Meditations 46. Of the burning of Sodom and Gomorrah compared with the burning of London Meditations 47 Of
been ambitious to have proselited either so great a Malefactor as others account him or one that was really mad To imagine he should do such a thing without instigation from others yea without the combination and conspiracy of others joyning with him is no less besides reason than if I mistake not contrary to his own confession If the Committee of Parliament which were appointed to examine how the Fire came and was carryed on did manifest no small jealousie that it was by Popish treachery after they had received the testimonies and informations of many sufficient witnesses as in reference to the Fire yea if the Parliament its self did since the Fire manifest a greater zeale and hotter displeasure against the Papists than ever before publishing to the World that they had been filled with complaints of the great Insolencies of the Papists in several Counties and if it be well known to many that many Romanists have been very jocund and full of triumph since that Fire as who should say ah ah so they would have it or as one brings them in saying Ah this hit better than the Powder-plot I say if all these things may not warrant so much as a rational suspicion that more Catholicks than that one that was executed for it did promote the burning of London I say if from hence we have not a sufficient ground to suspect some of those who are the enemies of Protestants as such and vehement suspicion is all I have insinuated leaving it to God in his due time to make a further discovery of that matter one way or other let me passe for vainly censorious which yet methinks I should not when so great Authors have appeared to have the same sentiments and suspicions Moreover when the Papists falsely say in their Apology that he was a Hugonite Protestant that said he burnt the City throwing the Odium of such an action upon Protestants yet seeming tender of charging him too deep in that they really absolve him as to the fact whilst they accuse him of a vain that is false confession which had they taken him for a Protestant they would scarce have done why may not we say as the truth is that he was a professed Papist and that at his very death at which time Men least dare to dissemble Yet on the other hand I am positive and absolute in charging no Man with the guilt of that fire whom the Law its self hath not charged with and condemned for it nay I shall go further than so and say that if I should ever be sure that no more Papists than one had a hand in it I should be heartily sorry that I ever harboured a mistrustful thought of any more of them upon that account I am or would be as earnestly desirous that all Papists may appear innocent in this particular in case they be so as manifestly guilty if they be guilty indeed neither would I that a hair of any of their heads should be singed for the burning of London unless it can be proved demonstratively that it was burnt by their meanes As for a bare suspicion that they did it they deserve and invite no less by manifesting a great deale of joy as some of them are said to have expressed since the time it was done Some it may be will wish that more of connection and dependency viz. of one Chapter upon another had been made use of than is in some part of this Treatise but as to that it is well known if it be but as well considered that books of this nature viz. consisting of various Meditations and reflections are usually Miscellaneous and like books of Proverbs in which little coherence is to be found witness the Proverbs of Solomon which in the Hebrew Language are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Kingly sayings therefore haply because each of them hath a kind of independent Jurisdiction and territory to its self or we may compare both Proverbs and Meditations to Beads which though many of them hang upon one and the same string yet each of them is incohering and intire of its self I fear least some should be offended if not fore-warned at my taking such a liberty and that but now and then as did the Prophet Elijah when he spake Ironically to Baals Prophets 1 King 18.27 where the Text saith Elijah mocked them and said Cry aloud for he is a God either he is talking or he is pursuing or he is in a journey or he sleepeth and must be awaked If this were no levity in that good Prophet as doubtless it was not why should it be counted so in others when with like sarcasmes they reflect upon Idolaters or worshippers of graven Images who ought to be cuttingly reproved 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and for that purpose I hope we may be allowed something of an edge Lastly some it may be if not prevented will censure me for prefixing more names than one of my worthy and honoured friends to this little book at leastwise for so doing before each of the four parts and divisions of it But I am conscious to my self that a grateful sense of their respects and favours towards me which is usually testified in such a way as this and which at present I knew not how to testifie to the world otherwise was my great if not onely inducement so to do and if to be grateful be a fault as David said when Michal scoffed at him he would be yet more vile so give me leave to say I must be grateful still and yet more grateful if I knew how to be so Onely mistake me not as if in so saying I did threaten the world with another Book for if I had resolved to clog the Press it is like I should have reserved to another opportunity several of these names which I have now inserted as it were in album amicorum If I have erred in multiplicity of Dedications it is not without president from that great master of Contemplations Bishop Hall of precious memory whose practice if I mistake not is sufficient to authorize at least to excuse in me a matter of this nature Reader if thou think there be here and there a passage that wants a grain or two of that sadness which thou didst desire should have been used upon this occasion do what thou wilt with it provided only that wheresoever thou dost meet with convincing rebukes and expressions awakening to Repentance with serious observations with seasonable counsels with right methods for acquiring true happiness and comfort even under such a stroke as this I say provided where thou meetest with any such things as those throughout this booke thou wilt receive such truths in the love of them Praise shall wait for God from the mouth and heart of his poor servant the Author of this work if he shall hear of any good that shall be done by these his mean labours which God forbid that he should sin in ceasing to second
fire There being such a likeness as is betwixt the Creator of all things and this creature I desire as oft as I behold fire to think of God whilst I admire the scarcely resistible power of Fire let me ever adore the utterly irresistible power of him that made and governs it Whilst it amuseth me to think what work and havock Fire can make in a few daies or hours Be amazed O my soul to consider what greater desolations God can make in the twinkling of an eye and with a word of his mouth If he will but speak concerning a Nation to pluck it up or pull it down it will be done presently Jer. 18. with him it is but a word and a fatal blow Methinks it doth not only help my meditation of but facilitate my belief concerning the greatness of the power of God Impartialness of his revenging Justice Severity and Fierceness of his anger Intolerableness of his displeasure when I see so much of such things as these in one of his creatures which in our houses we prefer to no better place than our chimneys and are unwilling even there to place it or suffer it to ascend too high May I think of Fire more frequently and solemnly than otherwise I should for those resemblances of God which are to be found in it I confess to think of God by the name of Love as he is called 1 John 4.8 16. is more pleasing and may better suit us under great dejections but to meditate of God as a consuming fire may profit us more when our hearts which is too usual want that due awe of God which should preserve them from sinning wilfully against him If God be Fire to sinners let us not dare to be as Tinder or as Gun-powder to Sin and Temptation If we come not neer a dismal Fire but with trembling hearts let us not approach God but with holy reverence and let us learn to tremble at his word which also is compared to fire Yet lest I dwell too long upon this one subject to the prejudice of others I will content my self with the addition of a few plain Corollaries so easie to be drawn from Gods being a consuming Fire in the sense given of it that he which runs may read them If God be Fire woe to them that are briaâ—s and thorns Isa 27. he will consume them If God be Fire it concerns us to prove our selves and our work for the Fire shall make all things manifest 1 Cor. 3.12 If we lay chaff and stubble though upon a good foundation our work will be burnt up and our selves saved but so as by Fire that is with great difficulty and much ado What impunity can great ones promise themselves if God be as impartial towards all sorts of sinners as Fire is towards all combustible things If the wrath of God be more intollerable than Fire who would not fear to offend him If the power of God be more irresistible than Fire it self who would set himself against him or who can do it and prospâ—r yea who would not labour to have God on his side For who can be against us that is to any purpose if God be for us Is God so able to destroy let me be none of his enemies Is he Fire then O that I might be Gold for if so though he may purge me yet he will not consume me In a word is God a consuming Fire then knowing the terror of the Lord Let us consider what manner of persons we ought to be in all holy conversation and godlyness Meditations and Discourses of the Reasons that are found in Scripture of Gods bringing the Judgment of Fire upon a person or people MEDITATION I. Of the sins for which God sent Fire upon Sodom and Gomorrah THe first pernicious Fire of which we read in Scripture was that which fell upon Sodom and Gomorrah Gen. 19.24 The general cause of it was that which was told Abraham Gen. 18.20 And the Lord said because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great and because their sin is very grievous But their particular crimes are set down Ezek. 16.49 where God upbraiding Jerusalem saith Behold this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom pride fulness of bread and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters neither did she sâ—rengthen the hand of the poor and needy v. 50. And they were haughty and committed abomination before me therefore I took them away as I saw good Now what that abomination was which they committed I think St. Jude tells us most plainly Jude 7. Even as Sodom and Gomorrah and the Cities about them giving themselves over to Fornication and going after strange flesh are set forth for an example suffering the vengeance of eternalsire Now the three first crimes charged upon them viz. Pride Idleness and Fulness of bread did make way for the last viz. their being given up to Fornication Pride prepares for uncleanness as it disposeth persons to those habits and gestures which tempt others to tempt them to wantonness witness the great pride which some take in going extreamly naked whence it often happens to them as to Hezekiah after that he had shown the King of Babylons messengers more of his treasure than was fit for them to see Isa 39. it was not long after that the Babylonians came and took away all he had from his children and carried both them and theirs into captivity One meeting a boy with a basket of chickens wide open askt him how he would sell them who answering him they were not to be sold he replied to the boy again Then fool shut thy Basket But that by the way It comes to pass by the judgment of God that proud persons often prove unclean because uncleanness is a disgraceful sin and so the more fit for proud persons to be left unto in order to making them more humble For of him that committeth Adultery Salomon saith Prov. 6.33 A wound and a dishonour shall he get and his reproach shall not be wiped away Persons by that sin are said to dishonour their own bodies Rom. 1.24 Also that very complexion which is most samed for proud is generally observed as most prone to uncleanness and 't is too commonly seen that a fantastical which is a proud habit and a filthy heart go together and those places are generally most notorious for lust that are most infamous for pride as if those two weeds delighted to grow in the same soil proud spirits and proud flesh go usually hand in hand And as for Fulness of bread by which we are to understand Gluttony and Luxuriousness in the use of meats that is as great a hand-maid to Lust as Pride can be Jer. 5.7 When I fed them to the full then they committed adultery and assembled themselves by troops in the harlots houses v. 8. They were as fed horses in the morning ever one neighed after his neighbours wife He adds v. 9. Shall I not
visit for these things saith the Lord and shall not my soul be avenged of such a Nation as this Sine Cerere Baccho friget venus But where Ceres and Bacchus that is meats and drinks are used immoderately Lust becomes outragious and then if abundance of Idleness be superadded as a third pair of Bellows to blow the Fire it cannot but flame out excessively For much Idleness is that which imps Cupids wings as much as any thing and is the very feathers that make his darts to flie The Poet knew that full well who said Otia si tollas periere cupidinis arcus No weed grows more generally in great plenty in the soil of mens hearts than lust doth in case they suffer them to lie fallow and unmanured in case they be not ploughed up by honest labour and sowed with the seeds of better things Now these I have mentioned were but the underling sins of Sodom which had their eies upon another sin as the eyes of a hand maid are towards her mistris The mistris whom they all served and did homage to that was the lust of the flesh in which they received their consummation and as St. James saith â—â—â—st when it hath conceived bringeth forth sin and sin when it is sinsshed bringeth forth death So Pride Idleness and fulness of bread when they have conceived bring forth lust We may not omit one sin more which is charged upon Sodom and did help to burn it and it is set forth in these words Neither did she strengthen the hands of the poor and needy She was too proud to look upon the poor she had fulness of bread but supplied not the necessities of others out of her own superfluities she was idle her self but did not set the poor to work or not reward them for it as those mentioned Jam. 5.3 4. The rust of your gold shall eat your flesh as it were fire Behold the hire of the labourers which is kept back by you crieth c. Now let us consider how proper and suitable it is for such offences as these to be punished with Fire No creâ—ture levels things or brings them into the dust sooner or more than Fire Therefore it is a fit punishment for pride which must take a fall Idle persons are drones and drones must be driven from their hives Ignavum fucos pecus a praesepibus arcent what can do it so easily as fire And as for those that are given to luxury or fulness of bread no such compendious way to punish them as by setting that cormorant Fire to cat them out of house and home Then as for uncleanness it is no wonder if that consume Towns and Cities being a Fire it self so called Job 31.12 It is a fire that consumeth to destruction c. Who can carry Fire in his bosome and not be burnt We see that ordinarily burns the bodies of men as to part and they express their mallady by telling us they have got a Burn or are Burnt Sometimes it costs them their noses as if that organ of smelling had rather quit the body than endure that stench which the rottenness thereof annoies it with They that escape so though that be sufficiently ill-favoured and no honourable scar come off better than many of them do who mourn at last when their flesh and their bodies are consumed Prov. 5.11 implying that some do lose not only their noses which are as it were the spout of their bodies in that cursed service but as it were the main fabrick this Fire burning down to the ground But why should unmercifulness be punished with Fire Lâ—â— St. James tell you the reason of that Jam. 2.23 For he shall have judgment without mercy who hath shewed no mercy No executioner of wrath more sit to dispense judgment without mercy than fire is and that is the portion of them that shew no mercy And now poor London how loath am I to trample upon thy dust or to speak so harsh a word to thee in thy misery as to say that in the forementioned respects thou mightest have shaken hands with Sodom and called her fister as God was pleased to speak to Jerusalem concerning her sister Sodom Yet because being deeply humbled under Gods hand is the way to be lifted up in order thereunto give me leave to say that even in thee O London though not in thee only nor in thee chiefly were found Pride Fulness of Bread and abundance of Idleness neither did many of you strengthen the hands of the poor and needy as you might and ought to have done Nor caust thou purge thy self from the guilt of much uncleanness which was in the midst of thee that abomination as it is called in the sight of God Ezek. 16.50 Was it to be seen by the garb of London and the gallantry of Citizens living and by that breadth and port they did bear that God had been taking them down several years together plucking off their plumes by a devouring Pestilence consuming war huge dearth of trade that God had been calling to them to put off their ornaments that he might know what to do with them I say was this to be discerned by the equipage in which men lived were not the expences of many far above the proportion of their estates when yet they needâ—â— not to have been so and their spirits yet higher than their expences what may we call this but Pride And as for fulness of bread I wish that Epicurizing had not been too much in fashion that there had not been slaying of Oxen and killing of Sheep eating Flesh and drinking Wine when God called for weeping and mourning as it is Isa 22.12 For it is added Sarely this iniquity shall not be purged away till ye die And whereas abundance of Idleness is further charged upon Sodom it were well if those expressions used Deut. 28.56 where we read of the tender and delicate woman which would not adventure to set the sole of her foot upon the ground for delicateness and tenderness were not applicable to too many of that sex and that others like the Athenians had not spent most of their time in hearing and telling some new thing An idler people could not be than many were in that great City whereof themselves would have been sensible if they had but seen the pains and industry which is used by many or most people dwelling in Villages and Countrey-places that are alwaies in action as the Poet saith of the Husbandman Redit labor actus in orbem And as for matter of uncleanness why was it that very Apprentices were ready to pull down houses upon that account though having no commission either from God or man they did not well to attempt it if Stews and Brothel-houses had not been too notorious As for not strengthning the hand of the poor and needy that is by a due relief how could they otherwise choose than be guilty of it who weakned their estates by idleness
heart-burnings against God himself discontent is a Fire within that flies and flames up against the great God as Ahaz said who with his tongue did speak but the language of the hearts of many others This evill is of the Lord why should I wait on him any longer wonder not then if the anger of God have burnt against those that did burn against him if he hath given us fire for fire We were alwayes murmuring when we had no such cause as now we have and now God hath given us as it were something to murmur for and yet let me recall my self that was spoken but vulgarly For though God should punish us with Scorpions in stead of Rods he will no tallow us to murmur but commands us to filence our selves with such a question and answer as this Why doth the living man complain man for the punishment of his sin Who so considers how unthankfull we were for what we had before the fire will see no cause to wonder at what we have lost but rather to wonder at this that such as have lost but a part did not lose all For with Parents nothing is more common than to take away those things from their Children quite and clean for which they will not so much as give them thanks as not being satisfied with them Then say Parents give them us again you shal have none of them they shal be given to them that will be thankfull for them yea say they not sometimes in their anger we will throw such a thing in the fire before such unthankful Children shall have it I see London full of open Cellars and Vaults as it were so many open Graves and Earth lying by ready to cover them How unwilling am I to say that Kiberoth Hatâ—aavah might justly be written upon them that is the graves of those that lusted after more and by that meanes lost what they had If I were one of the murmurers as there were few exempted from that guilt O Lord I have cause to own thy justice in whatsoever this Fire hath or shall contribute to my loss and prejudice and also to adore thy mercy if my share in this loss were not proportionably so great as that of many others and those my betters MEDITATION IV. Of Rebellion against Moses and Aaron procuring a destructive Fire Numb 16. THe sixteenth Chapter of the Book called Numbers in the 35 verse thereof tells us how that a Fire came down from the Lord and consumed no less then 250 Men that offered Incense not their Houses but their very Persons Some would hardly think that so small a crime as opposition to Magistracy and Ministry are in their account should have been the only causes of so heavy a judgment And yet we finde that alledged as the main if not the only reason of Corah and his Complices being consumed by fire The Confederates of Korah Dathan and Abiram are said to have been 250 Princes of the Assembly famous in the Congregation men of renown Yet when such as they who one would think might better afford to do such a thing than meaner men gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron saying why lift ye up your selves above the Cougregation of the Lord and they themselves would be Priests and Princes as well as they verse 10. Seek ye the Priesthood also said Moses to them yee Sons of Levi. And in the 13 verse they quaâ—rel with Moses for making himself which was false for it was God that had made him so altogether a Prince over them as who shall say they would have no body above themselves either in Church or State I say when they shewed this kinde of spirit and principle you see how God punished it These were right Levellers if I mistake not they pretend they would have all to be alike vers 3. ye take too much upon you all the Congregation are holy every one of them wherefore then say they to Moses and Aaron lift ye up your selves above others But to pretend they would have none inferiour to them surely was but a stratagem to bring to pass that they might have no Superiors or rather that themselves might be superiour to all others This was like to come to good they would have neither head nor taile in Church or State or else it should be all head or all taile But from these principles of Anarchy and Ataxy set at work I say from the displeasure of God against them upon that account sprang the fire which we there read of Much of this spirit hath been in England within a few years past when not a few gloried in the name of Levellers at leastwise in the character and principles of men so called If any of those embers be still raked up under ashes I should fear least a Fire of tumult and confusion might break out from thence and by their meanes as soon as any way nor do I question at all but that the sin and guilt of such vile and antiscriptural tenets might help to kindle that fire which lately devoured the City God will not suffer two such great Ordinances as Magistracy and Ministry which so greatly concern the good of the World nor either of them to be trampled upon St. Jude speaks sharply of such men calling them filthy dreamers who despise dominion and speak evil of dignities they who would level these the God of order will level them for such are said to perish in the gain-saying of Korah Jude 11. Of such it is said in 2 Pet. 2.12 That as bruit Boasts they are made to be taken and to be destroyed and that they shall utterly perish in their own corruption But then if we consider Moses and Aaron one as a holy Magistrate the other as a holy Minister that did greatly aggravate the sin of Korah and his Complices in rising up against and seeking to depose them for as such they had a double â—tamp of God upon them viz. both as Magistrates and as good For as such they were not only called Gods but also partakers of the divine nature and if we must be subject to Superiours that are naught and froward 1 Pet. 2.18 much more to them that are good and gentle the destruction of usefull Magistrates and Ministers is one of the greatest disservices that can be done to the World and will as soon kindle the wrath of God as almost any sin that men commit 2 Chron. 36.16 But they mocked the messengers of God and misused his Prophets till the wrath of God arose against them till there was no remedy Mat. 23.36 There we finde these words O Jerusalem that killest the Prophets and stonest them that are sent unto thee c. Behold your house is left unto you desolate in Numb 16.11 Moses told Corah and his Company that they were gathered together against the Lord. For what is done against Magistrates and Ministers either as Officers ordained of God or as good in their places
sort can wash their hands in innocency as from finding their own pleasure and speaking their own words on Gods holy day which is forbidden Isa 58.13 or have called the Sabbath their delight holy and honourable of the Lord as became us Or with John have been in the Spirit so as we ought on the Lords day Few of us have kept any one Sabbath as a Sabbath should be kept Under pretence that we fear to act like Jews it is well if we forget not to act like Christians as to the Lords day We took Gods day from him and now he hath taken our City from us we robd him of the best day in the week for all daies are his but this more especially he hath deprived us of the best City in the three Kingdoms We committed Sacriledge in robbing God of his daies which he had set apart for himself and it prospered with us no better than that Coale did which the Eagle stole from the Altar and therewith fired her own Nest And now poor London if I may still call thee London thou enjoyest thy Sabbaths in that doleful sense as was threatned Levit. 26.34 Then shall the Land enjoy its Sabbaths as long as it lieth desolate And the same reason may be given now as then v. 35. As long as it lieth desolate it shall rest because it did not rest in your Sabbaths when ye dwelt upon it MEDITATION VI. Of Gods contending by Fire for the sins of Idolatry and Superstition I Dolatry is plainly and properly enough defined to be the worshipping of a false God one or more or else of the true God in a false manner The former is expresly forbidden in the first Commandment which is in these words Thou shalt have no other Gods before me but the latter in the second which saith Thou shalt not make to thy self any graven Image c. that is Thou shalt not worship or pretend to worship me in the use of Images or of any thing else which I my self have not instituted and appointed Now whereas some may think that the worshipping of graven Images for Gods or as if they were Gods themselves and not the worshipping of the true God in the use of them is the sin forbidden in the second Commandment because it is said Thou shalt not bow down to them nor worship them The contrary is evident enough For the worshipping of any other besides the true God is that which the first Commandment doth directly forbid and is the sum and substance of it now we must not make the first and second Commandments one and the same Therefore the sin forbidden in the second Commandment is the worshipping of God in or by the use of Images and other things which he never appointed as means methods and parts of his worship Now this latter branch of Idolatry is the same thing with that which is called Superstition which is as much as supra statutum or a being devout and religious or rather seeming to be so above what is written or was ever commanded by God Of the first sort of Idolatry which consists in professedly worshipping any other besides the true God I shall need to say nothing because that is the Idolatry of Heathen only all Christians profess to abhor it But alas how many calling themselves Christians are not ashamed to own and defend their worshipping of Images relatively as they term it though not absolutely mediately though not ultimately But if we can prove that this was all that many did whom God was pleased to charge with Idolatry and to punish grievously even with Fire for so doing that will be to the point in hand See for this Levit. 26.31 I will make your Cities waste aâ—d bring your Sanctuaries to desolation which was afterwards done by Fire when themselves were carried into captivity their City and Temple burnt Now in what case doth God threaten so to do viz. in case they should offer to set up any Images to bow down to them v. 1. and should not repent of their so doing after they had been warned by lesser judgments If so saith God I will make your Cities waste and so he did by Fire for that very sin Now the people thus threatned were the Israelites who had so much knowledge of the true God that it was impossible for them to think that those stocks and stones which they did bow to were God himself but only they made them as representations and memorials of God or little Temples for God to repair to if he pleased or as sures to draw God to them as one calleth them and yet for this they are charged with Idolatry for those very Images are called their Idols v. 1. Ye shall make ye no Idols or graven Images and by the greatness of that punishment which God inflicted for the same we may gather he reckoned it as Idolatrie for it was that â—in if any Moreover that they intended no more by their Images than only pictures and resemblances of God is intimated to us by those words Deut. 4.15 Take heed unto your selves for ye saw no manner of Similitude on the day that the Lord spake unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the Fire v. 16. Lest you make you an Image the similitude of any figure As if he had said that God did therefore forbear at that time to assume any visible shape because he would not have any representations made of him which to doe were Idolatrie at leastwise if done in order to religious worship Were not Aaron and the Israeliâ—es charged with Idolatrie for making and causing to be made a Golden call Exod. 32.4 and sacrificing to it v. 5. c. yet that people were far from thinking the Calf they had made to be the true God that brought them out of Egyptâ— No they had made it for a representation and a memorial of him For so they are to be understood v. 4. Could any of them so far renounce reason and common sense least of all could Aaron do so as to think that Image brought them out of Egypt which was no Image till after their comming out of Egypt which had not been what it was but that they made a Calf of it which they knew of its self was neither able to do good nor evil No surely their intent was to set up that only as a memorial of God and to worship God in and by it For this Moses was so angry with them and with the puppet which they had made that as we read v. 20. He took the Calf burnt it in the fire ground it to powder and strewed it upon the water and made them drink of it The Apostle calls them Idolaters 1 Cor. 10.6 Neither be ye Idolaters as were some of them which is quoted out of Exod. 32.6 If there were no Idolatry in the Golden-calf so intended why was Moses so angry with it yea why was God so angry with them as by Moses to give
first so in heart Now if the hearts of many be such as their most fantastick and garish habits make show of those words of Solomon Eccles 9.3 Must needs be verified in them The heart of the Sons of Men is full of evil madness is in their heart whilst they live c. Yet for all this I would exercise charity concerning the habits of men and women though that be hard to do did not the common practise and course of this Age assure me that it is universally corrupt and degenerate and as it were expound the meaning of such suspicious habits It is no difficult thing to prove the sins of this Age because men now adayes declare their sins like Sodom and do as it were spread a Tent in the face of the Sun as did Absalom I am much mistaken and so are many more if the gross sins of swearing cursing Sabbath breaking drunkenness whoredome together with too great a connivance at and impunity to these and some others be not more chargable upon England at this day than they had wont to be Are not these the things which male-contents do alledge to justify their murmurings though neither are they or can they be thereby justified as I have plainly shewed in that Chapter in which I have discoursed of Rebellion against Moses and Aaron We must keep our stations and do our duties though other men should refuse to do theirs If a Wise play the harlot may her Husband in requital commit adultery no such matter This premised I may the more boldly say whatsoever the matter is and whence so ever it comes a very general corruption there is amongst us What is said of the soul viz. that it is Tota in toto tota in qualibet parte wholly in the whole body and wholly in every part may be applied to sin as if it were become the very soul that did animate and inform the Nation I was about to say I fear good men are generally not so good as they had wont to be and bad men are become a great deale worse the former having suffered like strong constitutions that have been impaired by bad aire and the other like unsound bodies which are almost brought to the Grave thereby And now let me say with Jeremy O that my head were a fountain of teares that I could weep day and night for the corruption as he said for the destruction of the daughter of my people and O that I could say with David mine eyes run down Rivers of teares because men keep not thy Laws at leastwise that with righteous Lot of whom it is said without the least hyperbole that he did vex his righteous soul with the conversation of the Sodomites so could I mine with the sins of England mine own and others O Lord thou seest how even the whole Mass of English blood is wofully corrupted by sin as it fareth with those that have had a Dart struck thorough their Liver in that sense Solomon is by some supposed to intend it viz. as a periphrasis of the fowle disease so that there is hardly any good blood in all our â—â—ines and arteries outward applications whether of judgments or mercies of themselves cannot cure us Inwardly cleanse us we beseech thee by the inspiration of thy spirit and purge our Consciences from dead works to serve thee that thy wrath may no more burn against us as Fire but that at length thou maist call us Heptzibah a people in whom thy soul may delight MEDITATION XII Of God's bringing Fire upon a People for their incorrigibleness under other Judgments WE have already spoken of twelve several causes of God's contending with a people by Fire and yet there is one behind as much in fault as any of all the rest and that is the sin of incorrigibleness I could presently produce three sufficient witnesses as it were to depose what I say One is that text in Isaiah Chap. 1. vers 5 7. Compared together Why should yee be smitten any more yee will revolt more and more your Countrey is desolate your Cities are burnt with Fire The next is Isa 9.13 compared with the 19. The People turneth not to him that smiteth them Through the wrath of the Lord of Hosts shall the People be as the Fewel of the Fire But Amos speaks out yet more plainly if that can be Amos 4.6 I have given you cleanness of teeth yet have you not returned to me saith the Lord vers 8. I have with-holden the Rain from you vers 9. I have smitten you with blasting and mildew c. vers 10. I have sent among you the Pestilence after the manner of Egypt Now the burthen of all the Indictment is Yet have yee not returned to me saith the Lord. Then in the next verse he brings in God speaking thus I have overthrown some of you as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah vers 11. And how was that but by fire So that you see the judgment of fire came as it were to avenge the quarrel of other abused judgments when Famine and Pestilence had done no good upon them then God used Fire which as being the worst was reserved to the last Most of the judgments denounced by Amos go under the notion of Fire Chap. â— 2. and incorrigibleness you see is one main reason rendered of Gods inflicting those judgment Now England hold up thy hand at the Bar and answer Art thou guilty or not guilty of the great sin of incorrigibleness and you dispersed inhabitants of that once famous City which now lieth in the dust little did I ever think to have called you by that name speak out and say were you guilty or not guilty of much incorrigibleness under other judgments before such time as God began to contend with you by that Fire which hath now almost consumed you Plead your innocency if you can Either prove you were never warned or sufficiently warned by preceding judgments or make it appear that you took warning and mended upon it That war by Sea which hath been as a bloody issue upon the Nation for several yeares past and is not yet stanched was that no warning piece That impoverishing decay of trade which hath made so many murmur was it no warning to us to repent and reform If it were a great judgment did it not call upon us to reform and if but a small one why did we so much repine at it That devouring pestilence which in one years time swept away above a hundred thousand in and about London was it not a sufficient warning to us from heaven Yet after all this how few did smite upon their thighs and said what have I done I doubt few have been the better for all these and many the worse who since God hath so smitten us have revolted more and more which is such a thing as if Jonah should have presumed to provoke God more than ever even then when he was in the great deep and
in the Whales belly or Daniel whilst he was in the Lions Den or the three Children in the midst of the fiery Furnace I wish some of our greatest sins had not been committed in the time of our greatest dangers as is spoken to the shame of the Israelites that they provoked God at the Sea even at the red Sea God having threatned that if great judgments do not reform a people he will send yet greater it is no wonder that it is with London as it is but rather that the execution of this punishment was defer'd so long Concerning Gods heating his Furnace seven times hotter for a people when a more gentle Fire hath not consumed their dross we read Levit. 26.24 If yee will not be reformed by these things I will punish you yet seven times for your sins Also ver 18.21 24 28. I will bring seven times more Plagues upon you according to your sins How justly may God complain of us as he did of the Jewes in old time Jer. 5.3 Thou hast consumed them but they have refused to receive correction they have made their faces harder than a Rock they have refused to return God hath made us as a boiling Pot but our sâ—â—â— is not gone forth of us Ezek. 24.10 As some Children though their Parents are severe enough are so bad that one would think they were never corrected but suffered to do what they list so hath it been with England Such as is the way of a Ship in the Sea which leaves no foot-steps behind it whereby it may be seen which way it went when it is out of sight So hath it been with the Plague and Sword and other judgments in England they have left little or no impression behind them whereby it might be discerned that God hath attempted to reform us by such terrible judgments We have cause to admire that God hath not in wrath ceased to punish us at the present intending to reserve us to the day of judgment and of the perdition of ungodly men to be punished It is one of the greatest punishments for God in wrath to give over punishing and to say as concerning Ephraim He is joyned to Idols let him alone or why should they be smitten any more they will revolt more and more It would kill the heart of an understanding patient when very ill to hear his Physician say let him have what he will and do what he will for then would he conclude he takes his condition to be desperate and hath no hope of his recovery O Lord sith thou art pleased to condescend so far as yet to chosten us For what is man that thou shouldst magnify him that thou shouldst visit him every morning and try him every moment Job 7.18 intimating thereby that thou hast not utterly cast us off but art in a way of reclaiming us be pleased to bless and sanctifie those thy chastisements and do us good by them as we would do by our Children if we knew how or if it were in our power Thou canst make less correction if thou so please to work a greater reformation in us One twig of thy rod and one lash of that twig being sanctified will do us more good than a Scorpion that is not Suffer us no longer by our incorrigibleness under judgments to add contempt and contumacy to all our other sins which is able to swell a small crime into a hainous offence When Christ who is compared to a refiners fire Mal. 3.2 Shall sit as a refiner and purifier of Silver let him purifie thy people and purge them as Gold and Silver that they may offer to the Lord in righteousness Then shall their Offerings be pleasant to the Lord v. 3 4. Do not thou alwaies correct us for our beeing incorrigible but vouchsafe to correct and cure our incorrigibleness its self so shalt thou receive more glory and we shall henceforth need less correction MEDITATION XIII Of the Aggravations of the sins of London O London how were thy sins out of measure sinful Consider thy sins without their aggravations and I doubt not but there were many places in England proportionably to their bigness more wicked than London was particularly many Sea-towns and some Inland most consisting of Innes and Ale-houses But how few of those places that equallized or possibly exceeded London in wickedness did ever come neer it as in reference to means of grace and other mercies I have heard of a Papist who in a storm did vow in case he were delivered that he would give to the Virgin Mary a ' Taper no less than the Main-mast of the Ship he was in but when the storm was over persideously said that he would make a Farthing-candle serve her turn Were not the means thou didst enjoy like the Taper he promised whilst those which other places enjoyed were but like the Candle which he performed Some wicked Towns have been like Aegypt for darkness whilst London was like Goshen for light Capernaum it self was not more truly lifted up to Heaven in the abundance of means than London had been For gifts and knowledge thou wert another Church of Corinth Had the mighty things which have been done in thee been done in other places who knows how they might have proved To be sure thou hast had line upon line precept upon precept here a little and there a little In thee an excellent Sermon might have been heard every day of the week and oft times more than one in a day The men that inhabited thee any long time for their time might have been all of them teachers though all did not profit accordingly They could not but know their masters will if they cared to know it and therefore if they did it not were worthy of many stripes I am loath to say what course fare the souls of men had in other places and what short commons whilst thou wert fed to the full Thou hadst Quailes whilst they had scarcely Mannah Thy Ministers spake like the Oracles of God whilst some of theirs could hardly speak sense Paul and Apollos and Cephas were yours whilst amongst them the blind lead the blind and no wonder if both fall into the ditch O London it is impossible thou shouldst sin so cheap as other places might do considering those words of Christ John 15.22 If I had not spoken to them they had not had sin but now they have no cloak for their sin Had thy sins been but motes there was that sun-shine would have made them all to appear but alas how many of them were beams I know not those sins that were found else-where that were not to be found in the midst of thee Though thou hadst the Prophets of God crying to thee early and late O do not this abominable thing which my soul hateth Some body spake long since by way of admiration or aggravation rather what go to hell out of London England is presumed to have more knowledge in the things
sort ought not to be bad in contempt or to be needlesly put into a combustion Alas were it not that God had put a divine stamp upon Magistrates as he hath been pleased to call them Gods surely they could no more rule the people when in the calmest temper that ever they are in some being alwaies too rough then they could rule the Sea What wisdom can it then be to put so unruly a body into agroundless commotion If this Sea once become troubled work and rage and foam and swell how much is it to be feared it may overflow all its banks and invade us with a ruining inundation It was not cowardize but prudence in Herod to decline putting of John to death for fear of the people because they accounted him a Prophet Matth. 14.15 Likewise in the chief Priests and Elders of the people not to reply unto Christ that the Baptism of John was of men because of the people who all held him as a Prophet Matth. 21.26 For my own part I dread the Insurrection of people no less than the consequences of Fire it self the beginnings whereof have appeared very contemptible so that it hath been said as is reported that such a fire as that was at the first might be pissed out but the conclusion fatal beyond all imagination Now do I long to be at the end of this Meditation but having promised to shew what the matter of those particles is whereof Fire consists and considering with my self that some good morall may be gathered and infer'd from thence as I have already hinted that sulphurious or oily particles are those whereof Fire doth altogether or mostly consist so I shall now undertake to prove that so it is and consider how we may improve it It is manifest that all mixt bodies here below are compounded of five Elements or principles viz. Spirit otherwise called Mercury Water or Phlegme Sulphur or an Oily kind of substance Salt and Earth For each natural body be it of vegitables Animals or Minerals is by chymical art reduced or resolved into these five From any such bodie may be drawn a spirit or generous subtile liquor an Oile a Water a Salt and a kind of Earth saving that the two last are rather said to stay behind than to be drawn now if each body that is burning be as it is both its own fire and its own fuell both that which burns and that which is burnt then one or more of the fore-mentioned principles so modified must be the matter and form of fire As for the Watery and Phlegmatick part of each body no man will so confound two Elements so contrary each to other as to say that is the Fire which consumes Then as for that Salt and Earth which belongs to bodies they are not the Fire that burns them up for that which burns so far forth consumes and flies away but Salt and Earth they remain after the greatest burnings under the form of Ashes True it is that spirit or spiritous Liquor which is in Bodies is capable of taking Fire as we see spirit of Wine will burn and Feavers arise in the bodies of men by vertue of their spirits being inflamed but then we must consider that there is but little of that which is called Spirit or Spirits in Timber and such like materials of houses as are destroyed by Fire neither is the Fire of any great duration which hath only Spirits for its fuell as we see in the bodies of men that those Feavers which only fire the Spirits never last above three or four daies and many times not above one day and are therefore called Ephemeral Having therefore quitted Water Salt and Earth from being the causes of Fire and also proved that the Spirits of such kind of bodies which have but little of Spirits in them cannot contribute much to the maintenance of a desolating Fire Sulphur or the oyly part of each body will appear to be the great Incendiary and to be more the matter fuell and fomenter of Fire than any thing else And that it is so doth yet further appear in that such bodies of all others are most apt to take Fire and to burn fiercely when they have so done in which there is most of a sulphurious or oily substance as Oile it self Pitch Tarre c. Moreover we see that when any body is thoroughly burnt the sulphurious parts are all or most of them gone as if conscious of what they bad done they had fled for it and which is most of all demonstrative when those parts are once gone all or most of them what remains will burn no longer as you see we cannot make a fire with Ashes for that they consist only of Salt and Earth with little or no commixture of Sulphur Sith then Sulphur or Brimstone though in an acceptation somewhat different from that which in commonly called by that name is the great matter of Fire and the Agitation Commotion and Flight of it is the very Form of Fire I shall the less wonder hereafter to finde the Scripture still joyning Brimstone and Fire together So Gen. 19 24. The Lord rained upon Sodom Brimstone and Fire Psal 11.6 On the wicked he shalt rain Fire and Brimstone And Isa 30.33 The Pile whereof is Fire much Wood. The breath of the Lord like astream of Brimstone kindleth it viz. Tophet Fire most usually kindleth Fire A stream of Brimstone in violent motion is Fire and here you see the breath of the Lord is said like a mighty stream of Brimstone to kindle Tophet which kinde of expression is more genuine and philosophical than most men know it to be and may hint unto us that thorough our ignorance it comes to pass that many expressions in Scripture seem to us no more proper and significant than they do it faring with us in the reading of holy Writ as with those that ignorantly walk or ride over precions Mines little do they think what a world of Treasure they tread upon nor if they did could they be content till they had gotten within the bowels of that ground which now they flightly trample upon But I have been too long in this Philosophical contemplation because it was such and must endeavour to compensate my prolixity in this with greater Brevity in the rest at leastwise of that sort if any such shall occur CONTEMPLATION II. Touching the Nature of Sulphur which is the principal matter and cause of Fire and how it comes to be so mischievous in the World BEing credibly informed that the Element called Sulphur hath had the greatest hand under God in the late dismal Fire as it hath had in all other whereby Towns and Cities have been laid waste it is but fit we should take him under serious examination and strictly enquire what he is by what waies and means he brings such great desolations to pass Sulphur that is Brimstone so called by Chymists because it hath some assinity with that which
to rebate the petulancy of sulphur so are those soules lest obnoxious to the injuries of temptation that have the most grace which in scripture is compared sometimes to water and other times to salt let your words be seasoned with salt that is with grace Seeing then in this life more or less of sin will alwayes cleave to us as so much sulphur ready to set us on fire labour we to weaken the power of it by the predominancy of grace so shall the remainder of our very sins in some sense contribute to our good as sulphur to the good of those bodies it is mixed with as tending to keep us from pride security self-confidence trust in our own righteousness and such like evils to weaken in us the salt sharp humour of censuring others to make our spirits more serious and consistent by the shame and grief which they occasion in us so shall we improve them as vipers in treacle which so mixed make it the better antidote and that which was as down-right fire in the commission of it shall become as profitable sulphur in our reflection upon it and accommodating of it to the forementioned uses and purposes CONTEMPLATION IV. Of Fire kindled by Fire THe most usual way of kindling sire as we all know is by fire one fire begets another That which is actually fire makes actual fire of that which before was but potentially or rather habitually such The reason is plainly this things of the same kinde do naturally resort one to another and consort each with other as we say proverbially that Bards of a feather flock together and fire hath a name above all other things for congregating or calling together things that are homogeneous or of the same nature as also for segregating or separating things that are heterogeneous or of a different kinde in so much that that was made the very definition of fire by them that knew no better Now actual Fire when it bath once separated the fulphurious particles of other bodies from those more quiet Elements which did restrain them whilst mixed therwith and when it hath brought those wilde Atomes together which before were conveniently dispersed and dis-joyned each from other the product is this that each of these being habitually fire as flints are out of which fire may be struck what with the irritation they receive from actual fire and what with that greater strength they have acquired by being united in such great multitudes presently they begin to kindle and show themselves in actual fire and as it were to brandish their glittering swords which before they kept as it were in scabbards as by way of triumph that they had now cast off the yoak of mixtion with discenting and restraining Elements and possest themselves of that liberty which they were alwayes desirous of but could not sooner attain Here me thinks I see a lively embleme of ungodly youth some are actually so others are so but habitually as being under restraint from Parents Masters and other Governors who do all that in them lies to keep those fiery mettalsome youths from consorting each with other lest by that meanes they should inflame each other as beames of the Sun concentered in a burning glass are able to kindle fire which scattered and dispersed they could never do Now when some or more of these young men or maides actually wicked and debaucht as having already cast off the yoak of all government and run away from those that did and should restrain them either openly or secretly lights into the company of those that are habitually such as themselves and have great propensions to the same things first he tempts and inticeth them away from under the jurisdiction and society of those that have hitherto restrained them as to their lusts then he joynes them to as great a number as he can of such young ranters as themselves who mutually encourage one another in an evil way and strengthen the hand each of other to do that in heards and troops which they would dread to do singly and one by one and when it is come to that then doth the wickedness which heretofore they smothered flame out they are presently all on a light fire and so continue if God extinguish it not till having utterly consumed themselves by sin they come to just nothing or what is worse than nothing as that which we call Fire domineers a while and carries all before it but by and by it vanisheth and we know no more of it save that it oft-times leaves an ugly stink behind it To give this fair warning to young men and women ready to be debauched by the next ill company is all the use I shall make of that most known way of kindling fire which is by fire its self where the allegory you see holds in every thing and improves a truth to our hands which might seem not worth our taking notice of because every foole knowes it To which I shall add but thus much though fooles can apprchend it yet can they not apply it at leastwise to their own good and he that can do so is no fool CONTEMPLATION V. Of Fire kindled by Putrefaction THey say that fire is sometimes kindled by means of Putrefaction it seems evident from experiments both without and within our selves that so it is What are Feavers but as it were so many fires kindled in the bodies of men Else how do they make the blood to boile in our veines and so exceedingly rarisie it that the vesels are painfully distended by it and are scarce able to contain it or how come they to make such a heap of ashes in the body as appeareth to be made by that deep sediment that is in the urine when the disease begins to decline or as it is vulgarly called to break away These hints may sufficiently prove that Feavers are Internal fires and whence are most of those sires at leastwise that are of any long continuance but from Putrefaction and thence called Putrid Feavers Now as for Corruption or Putrefaction it is thus defined viz. that it is the separation of those parts and principles which were before mutually combined the band of their union being dissolved or that it is the dissolution of or resolution of a compounded body into all or most of those principles or elements of which it was compounded some taking their flight one way and some another Now this separation or divorce of the principles of bodies one from another contributeth to the inkindling fire by this means viz. because when the sulphurous particles get loose from the rest then do they combine together and break away with great heat and violence from those less active Elements to which they were joyned before and thence comes Fire Thus in putrid Feavers the due mixture and composition of the blood is very much destroyed the thicker and thinner parts affecting as it were to be each by themselves like the whey and curds in
and a ghastly appearance let all that passe by them Judge Surely London is now the saddest spectacle that is this day in England Doth the circumstance of time in which this fire befel us add nothing to our affliction Had we at the same time had many friends and enemies but few or none our misery had been less For then should we have been much pitied which had been some mitigation of our loss but did it not befal us at a time when we had few friends but many forreign enemies round about us This Jeremy lamented in reference to Jerusalem Lam. 1.2 Amongst all her lovers she hath none to comfort her all her friends have dealt treacherously with her they are become her enemies Is it no aggravation of our misery surely it cannot be otherwise to think how wretchedly our many enemies will triumph and insult because of it and cry Ah ah so would they have it Lam. 1.21 All mine enemies have heard of my trouble they are glad that thou hast done it And Lam. 2.25 All that pass by clap their hands they hiss and wag their head for the daughter of Jerusalem saying Is this the City that men call the perfection of beauty the joy of the whole earth vers 16. All thine enemies say This is the day that we looked for we have found we have seen it vers 17. The Lord hath caused thine enemies to rejoyce over thee he hath set up the horn of thine adversaries Also in Lam. 3.14 45. You may see how much stress the prophet Jeremy did lay upon the insultings of enemies and how humbling a consideration he took it for When enemies congratulate our miseries in stead of condoling them it adds much Surely France but for shame had rung bells and made bonfires when the tidings of our fire did arrive there God would that a people should lay it to heart when he exposeth them to contempt Jerusalem hath grievously sinned therefore she is removed so is London all that honoured her despise her because they have seen her nakedness He loves not his countrey that cares not how it is slighted or who insults over it What if it can be made out that there is no parallel at this day for London's calamity should not that be for a lamentation that God should so punish us as if he would make us an example to all the world or as if we had been the worst people in the world Ieremy took that circumstance to heart in Jerusalem's case Lam. 2.13 What thing shall I liken to thee Oh daughter of Ierusalem What shall I equal to thee that thou maist be comforted So Daniel 9.12 For under the whole heaven hath not been done so great evil as hath been done upon Ierusalem If the like may be said of London and indeed I have heard no man pretend the contrary at this day its misery must needs be great If it be an unparallel'd stroke it must needs carry a great face of Divine wrath and displeasure with it and that doth add much Lam. 2.1 How hath the Lord covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his Anger and remembred not his footstool in the day of his Anger Ver. 3. He hath cut off in his fierce Anger all the horns of Israel Many things in this judgement seemed to carry with them a great face of Divine Anger as namely for that the Lord seemed to destroy London so far as he went without any pity Such a thing as this is bewailed Lam. 2.2 The Lord hath swallowed up all the habitations of Iacob and hath not pitied And verse 17. The Lord hath thrown down and hath not pitied If God had taken away the houses of rich men that could have born their loss and mean time spared the houses of such as were poor there had been pity in that but he was pleased to take all before him and with the same besome of destruction to sweep away the habitious of the poorest as well as of the most rich And did not God's turning a deaf ear to all the prayers and intercessions that were made as for the greatest part of London whilst the fire was and going on to destroy notwithstanding though they cried unto him day and night that he would stay his hand and spare the remainder I say did not that speak God exceeding angry This was one of Ieremies complaints Lâ—m. 3.8 Also when I cry and shout he shutteth out my prayer and verse 44. Thou hast covered thy self with a cloud that our prayers should not pâ—ss thorough God did in effect say that Though Noch Daniel and Ioh stood before him yet would he not be intreated for the City When prayers can prevail no longer in such a case as that was it is a sign God is exceeding angry Moreover the fierceness of the judgement and the mighty force it came with and the quick dispatch it made intimates as if God for that time had abandoned all pity towards London For may not these words of Ieremy be applied to us Lam. 3.10 He was unto me as a Bear or as a Lion he hath pulled me in pieces he hath made me desolate If any man that reads these things be yet insensible of the heaviness of Gods hand in this stroke let him beside all that hath been said consider how unexpected and how Incredible a thing it was that London should be almost totally consumed by fire ere this year were at an end Now what but the greatness of this judgement made it so incredible till it came That some few houses might have been fired in a short time we could easily have believed but not that so many as the Prophet speaks Lam. 4.12 The kings of the earth and the inhabitants of the world would not have believed that the enemy should have entred into the gates of Jerusalem To think a judgement too great to be inflicted and yet when it is inflicted to make light of it are very inconsistant things and mighty self-contradictions He that should have come to a man worth eight or ten thousand pound a week before the fire and told him that within ten days he should not be worth so many hundreds would he not have laugh'd at him and said in his heart How can that be Had all his estate been in houses some in one street some in another he would never have dream'd that they should be all sired together or within a few days of one another And yet it is well known to have been the case of many to have been worth a good estate one day and the next day by the fire to have been reduced almost to nothing How are the words of Jeremy upon this occasion revived Lam. 4 5. They that did feed delicately are desolate in the streets they that were brought up in scarlet imbrace dunghils Great and sudden downfalls cannot but move compassion in any man that hath bowels As Jeremy speaks of the Nazarites Lam. 4.6 7. That they who
stand gazing on and not run to help The Fire hath now got such head and is so fierce would they say that there is no coming near it But why do they not pull down houses at a distance that is long work would some reply and seeing they cannot carry away the timber when they have done it will do but little good Do not the Magistrates would some say bestir themselves to put a stop to it It is like they do what they can but they are even at their wits ends or like men astonished They that stood and look't on would cry out See how it burns East and West at the same time not onely with the wind but against it Hear how it crackles like a Fire in thorns Hear what a rattling noise there is with the crackling and falling of timber Look you there saith another just now the Fire hath taken this or that Church which alas is full of goods now it is just come to the Royall Exchange by and by would they say See how presently such a stately house was gone it was but even now that it began to fire and it is consumed already Oh what a wind is here See how it is as bellows to the Fire or as the breath of the Almighty blowing it up You would wonder to see how far the sparks and coles doe sly It is strange they do not fire all the houses on the other side of the water where abundance of them do light I can think of nothing saith one but of Sodom and Gomorral when I see this sight Alas Alas cries one now do I see such a good friends house to take fire and by and by now do I see the house of another good friend of mine on fire in that house that you see now burning dwelt a Brother or Sâ—ster of mine or some other near Relation Others would come dropping in and say They had staid so long as to see their own houses on fire and then they came away and left them Such aâ— dwell near to London and to the Road would cry as they lay in their beds we hear the Carts rumbling and posting by continually Those that were within the City at that time would ever and anon say to one another Did you hear that noise There was a house blown up and by and by there was another house blown up Others would cry The fire is now come near the Tower and if the powder be not removed God knowes what mischief will be done with that One while the people would take an Alarm of Treachery and cry out that the French were coming to cut their throats Such whose houses the Fire had not yet seized but was hastâ—ing towards them you must suppose to have made this their discourse What shall we do for Carts to carry away our goods we have offered three four pounds a load for Carts to carry them but two or three miles off and cannot have them One while they cry there is an order to prevent the coming in of more Carts it being thought that whilst we mind the saving of our goods we neglect the putting out the fire and now will our houses and goods burn together and so we shall loose all Such as had the opportunity to convey their goods as far as the fields and no farther How did they discourse of the hardship they must undergoe if they should leave their goods they would be stollen if they should look to them themselves as many had no body else to do it for them they must have but little sleep and a cold open lodging and what if it should rain And some we may imagine were discoursing what they and theirs should do their houses and goods being burnt where they should put their heads as having neither money nor friends at leastwise so near that they knew how to get to them These were but some of those dreadfull stories that men and women talkt of I could tell you how women with child would say They had but a month or a week to reckon and this had frighted them almost out of their wits so that they found it would go very hard with them Others again would say They were but so many weekes gone but were so disturbed that they did never look to go out their full time Others it is like would say They were so ill with the fright they had taken that they thought verily it would kill them or that they should never come to themselves whilst they lived Would not others again report of some here and there who by venturing too much in the Fire or staying too long to bring away their goods had lost their lives and perished in the flames Neither were all sad discourses exstinguished with the fire For since that time it hath been the manner of Friends as they met to ask some accompt of the losses each of other Pray what lost you saith one by the Fire I lost the house I lived in saith one which was my own or as good as my own by virtue of a long Lease and a great Fine I lost my houses and goods saith another I lost to the value of two thousand pounds saith one I four I six saith another I have lost the one half of what I had saith one I have lost all saith another I am burnt to my very shirt I have lost more than all saith a third for I by this meanes am left in a great deal of debt that I shall never be able to pay I had many things belonging to other men committed to me which are swept away Saith another I am not only undone my self but so many of my Children and near Relations it may be all of them are undone by this Fire as well as my self But I need to say the less of this because every dayes converse will or may tell us what men talk since the dismall Fire of and concerning it O Lord I see thou who canst put a Song of deliverance into our mouths when thou pleasest canst also sill us with complaints and lamentations when thou wilt and make our own tongues as it were to fall upon us how thou canst make us out of the abundance of our hearts to speak such things as will terrifie both ourselves and others and cause both our own ears and theirs to tingle how easily thou canst find us other discourse than to ask and tell what newes is stirring for who regarded news whilst these things were in agitation who seemed to mind what became of affairs either by Sea or Land I see how easily thou canst imbitter our Converse one with another and make us speak so as to break each others hearts that use to delight and refresh each other by their pleasing conferences and communications so that solitude may become lesse afflictive than that good company which was wont to be very acceptable Would not our tongues rise up in judgement against us if we should ever forget the sad
avoid a greater than that all that can be said is No man can be forced if he consent Volenti non fit violentia is true but not Volenti non fit injuria If you have not wronged the poor Citizens whether with or against their consents as it was partly both never were men wronged How many think you did lose all or the most of their goods because they had not wherewithall to give those unreasonable rates which you demanded who yet could and would have honestly paid you as much as you in reason and conscience could have demanded for the removal of their goods Will not the great God think you place the loss of those goods and the undoing of those poor families to your accompt Therefore O Countrey men honest Countreymen I must not call you till you better deserve it let my advice be acceptable to you Blush for what you have done repent restore make satisfaction to the full What you have gotten in that way unlesse it be such of you as ventured your own lives or the lives of your beasts by going near the fire will never thrive with you yea may prove a moth and canker to all you have besides Who were the large contributers to all Briefs when your Towns and Houses were at any time burnt but these very Citizens whom you have used thus unkindly If fire should happen in your thatch which may easily be and which you have provoked God to send how dearly would you miss that City which you have so inhumanely oppressed You that have not pitied Londoners pity your own souls and remember that true saying Unjust gain is not remitted that is forgiven unlesse intentionally by those that cannot and actually by those that can restitution be made MEDITATION V. Upon those that stole what they could in the time of thâ— Fire IT should seem it was not enough for Londoners to have their houses consumed by fire and their faces grownd by unconscionable Carters demanding half as much for carrying away their goods as some of them were worth yea ten times so much as was their due but as a further aggravation of their misery God was pleased to give London as he gave Jacob to the spoil and as he gave Israel to the robbers How many under pretence of rescuing their neighbours goods out of the fire carried them away for altogether as if all things now had been common because the fire had broken down mens inclosures Was this your kindnesse to your friends Was this the pity that should be shewed to them that are in misery I have heard indeed of Janizaries that is Turkish Souldiers that when fires have been in Constantinople would sall to plundering but are you Turks Some living upon the Sea-coast may perchance gain now and then by racks bringing rich goods to their hands but then it is presumed the owners are cast away or cannot be known They say some Nurses that use to attend on such as have the plague are wont to make away all they can lay their hands on but then they stay till the people whose goods they take be dead and have no further need of them But you barbarous wretches stript the poor Citizens being yet alive and likely to live and to need all they had and more Do you think much to be chid for what you have done Alas yours is a great crime It is an iniquity to be punished by the Judges yet I had rather you would judge your selves for it satisfie for the wrong you have done and so avoid the punishment both of God and Men. You make me think of the Eagle that stole away a coal from the Altar and fired his own nest with it Were they not fire-brands snatcht out of the fire that you stole away If you continue to keep them in your Nests sure enough they will set them on fire I mean they will bring a curse upon all the rest of your substance You have done that which one would have thought no mans heart could serve him to have done If other Thieves deserve hanging you are worthy of a Gallows as high as Haman's for the circumstance of time makes your sin out of measure sinful Would you offer to be stealing when God was burning Would you take from those to whom you had more need to have given Now you are told of your fault be not worse than Iudas himself who when admonished but by his own conscience came and brought back that wages of unrighteousness which he had received viz. The thirty pieces of Silver I do not advise you by any unnecessary confession to bring your selves into danger so you do every man right what matter is it whether they know who it was that wronged them If ever God pardon you see one Condition that must be performed by you Ezek. 33.15 If the wicked restore the pledge give again that he hath robbed he shall surely live he shall not dye MEDITATION VI. Upon unconscionable Landlords demanding excessivâ— Fines and Rents since the Fire IS it a good Rule that men may take as much as ever they can get for such things as men cannot live without Surely that is the Rule you go by in asking and taking such vast Fines and Rents for the houses you lett By that Rule if some few men could be supposed to have all the Corn in England in their hands they might sell it for five pounds a bushel for men would give it if they had wherewithall rather than be without bread which is the staffe of life But how would you curse them that should serve you so You seem to have made a Covenant with fire as some are said to have done with death Isa 26.15 and with slames as others with hell to be at an agreement that if an overflowing scourge should passe thorough it might not hurt you as who should say If your houses be burnt hereafter yet they are paid for such Fines may be sufficient to build them again Methinks I hear the great God saying Your Covenant shall be disannulled and your Agreement shall not stand when the overflouring scourge shall pâ—sse thorough you shall he trodden down by it as it is verse 18. Like the builders of Bâ—bâ—â— you seem to have been raising a Tower to fortifie your selves against heaven but God will confound your Languages Would you anticipate the rebuilding of the City by obliging men alwayes to remain in the Suburbs I wish it may not be said of you in a bad sense what the Psalmist sayes of others in a good that You take pleasure in the stones of London as they of Zion and savour the dust thereof Psalm 102.14 because its ruine hath been your rise I doubt not but the Fines you have taken and the Rents you have agreed for will be the undoing of many a poor Family that but for those exactions might have made a shift to live Possibly all the gains of your Tenants trading being so dead as it is and
they assumed some grandeur to themselves as they were a Society whatsoever their condition might be â—ngly and apart Or to say that the meeting together of the members of those Companies in their severall Halls upon many great solemnities was a probable means to increase love and friendship amongst them were to defcend to lower considerations about them then I have yet taken notice of and yet those things are not altogether contemptible and therefore I scarce care to mention them But put all I have said together though possibly I know not half the uses they were put to it will appear a doleful thing that they were burnt and that in their destruction we lost not onely great Splendor but great conveniences helps and advantages and that in several kinds If men did there decree righteous things amongst themselves as I hope they did I know no Crime those places were chargeable with unless it were too much Feasting which the sadness of Times for many years past might put an aggravation upon And if that were all their Crime I see how necessary it is to shun not only greater but also lesser sins which may expose Places and if Places Why not Persons also to ruin and destruction One Hall there was of something a different use from the rest and of greater spendor Guild-Hall I mean in which one Author tells me no less than nine several Courts had wont to be kept whereof one was called The Court of Conscience If any of the rest did not deserve the same name which I cannot charge those or that which did not should be lookt upon as the Acan's which troubled that place and brought a curse upon it One sinner destroyeth much good saith Solomon Eccles 9.18 What then may not an unrighteous Court do which consists of many sinners When I consider the Largeness the Strength and yet the Antiquity the Majesty and the daily-Usefulness of that same Guild-Hall methinks it is not enough to weep over the Ruines of it As firm as it stood it was founded no less than upward of 360 years agoe and to see it confounded as I may call it in one day Whose heart would it not cause to bleed Other Halls were like Parliament-Houses to particular Companies but this to the whole City where the Assembling together of the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Common-Councill had some resemblance of a King Lords and Commons There seemed to be an awfulness in the very place methinks it had a Majestick look with it and such as made the Magistrates there convened though very venerable in themselves yet something more considerable than they would have appeared elsewhere It was surely that place which did more contribute to make London look like it self that is like the Head-City of these three Kingdomes than any one Structure thereunto belonging London had not been its self if it had lost nothing but that one Hall I wonder That all the Wise Heads that were concerned in it could not save that stately Hall our English Capitol as I may call it from burning Methinks it speaks our Provocations-high that we have sinned away so great an Ornament so vast an Accommodation as that Hall was and to think that almost all the rest are gone with it might make our joynts tremble and our knees smite together as Belshazzar's did when he saw the hand-writing upon the wall I see there is no building certainly durable but that which Paul speaks of 2 Cor. 5.1 and Lord let that be mine as well as his That building of God that house not mâ—de with hands eternal in the heavens MEDITATION XII Of the Burning of Publick Schools as Pauls School and others IS Learning taking it's leave of England Is that Sun about to set in our Horizon that Schollars have received two such terrible blows Young ones have lost their Schools and both young and old have lost their Books Nevertheless for ever Renowned be Reverend Doctor Colet and the rest of the Founders and Benefactors of all those noble Free-Schools that now lie in the dust I say Let their Memory be ever precious though their Gift hath not continued so long as they and we did hope it might Yet the youngest of the three Publick Schools that are now demolished viz. that which was founded by the Merchant-Taylers had lasted above a hundred years and the eldest of the three viz. Paul's half as long again and many Centuries more they might have stood had not this fire brought them to an untimely end I cannot but muse to what a plunge Parents are now put to get good Schools for their Children especially those who cannot endure their Children should live at a distance from them considering that honest and able School-masters are but here and there to be found A good School-master must in the first place be a good man It is to a wonder what notice Children will take of their Master's Religion and what a lasting impression that will make upon them and how apt they are to take after them because of the veneration they have for them If their Masters be profane they think they have leave to be so and should not take upon them to be more religious than they A Master must consider that his Scholars have souls to save as well as minds to inform and he is not to be trusted with Youth that will not consider it Nextly A good Master must be a good Scholar at least wise for some kind of Learning a good Grammarian a good Linguist and one that is not only so himself but also able to make others such that is one that knows how in an easie and familiar way to communicate Knowledge to Children to make hard things plain c. He must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle saith a Minister should be that is Apt to teach Again A good Master must be a wise man no antick no mimmick as too many are which hath made the word Pedant and Pedantical to sound very ridiculously though the work of a good School-master be very honourable Wise he ought to be that he may set his Scholars the Example of a wise behavior and teach Children to carry themselves like Men whereas some seem to learn of their Scholars to carry themselves like Children that is Conceiptedly Humorsomely Phantastically It requires no small Wisedom to judge of the different parts and tempers of Children where their excellency lies whether in Memory or Invention or otherwise that they may put them upon those pieces of Learning in which they are like most of all to excell and whilest they find them to have an excellency in one kind work upon that and bear with their defects in another kind He may have a great Memory that hath but mean Fancy he may be long in retaining who is slow in getting things into his memory one can make his exercise of a sudden as well as if he had more time another can do nothing of a sudden but
to be indeed the Body of the said Bishop I shall not dispute whether the dignity of his Person as he was sometimes a Bishop or as he was sometimes Lord Chancellor or as he was both at once were that which did consign over his Body to so long an incorruption as if Corruption and Worms had been afraid to claim kindred of him as of others but I think rather than either that this came to passe to shew the power of God as to preserving Bodies from Corruption in the Grave as well as those of the three Children from being consumed in the fiery Furnace and that of Daniel from being devoured by the Lions when he was in their Den. But whilst this passage ministreth great wonder to all that see and hear of it What is himself the better for it For had his Body been eaten by Cannibals those Cannibals by Fishes those Fishes afterwards by Men those Men by Worms yet should it have been brought forth as perfect at the Resurrection of the Dead as now it is yea as it was then when it was first committed to the Grave Now as for re-building of that Cathedral when I consider how many Sons that Mother hath had who in all Ages have been as kind and bountiful to her as could be desired I doubt not but the same principles and affections which led them to it in her prosperity will prevail with them to be the same now she lieth in the dust commiseration towards her and consideration of the honour of England stepping in as further incentives thereunto May England if the will of God be so enjoy so much peace and plenty and all the living Temples of God be so well provided for that none may grudge that cost and charge which is necessary to re-building Churches not onely such and so many as may serve for indispensable use but neither that also which may rear up others not only for use but such as may be also an outward honour and ornament both to the Church and Nation MEDITATION XVI Upon the Visiblewsse of Gods Hand in the Destruction of London IT is a great dispute amongst many people whether men one or more had any hand from first to last in the burning of London They that are for the affirmative think they have much reason on their side because one was by Order of Law executed upon that account and the proof against him no lesse than his own Confession both in publick and private in which he long persisted though he knew full well the danger of it Now who but a mad man would confess himself guilty of so hainous and odious a crime which he had never committed And on the other hand had he been mad his Judge and Jury wanted not wisedom and diligence sufficient by one means or other to discover it neither had they so little Justice and Conscience as to have convicted and condemned him for ought he had said against himself if it had been evident to them he had not been himself or as they call it Mentis Compos Moreover say they This must needs have been done either by Over-sight or by Treachery or by Miracle We hear not of the least umbrage of any over-sight or carelessnesse in any of the Family where the fire began which doubtlesse hath been narrowly lookt into so that if we reject the second we must rest in the third viz. That it was done by a miraculous that is by an immediate Hand of Heaven which since the time that miracles have generally ceased seems far less probable than it is that that should be true which a man that for ought could be made appear was in his right wits did confesse against his own life But grant it were so that the first fireing of any part of London were wilfully done by that miserable Wretch who took it upon himself and was executed for it Will it follow from thence that the Hand of God was not visible upon it Yea all things considered if Pharaoh's Magicians had been then alive and present they would have said This was the Finger of God as they said in another case when it was undeniable For first of all Who but the great God withheld Rain for so many weeks before and sent so great a Drought as did make the houses ready to take fire like so much Tinder Who brought the wind out of his Treasures and made it blow so fiercely for several days together as if it had been on purpose to augment and spread those flames like mighty bellows Who that had begun that sire could foresee the wind would continue so long to carry on his work and not suffer those flames to be extinguished as other fires have been Who dried up the Springs that when men came to dig for water in severall Streets little could be had where used to be plenty at other times By whose Providence came it to passe that the Engines which used to be serviceable in such cases were at that time most of them out of kelter and unfit for use Who took away spirit and courage from men that they were at that time above all the rest like silly Doves without heart and contrary to their usuall manner did generally apply themselves not to extinguishing the fire but unto removing their goods even such as were competently remote as if they had given all for lost at the first dash Who hid counsell from mens eyes that so obvious and effectuall a way as that of Blowing up of houses to stop the increase of fire was not sooner thought of Or if it were that it was no sooner put in Execution I say Who but the great God did all these things Who caused the fire to burn fiercely as well against the wind as with it Disown Providence in this and you will disown it every where If there were something of the hand of man in it doubtlesse there was more of the hand of God But yet more do they intitle the Providence of God to this sire who seem consident there was nothing of Treachery or Design in it For if they think it came in an ordinary way but unintendedly things that so happen are in Scripture more especially put upon God's account It is said of him that killed a man accidentally and without any purpose so to do that God had delivered him into his hands Exod. 21.13 Moreover when things that come by accident or without humane contrivance so fall out as if all things had been laid and prepared for such a purpose in such cases the Divine Providence is most visible and conspicuous Now manifest it is that if a Councill of Jesuits had laid their heads together how they might burn London to the ground they could not have chosen either a fitter time or place Not a fitter time in respect of the great Drought that had been and wind that then was nor yet a fitter place considering the vicinity of it to the great magazine of
with it as if they had been left to enclose and secure a City which should afterwards be built though there were scarcely any for them to secure at present but we trust through divine goodness the same thing will be done but with more charge without that Omen No man can tell where destruction will begin or where it will make an end for that sometimes it makes an end where usually it begins Destruction usually assaults the Gates of a City first and then the City it self the loss of the Gates doth generally prove the losing of the City but in this case the losing of the City first proved the loss of the Gates at last The fire went out of the City by the Gates but it came not in that way There are famous Gates for Death and Misery to enter in by which are all we look at generally and if they be but shut we think our selves secure alass but too secure are we in one sense for thinking so sith Death and Misery have so many secret in-lets which we know not of and can make a way where they scarce find any We thought if London had been destroyed as now it is it must have been by some powerful enemy visibly entring in at its Gates but little did we think of what one spake in another case That there was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some such invisible evils or enemies within us as were sufficient to destroy it in this fashien Alass When can we conclude our selves safe in this World Besides that great Ornament which those stately Gates that were burnt added to the City and the great Defence which they afforded thereunto as to enemies from without Were they not also very serviceable as they were the fittest places in reference to their impregnable strength whereof to make Goales and Prisons neither are there any Houses more necessary than they so long as there are many lewd People whom no other places but such can keep within compass for whom Prisons are as needful as Chimneys are for fire which set at liberty would put all into a slame But now came an unexpected Goal-delivery better to many poor Prisoners than they looked for but to Capital-Offenders not so good as it is like they did hope it would have proved When notorious Felons heard of this probably they did hope it would break open the doors of their several Prisons and set them free but all they got by it was only a Newer Newgate or to be removed from one Goal to another But poor Men that were in for Debt only as in Lud-gate c. possibly they were in a pannick-fear they should have been burnt in the Prisons where they were not knowing how to make an escape But if I mistake not they were released in the time of the fire which had left but room enough for Offenders of a higher nature So was the Proverb verified that It is an ill-Wind that blowes no body any good So was the Fire more merciful to them than their Creditors so were their fears converted into joy Is it not worth mentioning How that Cannibal-fire did first roast and then devour those Quarters of human flesh which upon those Gates were exposed to the Fowls of the Air robbing them of their prey and burying them in the dust much sooner than was expected Now may it be said That the Gates of London as of old That the Gates of Sion did mourn VVe little thought the time had been so near when the Security of London should not consist so much in its Gates and VValls I say its Security as from a forraign Enemy for Nullus ad amissas ibit opes as in its un-enviable Ruins and Poveâ—ty MEDITATION XIX Upon the Constagration of the Universe IT is evident by Scripture that the Heavens and the earth which are now are reserved unto fire against the day of Judgement 2 Pet. 3.7 And That in the day of God as it is called the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with fervent heat Vers 12. Yea the heavens shall passe away with a great noise the earth also and the works that are thereof shall be burnt up Vers 10. Some think that fire shall only refine and purifie not consume and destroy But besides that the expressions of the heavens their being dissolved and passing away and that of the earth its being burnt up seem to import more than a bare purifying of both or either of them Why should we think the World it self should last when all the Inhabitants of it shall be removed into another World Surely the World will be of no further use when there shall be no one Man or Woman to Inhabit it and to adore God in and for it God made the World for Mans use and therefore will unmake it again when Man hath no further use for it as Men use to pull down Tents when they have no further occasion for them The World is but Gods Nursery such a thing I mean as Gardiners use to call by that name from whence he means to transplant all he there sets and when that is done he will pull down his sences and let it run to ruin Yea he will lett-in fire as a wild Bore that shall destroy it Whosoever believes that God made the World cannot but think he is able to destroy it for that it seems much easier of the two to bring something to nothing than to bring something out of nothing What a solemn time will that be when the whole world shall be in flames What a petty puny fire was that which burnt up London to that which shall consume the whole world For what was London to England What is England in comparison of all the Earth Or what is the whole Earth in comparison of the Globe of Heaven which consists of innumerable Stars some one of which is far bigger than the surface of the whole Earth Surely the fiering of one City was but a blaze to what the burning of the whole Fabrick of Heaven and Earth will be We have seen great things in reference to this Fire such as our Fathers never saw but these are nothing to what both we and they shall see at the Great Day Though I cannot conceive what kind of fire it should be that might be able to dissolve the Heavens and melt the Elements yet will I believe the matter of things contained in Scripture though I cannot reach the manner how such things should be He that can withhold fire from consuming that which is in it's self Combustible can make those things Combustible which in their own nature are not so or rather can inable fire to consume them God by setting fire upon the whole World will let us see He can spare it He is Conscious to his own power that he can make another World when he pleaseth yea as many Worlds as now there are Stars He was infinitely happy before he made the World which
have since let them for moderate Rents such are honest gainers Others have let their houses at most excessive Rates and such have loaded themselves with dishonest gain But be their gains one way or another I think no man ought for the present to pocket the money which he hath clearly gotten by the fire if it be so they can spare it David would not drink of the waters of Bethlehem which were brought to him because as he said They were the price of Blood meaning his Souldiers had ventured their lives for it What men have gotten by this fire is little lesse than the price of Blood considering how many were impoverished that a few might be inriched or rather that the inriching of but a very few is by the undoing of many thousands Men may look upon their gains by this fire as Deodates Let as many as are able be their own Almoners and give it back to God Is it not a Sabbatical year in a doleful sense for that the poor City now injoyeth it's Sabbath and in a Sabbatical year that did bear a better interpretation the rich were not suffered to reap but were to leave the Crop to the poor as appeareth by comparing Exod. 23.11 with Levit. 25.5 If men who have only saved what they had before ought to contribute to them that have lost how much more ought they who have received an Addition by this very means To Build upon the Ruines of others is one of the worst Foundations that can be Let it never be said The fire hath made you rich whilst such multitudes continue poor miserably poor whom meerly the fire hath made so We use to say Men have gotten those things out of the fire which they came hardly by But what men got by or out of the late fire was easily come by well may it go leightly for it leightly came yet neither doth that go leightly which goes to the use of Charity When I consider how this fire which hath ruined many hath raised some it brings to mind what is said Luke 1.52 He hath put down the mighty from their seats and exalted them of low degree He hath filled the hungry with good things and the rich he hath sent empty away How strangely and by seeming contraries doth the providence of God bring things to pass that when a dismall fire hapned some men should be made by it So a Prison made way for Joseph's preferment and Onesimus his running away from his Master for his returning to God and to himself and a better Servant to his Master than ever And Estate cast upon men by the desolating Fire sounds like such a Riddle as that of Sampson Out of the eater came meat and out the strong came sweetness Is it not as a Honey-comb found in the Carcase of a Lion You whom God by this fire hath unexpectedly enabled more than ever to eat the Fat and drink the Sweet you know what I allude to see that you send portion to them for whom nothing is provided MEDITATION XXVII Upon the Inducements unto re-building of London and some wayes of promoting it THat London should be re-built is so much the concern of England both in point of Honour and of Trade as hardly any thing can be more Whilst that lieth in the dust our Glory lieth with it Our Enemies rejoice to see it where it is but should we let it lie there long Oh! how would they scorn us for it and conclude it were because we had not wherewithall to build it up again They know as well as we that there is no part of England situate so commodiously for Trade as London is which name is said to signifie in the Language of the Britains it's first Inhabitants Shipton or a Town of Ships in regard that the famous River which runs by the side of it is able to entertain the greatest Ships that can ride upon the Sea which thing hath made it so famous a Mart those Ships bringing in all the rich commodities the world can afford Hence London for so many Ages past hath held it's Primacy over all other parts of England and none hath been thought fit to succeed it in that dignity though the shifting of Trade from one City to another and an alternate Superlativeness hath been frequent in other parts of the world where one place hath been as commodious as another But London never had rival that did or could pretend it's self as fit to make the great Emporium and Metropolis of England as was it's self The River of Thames made it so at first and that under God will and must make it so again It perished by fire and must be saved by water for that if any thing will make it once again what it was before as Job saith of a Tree onely the Root whereof is left in the ground that thorough the scent of water it will sprout again How venerable is London were it but for its Antiquity of which Ammianus Marcellinus reports that it was called an ancient City in his time which was above twelve hundreds years ago and Cornelius Tacitus seems to do the like three hundred years before him telling us that for multitudes of Merchants and Commerce London was very renowned fifteen hundred years ago nor can we suppose it to have presently arrived at that perfection Who would not assist the building of another City in that place hoping it may continue as many Ages as the other did and longer too if God be pleased to prevent the like disaster I confess I love not to hear men boast at such a time as this what they will do or what shall be done as to the building of London more glorious than ever The Inhabitants of Samaria are blamed for saying The Bricks are fallen down but we will build with hewen Stones the Sycamores are cut down but we will change them into Cedars We are but putting on our harness as to re-building let us not boast as if we were putting of it off This is not a time in which to say much though it becomes us to do all we can If we may see but such another City it will be a great mercy but one more glorious than that we may scarce expect till we see it Alas how many difficulties is that work clogg'd with How scarce and dear are all materials How poor are many that desire to build How hard and almost impossible will it be to satisfie the Interest of all proprietors Amongst all the Models that are presented for that purpose How hard will it be to know how to pitch upon that which may be most convenient If we build every where as before it will be incommodious for Passage dangerous for Fire if by a new Platform it is hard not to be injuxious to multitudes of People whose Houses stood inconveniently as to the Publick Lord Give our Senators double and treble wisdom that they may be satisfactory-Repairers of so great breaches But
they dream of nothing less How comes it like a thief in the night when men are in a profound sleep of security It is like those People thought that seeing so many persons had gon that way with safety the self-same-day yea it may be the self-same-hour so might they as well as the rest But I see there is no Topick from which men argue for security how probable soever but fails them now and then neither is there any safety in probable immunity from sudden death but only in due preparation for it As for those who have often passed to and fro the Ruins and by the sides of tottering-Walls but never received any hurt I wish they may consider How infinitely they are bound to God for the gracious watchfulness of his good Providence over them and for putting so vast a difference betwixt them and others as not to let them lose one hair of their heads by ruinated-Buildings whereby others have lost their lives And may such as have occasion to pass-by such places from day to day duly consider That God hath created more dangers than were formerly and therefore ought they to walk with more circumspection than they had wont to do and to be in the fear of the Lord all the day long and to be in readiness for the worst that can befall them as men that carry their lives in their hands and do walk in the midst of menacing-perils There is a Promise if I may so call it Job 5.23 that it were good for a man to have interest in especially at such a time as this Then shalt be in league with the stones as well as the beasts of the field shall be at peace with thee MEDITATION XXXV Of the Fire it s not exceeding the Liberties of the City VVHen I consider the Compass this fire took how far it went and where it stopt I see cause to wonder at several things First That it did burn much-what about the Proportion of the whole City within the Walls that is to say look how much was left standing within the Walls as if it had been by way of exchange and compensation so much or thereabouts it burnt without Secondly That though it threw down the Gates and got without the Walls yet it no where went beyond the Liberties of the City of London as if the Bars had been a greater fence against it which indeed were no sence at all than the Gates and Walls could be Had the Cittizens gone in Procession or had the Lord Mayor and his Brethren took a Survey of the Bounds and Limits of their Jurisdiction they could not have kept much more within compass than the Fire did Did not he who sets bounds to the Sea and saith to the proud waves thereof â—hitherto shalt thou go and no further I say did not he say the same thing to those proud stames How admirable is the work of God in causing Creatures that are without Reason yea without Life to act as if they well understood what they did Doth he not cause the day-spring to know its place Job 38.12 and the Sun to know its gâ—ing down Psalm 104.19 The Storck in the heavens knoweth her appointed time and the Turtle and the Crane and the Swallme observe the time of their comming Jer. 8.7 When I consider how the fire took just such a proportion as if it had been markt out it brings to mind that usual saying That God doth all things in weight and measure and makes me think of such passages of Scripture as where God saith Isaiah 28.16 that He would lay Judgment to the Line and Righteousness to the Plummet Also where God speaks of a people meted out viz. for destruction Isâ— 18.2 and 7. and trvden under foâ—t Also where it is said of God that He weighed out a path to his anger Psalm 78.50 Which we translate that He made a way to his anger the meaning is He did proportion it as if he had dispensed it by weight How great a Mercy was it that the Suburbs were spared considering how great how populous and how poor they were Being so great and capacious they can contain all the exiles of the City but it had been impossible for the City if it had stood and they had been burnt to have contained all the out-casts of the more spacious Suburbs Considering their populousness if the fire had fallen to their lot possibly five times so many persons as now are had been undone and so many families had been reduced to utmost penury as all England had scarce been sufficient to relieve Lastly considering their Poverty they had much more generally been unable to bear their losses than Citizens or those within the Walls were Neither was the sparing of the Suburbs a thing more desirable than it was improbable when the fire was in its Meridian or Zenith if I may so call it For as the Sun which sets out in the East finisheth not its race till it come about to the West so did this dreadfull Fire threateâ— not to stop till it had run thorough the Suburbs as well as the City its self But God who causeth it to rain upon one City and not upon another and who kept that Storm of fire from falling upon Zoak which destroyed Sodom and three other Cities of that which was called Pentapolis He thus divided the flames of fire that most parts of the City should have their share but the Suburbs though in great danger should have none I think if men had designed to have burnt so farâ— and no further as easy as it was to kindle it was hard to extinguish such a fire when and where they would But if any malicious persons did conduct it so far and there leave it VVhat they have done secretly will one day be proclaimed upon the House-top MEDITATION XXXVI Upon the Suburbs coming into more request then ever since the fire HOw much more considerable are the Suburbs now than they lately were Some places of despicable termination and as mean account but a few moneths since such as Hounds-ditch and Shorditch do now contain not a few Citizens of very good fashion Philosophers say that Corruptiounius est generctio alterius so was the marring of the City the making of the Suburbs What rich commodities cannot the Suburbs now supply us with which heretofore could be had onely within the walls Time was that rich Citizens would almost have held their Noses if they had past by those places where now it may be they are constrained to dwell they would hardly have kept the dogs of their flâ—ck to use Jobs words with some variation where now they are forced to keep themselves Had London been standing in the places where some of them do now inhabit Zijim and Ochinâ— might have dwelt for them and the Satyrs might have danced there to allude to Isa 13.21 In how great request at this day is poor Piedmont as I may call it Southwark I mean which
three things Troy could never be destroyed One was they must get the Palladium or image of Pallas out of the City which Virgil saith they did by means of Ulysses Pallas was counted the Goddess of wisdom Had not the Pallâ—dâ—um been taken away for the time or had those that were concern'd been so wise at first as they were at last London had scarcely been burnt to the ground in spight of all the treachery that was suspected or could have been used Another thing was If they would destroy Troy they must provide a great Wodden-horse which accordingly they did putting some of their choifest men into the belly of it which pretending to dedicate to Mâ—â—crva they left before the City having made it higher than the gates hoping as it proved that the Troâ—â—s would pull down part of the wall to take it in whilst they had withdrawn themselves to the 〈◊〉 Teâ—â—dot The Trâ—jans brake down the wall took in the horse placed it in the Castle but in the night Sinon who was one of those Greâ—â—â—â— that were in the Horse's belly giving notice by sire the Greeks came from Tenedos who finding the Trojans had drunk themselves fast asleep sackt the City and burnt it Thus Troy perished partly by the Credulity Security Weakness and Intemperance of it's Inhabitants in a little time after it had for ten years together withstood the fruitless attempts of its adversaries Was there not some such thing went to the destruction of London Were there not a sort of men within that City as is vehemently suspected who might not unsitly be compared to the Greeks that were hid in the Belly of the forementioned Wodden-horse people of a concealed Religion and therefore I call them hid and amongst the rest was there not one Sinon as I may call him because he was the first that kindled the fire witness his own confession Had not the Gates of London been set too wide open for such treacherous Greeks to enter in possibly that famous City had been standing to this very day But what was a Proverb concerning Trojans Sero sapiunt Phryges The Trojans use to be wise when it is too late was too applicable to our selves We begin to wish the gates of London had been shut against such dangerous Persons when alass in some places it hath no Gates to shut It is likely the Gentlemen that lay Couchant before in the Belly of the Woodden-horse are now not without greater hopes than ever that they shall get up and ride But he that sits in heaven can make the second of September produce them as little good as did their infamous fifth of November But why was it that London was destroyed by the same means as was old Troy Will any say that the old Proverb that such a one is a trusty Trojan was as applicable to the new Trojans as to the old I do not think that was the reason For though there might be some faithless men in London as there are in all places yet I doubt not but Londoners take one with another might and may safely be trusted as far as any sort of men and have as much Faith and Conscience amongst them as is elsewhere to be sound But that God who found sin enough in Job to justifie all that he did against him all the evil he brought upon him could not but have a sufficient controversie with London which absolutely considered was bad enough though if compared with other places and People it was certainly one of the best MEDITATION XLVIII Upon the burning of Jerusalem compared with the Burning of London MAny Prodigies there were as Josephus tells us that went before the destruction of Jerusalem by Fire namely that a great Gate of the Temple which twenty men could hardly pull open opened of its own accord and that an Oxe brought forth a Lamb in the Temple with several others which I forbear to mention These were dark Texts for men to expound yet some did venture to give the sense and meaning of them as if each of them had been a token for good whereas the event did manifest the quite contrary So was the destruction of London ushered in with several Prodigies Blazing-Stars and others which did precede it at no such distance of time but that it was probable enough they might veâ—er to the fire as well as to the foregoing-Pestilence Neither may we doubt but there weâ—e some who did put a good construction upon those ill-Signes as if they had been fore-runners of the good things which they themselves expected in the year -66 though as to their enemies they might have an ill-aspect and ominous signification Thus far some involved themselves in the same practise with the Jews of old and God hath involved them in the same kind of calamity It is dangerous doing as Jews lest we suffer as they But besides Prodigies there were also sundry Prophesies which did precede the destruction of Jerusalem Christ fore-told it at large as is reported by several Evangelists Mat. 24. Mark 13. Luk. 21.5 Luk. 19.44 with the several antecedents and concomitants of it how That the Sun should be darkned and the Moon not give her light Matt. 24.29 There were also humane Prophesies concerning it as particularly by that Man who ran thorough the Streets of Jerusalem and cried Woe to it several dayes together which considering what Christ himself had said was at no hand to be slighted We find no Text in Scripture Prophesying the burning of London and in such a year but I have heard that some did considently assert before any thing of the Fire did happen that London would be burnt in the year -66 as others had done that it would be visited with a great Plague in -65 VVhich things coming to pass accordingly may reasonably incline us to believe that God though by what way and means we know not had imparted the fore-knowledg of that Event to such as did peremptorily Prophesie concerning it For though it be too much credulousness to believe a Human Prophesie before it be fulfilled yet to dis-believe that it was a real Prophesie when it is fulfilled is on the other hand too much moroseness and incredulity It is not unusual with God to reveal to one or other those great and strange things which he is about to do in the VVorld though because there are many false pretenders to Revelations we ought to suspend our belief of such things delivered to us by others till the event do attest them The burning of Jerusalem at leastwise of the Temple is said to have been begun by one of Vespatian's Souldiers contrary to his known will and pleasure but when it was once begun there were many more that did help it forward with an eye to gain and plunder So the burning of London seems to have taken its first rise from one hand viz. His that suffered for it but is vehemently presumed to have been earried on by many more of the same
milk that is sowred or turned which were before perfectly united Then the sulphurious or oily part of the blood thus set at liberty flies thorough the body with great violence and sets all into a combustion And this is the great instance as from within our selves of Fire arising from Putrefaction As for an experiment from without one may suffice viz. that of Dung which lying together in heaps and so putrifying more and more doth sometimes wax so hot that it sets fire on the straw that is mingled with it which is long of its sulphurious parts by putrefaction set at liberty and flying away in great troops and with much violence And is there nothing to be made of all this besides matter of Speculation You know what corruption and putrefaction doth signifie in a moral sense and sure I am that kind of corruption is the cause of all the mischievous fires that are in the world Did God drown the old world because all flesh had corrupted its self and did he not burn Sodom and Gomorrah for the same cause So likewise Jerusalem Jer. 9. v. 13. The Scripture calls sinful communication 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is rotten or putrified Eph. 4.20 and saith of it that it doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is corrupt or putrifie good manners Many fires are kindled by such communication viz. fires of lust and fires of anger and of revenge besides those fires of judgment and vengeance which God sends upon the world for the same James 3.6 The tongue is a fire a world of iniquity and setteth on fire the course of nature and is set on fire of Hell Moreover if we take the word putrefaction strictly for a secession or separation of principles or elements formerly united in that acception it is capable of a good moral and may serve to teach us how great the danger of perfect separation and disunion is even amongst those whose principles do so far forth disagree that they cannot be together but refractly as fire and water in mixtion Yet these in natural bodies as contrary as they seem do much better in a convenient mixture and composition than they ever can singly and apart yea when they fall in pieces though one bear a greater sway for the present than before and that the worthiest of all the rest as it might be the spirits in Ephemeral Feavers yet as well that part which rules more absolutely than ever for the time being as those parts which are more than ever subjected to it is quickly destroyed and brought to nothing Natural bodies cannot be mistaken about their own party which are really such but by a kinde of infallible instinct do draw those parts out of other bodies which are for kinde the same with themselves as the kindled fulphur that is in one body kindles and drawes forth that sulphur which is in another and yet it proves unhappy and fatal to those bodies as to sulphur in particular that they divide from all others and will unite only amongst themselves though they are all perfectly of the same species and no more than just numerically differenced How it should be more safe for men to do the same thing viz. to abstract and divorce themselves from all but those that are of their perswasion whilst mean time divers may be such only in pretence and for their own ends for ought they know and others whom they reject may heartily symbolize with them in more things I say how that can be prudent or safe I am yet to learn Those that affect that simplicity which is poculiar to God and his alone prerogative let them conceive a displeasure against the composition of their own bodies and try conclusions to make them consist but of one Element and that the noblest of all Let them quarrel four of those five principles which are the ingredients of our bodies and resolve to turn sulphur salt Earth and Water out of doors and that they will consist of meer spirits and to that end let them exalt those spirituous liquors that are in them to the greatest height that may be that so they may be able to turn those four inferiour principles out of possession and live alone in and throughout the whole body all the veines and arteries being henceforth filled with spirits only in stead of blood Try how this experiment will succeed If it do well attempt the like thing upon the Church and State bring them to the same pass But if you finde this likely to set on fire the whole course of nature to set you in a violent feaver that will soon burn you to death be so just as not to wish that should be done to others that you would by no meanes have done to your selves and suspect that may be bad for publick bodies which would be so destructive to your own private Let one principle bear rule over all the rest as in good Wines the spirituous parts are predominant and let the noblest Element sway the Scepter else things will degenerate as Wines do into Vinegar when the spirits are kept under and the saline or saltish particles exalted but let the less noble Elements not be excluded but fairly comprehended in a due mixtion and subordination otherwise if it fare with men as it doth with fire that which aspires to be all in all will soon vanish and be as it were annihilated CONTEMPLATION VI. Of Fire kindled by the collision of two hard bodies AS obvious almost as any of the former is the way of kindling fire by the collision or smiting together of two hard bodies as when slint steel are struck one against the other the reason why fire issues from thence is because by the blow given the sulphurious particles of the steel and flint are put in motion Now inward they cannot move because these bodies being hard and of close parts do suffer nothing to get within them for as much as there can be no penetrating of dimensions Therefore our they must come and if they could come out leisurely and by degrees they would produce no fire or scarce so much as heat but sallying forth in great haste and all at once as if they were affrighted with the blow they had received by virtue of their number union and violent motion they ingender sparks produce that fire which we discern to come from them Just thus it is betwixt persons of stout and sturdy spirits when they happen to clash one against another retreat and retire into themselves they cannot to deliberate and consider what they had best to do so full are they of themselves that is of their pride and passion but out they come being once put into a commotion and with all the spirits they can make muster together assaile each other and with their drawn glittering swords do as it were fire at one another and with greatest eagerness pursue a bloody duell Now oh the folly of men Do they not know that the
contests and incounters of two great spirits is as like to produce such a bloody issue as the smiting of slint and steel together is to bring out Fire and yet they will give way to it upon every slight occasion as if they had less consideration than the devil himself who said skin for skin and all that a man hath will he give for his life but they will give or throw away their lives upon every trifling provocation as if they were nothing worth I wonder who it is that doth so highly honour the memory of men dying upon those termes that persons of quality should be ambitious of it I wender in whose Kallender it is that such kinde of persons are put down for Martyrs Saints and Worthy-men I wonder what heathen God it is whom men think to please with such kinde of sacrifices for the true God doth most certainly abhor them I wonder that men who stand so much upon the nobleness of their blood as if each drop of theirs were more worth than all that runs in the veins of ordinary men should trivially pour it out or hazard it to be poured out like water upon the ground and at the same time everlastingly tain it by sheding the blood of others either actually or intentionally Surely Cain and Lamech and these men deserve to be canonized all in one day at leastwise it is very sit that all their names should be written in red characters that is in letters of blood But what shall we say to those persons who make it their business to knock those slints and steels against each other and then to finde tinder to receive the sparks and matches to procure the flame that tinder of its self could not that is to set persons of great and sturdy spirits together by the eares to foment their differences and to make them thirsty after one anothers blood If that rule in Law be true Plus peccat Author quam Actor If any such two shall happen to kill one another in a duel or so they will be murtherers but you will be greater murtherers than they I can scarcely think of two hard bodies by their mutual attrition fetching fire out of each other and not meditate that thus it is when two Nations fall at oddes they are alwayes firing one at another and the reason is because they are hard bodies and neither can yield one cannot yield in point of right nor the other in point of honour and so those sparkes are continually struck from each which fomented by that tinder that ill-willers to both do cherish it with and propagated by dangerous matches and confederacies breaks out into that flame which possibly may never come to be extinguished Oh how do I long for the accomplishment of that promise Isa 11.6 The Wolf shall dwell with the lamb and the leopard shall lie down with the kid c. And vers 9. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy Mountain And Isa 65.2 How should I rejoyce to see some of that Prophesy fulfilled in our days Isa 2.4 They shall beat their swords into Plow-shares and their speares into pruning-hooks Nation shall not lift up sword against Nation neither shall they learn War any more I further consider if two things be struck together though one behard if the other be soft as a feather against a flint not one spark will insue Thus it is when persons of rough and rugged tempers are marcht and mated with those that are of a quite contrary disposition viz. full of the Ornament of a meek and quiet spirit though that which is hard may dash against that which is soft yet no fire of contention is thereby inkindled because that which is soft soon yields and so prevents the quarrel We say the second person makes the fray and Solomon gives us a better proverb Prov. 15.1 A soft answer turneth away wrath and Prov. 25.15 A soft tongue breaketh the bones So will a flint break upon a cushion better than upon that which is hard May I never be one of those hard things which help to kindle fire either national domestical or otherwise but always possest of that christian softness that may prevent the kindling of those things which upon a little undue collision would be all in sparks if not in flames CONTEMPLATION VII Of Fire kindled for want of vent as in Hay c. THere is one way more whereby Fires are sometimes kindled the consideration wherof is capable enough of a practical improvement and therefore I shall not pass it by and that is by denying convenient vent to bodies that are full of sulphur Thence it is that Hay that is laid up too wet and lies too close together is frequently set on fire because by that meanes those sulphurious particles which would otherwise have exhaled by degrees are pent in and being so do associate one with another provoke and excite each other and when they have gotten a sufficient number of them together with united force do as it were break Prison for want of leave to go out quietly now and then some of them or some by some and fly away like lightning And thence is that fire which sometimes is kindled in Hay and other times in dung upon the same account Those active particles which affected more liberty than they could singly obtain and such as might have been given them without any danger for dry hay the sulphurious particles wherof do exhale freely by some and some doth not kindle of its self combine together to set themselves free as if they were of Caesar's minde who said Omnia dat qui justa negat when he was denied some priviledge which he might justly challenge But those are not words fit to be taken into a subjects mouth Yet as unlawful as it is for those that are under authority to act or speak at any such rate as that of Caesar I cannot but think withall that it is no point of prudence in Parents Masters and other Governors to deny to those that are under them that desirable liberty which they may safety give any more than to give them that liberty which a due care of safety bids them to deny That profound Philosopher and Statesman the Lord Verulam in his Essayes pag. 86. speaks thus To give moderate liberty for griefes and discontentments to evaporate so it be without too great insolency or bravery is a safe way For he that turns the humours back and makes the wound bleed inwards indangereth maligne Ulcers and pernicious imposthumations When I consider what Fires have formerly been kindled both at honte and abroad both in Church and State and all for want of a little vent otherwise called liberty I say a little for too much may be as dangerous on the other hand pardon me if I wish that in all places where it is vehemently desired there might be as much of it as might consist with the real welfare and prosperity both of