licence you to make your wills your laws and your lusts your gods and to commit not onely peccata but monstra that are Pessimi maximi not Optimi maximi The great Jehovah against whom you sin is greater than the greatest he bindeth Kings in chains and Nobles in lincks of iron He hath provided Tophet of old yea for the King it is provided Hell was made for great men as well as poore Observe how resolutely and emphatically the Prophet speaks yea for the King it is prepared Potentes potenter torquebuntur Ingentia beneficia ingentia vitia ingentia supplicia To whom God hath given great mercies if they abound with great vices God will inflict great punishments upon them Think of this you that trample the bloud of Christ under your feet by your prodigious oathes and by the contempt of the day worship and servants of Christ The bloud which you contemne is nobler than the noblest bloud that runs in your veins It is the bloud of the eternall God of that God before whom the great as well as the small must appear at the great day of Judgment in which terrible day the Kings of the earth and the great men and the rich men vnd the chiefe Captains and the mighty men will hide themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains And say to the mountains and rocks fall on us and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the Throne and from the wrath of the Lamb c. They that are here cloath'd in silk and velvet shall wish for the mountains to cover them which yet shall be but a poor shelter For the mountains melt at the presence of the Lord and the rocks rend asunder when he is angry They that made others to flye away from them as innocent Lambs from devouring Wolves shall be afraid of the wrath of the Lamb that sitteth on the Throne Great men must dye as well as others and when they are dead there is no difference between the dead bones of Philip of Macedon and other men as Diogenes told Alexander Remember the wofull Catrastophe of Herod the great Agrippa the great Pompey the great Oh let all men fear to sin against that God that removed the Assyrian Monarchy to the Persian and the Persian to the Graecian and the Graecian to the Roman That toucheth the mountains and they smoak before whom the Devils feare and tremble Oh let not our hearts be harder than the rocks worser than Devils Oh England feare the God of Heaven and earth Oh you House of Commons tremble and sin not most in the World sin and tremble not Do you tremble and sin not We are all in Gods hand as a flye in the paw of a roaring Lion as the clay in the hand of the Potter Do we provoke the Lord to jealousie are we stronger than he Consider the advantages God hath us at and our dependencies upon him and let us not dare to sin against him A Sanctuary in all distresses and dangers Let us flye to this God of power who giveth Kingdoms and taketh away kingdoms as he pleaseth The great superintendent Fly to him as to thy Ark thy Pella thy City of refuge And in our deepest miseries let us sing cheerfully the 46. Psalm as Luther was wont to do God is our refuge and strength a very present help in trouble I will not feare though the earth be moved and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea c. A divine project to secure a Nation from ruine to make this great Jehovah our friend for if God be on our side we need not feare those that are against us Deus meus omnia Tranquillus Deus tranquillat omnia And for this very purpose we are here met this day in Gods Sanctuary flying to the horns of the Altar to beseech that God who is the only Potentate King of kings and Lord of lords that only doth wonderfull things that he would be reconciled unto us that he would quiet the commotions that are in Ireland reduce the Rebels into order sheath up the sword that is there drawn and quench the flames that are there kindled That the Lord would knit the heart of our Soveraign to his people more and more and of his people to him That he would unite both Houses of Parliament that they may joyn together with one heart as one man to relieve poor Ireland and reforme England Athanasius tells us that Anthony the Monk fought against the Divell with that Text Psalm 68.1 Let God arise and let his enemies be scattered let them also that hate him flee before him The Divell is more afraid of this Text then any other for he knows he is Gods greatest enemy and if God arise he must needes be scattered Oh let us set God on work this day to destroy the implacable enemies of his Church arise oh Lord and scatter the Irish rebells arise oh Lord and confound Antichrist and build up the walls of Ierusalem The Romans in a great distresse were driven to take the weapons out of the Temples of their Gods and to fight with them and so they overcome This is our course this day wee fight with the weapons of the Church Prayers and Teares The Spartans walls were their speares Our walls are our prayers our helpe standeth in the Name of the Lord who hath made Heaven and earth Lord speake a word and Iericho shall fall be favourable to England and Ireland Lord take away our tinne and purely purge our drosse Our trust is not in our bow nor speare Let us labour to become Gods favourites and then we have all happinesse concentred in two words The second Doctrinall conclusion Though God hath this absolute power over Kingdomes and Nations yet he seldome useth this power but first he gives warning I say he seldome useth it for I do not lay it downe as a generall rule Deus non alligat suas manus God may and doth sometimes destroy at once and give no warning Thus he dealt with the Heathen Ammonites and Idumaeans as Calvin observes but he seldome or never sends any great judgement upon his own people but first he speaks before he strikes First Verba then Verbera as it is in the Text At what instant I shall speak c. If that Nation concerning which I have pronounced c. First God pronounceth a judgement before he executeth a judgment he lightneth before he thundreth he hangs out his white Flag of mercy before his red Flag of utter defiance first he shoots off his warning Peeces before his murdering Peeces And the Reasons are 1. That all the World may take notice that all punishments and afflictions come not by chance or fortune but from the immediate hand of the great God It is he that forms the light and creates darknesse it is he that makes peace and creates evill I the Lord
Oh that your lives might shine forth in holines after this day and that it may be with you as it was with Hezekiah when he and all his people kept the Passeover together the first thing they did before the killing of the Passeover was the taking away all the Altars that were at Ierusalem and casting them into the brook Kidron And when the Passeover was finished all Israel that were present went out to the Cities of Iudah and brake the Images in peeces and cut down the groves and threw down the high places and the Altars out of all Iudah and Benjamin in Ephraim also and Manasseh untill they had utterly destroyed them all I speak not of any tumultuous disorderly illegall way but of an orderly and legall reformation Which I desire like this of Hezekiah may be the issue of this day The Motives are many 1. If you build Gods house God will build Houses for you as he did for the Hebrew Midwives he will blesse and prosper you Remember what the Prophet Haggai saith Is it time for you O yee to dwell in your ceiled houses and this house lye waste Now therefore thus saith the Lord consider your wayes Yee have sown much and bring in little yee eat but ye have not enough ye cloath you but there is none warm and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes Thus saith the Lord Consider your wayes go up to the Mountain and bring Wood and build the house and I will take pleasure in it and I will be glorified saith the Lord c. Read also Verse 9 10 11. 2. Consider what Mordecai said unto Esther Think not with thy self that thou shalt escape in the Kings house more then all the Iews for if thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time then shall there enlargement and deliverance arise to the Iews from another place But thou and thy Fathers House shall be destroyed And who knoweth whether thou art come to the Kingdom for such a time as this As Ierome said concerning the day of judgement That whether he did eat or drink or whatsoever he did he did alwayes hear the voice of the Arch-Angel Arise yee dead and come to judgement So doe I desire that you would at all times and in all places remember and consider this soul-awakening speech of Mordecai and Esther 3. Consider the famous examples of Ezra Nehemiah and Zerubbabel what care and pains they took for the rebuilding not only of the Walls but also of the Temple of Ierusalem It is not enough to set the State in tune but you must remember to repair the Temple also Be not afraid of Tobiah Sanballat or of any other enemy Who art thou O great Mountain Before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain A Parliament-man must be like Athanasius who was Magnes Adamas A Loadstone and an Adamant A Loadstone by his affable carriage and courteous behaviour drawing all men to the love of him But in the cause of God he was as an Adamant untameable and unconquerable 4. If we reform and turn God will turn If we turn from the evill of our sins God will turn from the evill of his judgements Tertullian speaks of himself That he was born to nothing else but to Repentance An excellent saying for every one to lay to heart The first Text that ever Iohn Baptist preached on was Repentance The first that ever Christ preached on was Repentance And the first thing that Christ commanded his Apostles to preach was Repentance God himself hath consecrated Repentance by his own example saith Tertullian Dedicavit poenitentiam in semetipso He repenteth to teach us to repent This is that which God not only commands and entreateth but sweareth that he would have us to do Happy we for whose sake God swears but most unhappy if we beleeve not God when he swears and if we live not as we beleeve Will a nationall reformation certainly divert Gods judgements from a Nation Did not Iosiah reform and yet it is expressely said That notwithstanding this Reformation Yet the Lord turned not from the fiercenesse of his great wrath wherewith his anger was kindled against Iudah because of all the provocations that Manasses had provoked him withall 1. A nationall reformation will certainly deliver us from everlasting misery 2. It is Gods ordinary way for the removeall of temporall judgements There is no instance fully against it but this of Iosiah but to this it may be replyed that Iosiahs reformation in reference to the multitude was hypocriticall and therefore it did only prorogue and adjourn but not totally remove Gods wrath That it was so in regard of the people appears Ierem. 3. 10. And yet for all this her treacherous sister Judah hath not turned unto me with her whole heart but fainedly saith the Lord A sincere Nationall turning will certainly divert Nationall Judgements and procure Nationall Blessings If we will not turn reform and repent of our sins God will repent with a new kinde of repentance he will not repent of the evill but repent that he hath repented of the evill he will repent of the good wherewith he said he would benefit us And this leads me to the fourth Doctrinall Conclusion Doctrine 4. That when God begins to build and plant a Nation if that Nation do evill in Gods sight God will unbuild pluck up and repent of the good he intended to do unto it This is a point of great concernment expressely set down in the tenth verse It is certain that God hath begun to build and plant this Nation and he hath made you his Instruments Right Honourable in this great work We reade Zechary 1.19 of four horns which scattered Iudah and Ierusalem By these four horns are meant all the enemies of Gods people that are alwayes pushing at them and goring of them And verse 20 we reade of four Carpenters whom God raised up to fray away these horns Such Carpenters have you been unto us You have knockt off all those horns wherewith the fat Buls of Bashan pushed at us You have endeavoured to under-prop the House of this Kingdom and to keep it from falling You have stubb'd up many unprofitable Trees and taken away at least in your endeavours many rotten posts you have removed a great deal of rubbidge You have been our Ebedmelech's to release our Ieremies out of the Dungeon Indeed you have done marvellous things blessed be the Name of the Lord And we have cause to be enlarged in much thankfulnesse though you never have opportunity to do more for us Ezra blessed God that had given them a little reviving in their bondage A man that hath been for many yeers in a dark Dungeon will rejoyce exceedingly for a little crevise of light though never so little We have been in the Dungeon of despair and we blesse God for the
do all these things And therefore God gives warning to imprint this doctrine That there is no evill of punishment but from God 2. Because God is loath to punish Minatur Deus ut non puniat they that minde mischiefe give no warning When Absalom intended to murder Amnon he spake neither good nor bad unto him 2 Sam. 13.22 Neither would God reveale his intentions to destroy us but only because he desires not to destroy us I reade of one that came to murder one of the Roman Emperors and by speaking these words Hunc tibi pugionem mittit Senatus detexit facinus fatuus non implevit Another was seen whetting his sword and by that suspected and detected But it is otherwise with God he gives many items and sets many Beacons on fire before he destroyes a Nation As Ambrose observes upon Gen. 9.13 He puts his bow in the Cloud Non sagittam sed arcam not his Arrow but his Bow the Bow cannot hurt us but the Bow forewarns us of the Arrow and the string of the Bow is to us-ward to shew how unwilling God is to punish He must first turn the Bow and put in the Arrow before he can shoot And as it is Psalm 7.12 If you will not turn I will whet my sword I will bend my Bow and make ready my Arrow First God whets his sword before he strikes and bends his Bow before he shoots his Arrow is unprepared c. And all this because he is a Father of mercies and a father you know is loath to whip his child I afflict not willingly Lamen 3.33 Fury is not in me Isa. 27.4 It is your sinnes that put thunderbolts in my hands As a Woman brings forth her childe with pain and a Bee never stings but when he is provoked So it is with our good God He never punisheth but when there is no remedy 2 Chron. 36. 15 16. When God came to punish Adam he came slowly in the cool of the day but when he commeth to shew mercy he comes leaping over the hills and skipping over the mountains God was but six dayes in making the whole World and yet as Chrysostome well observes he was seven dayes destroying one City the City of Iericho God gives warning for the glorification of his justice That all those persons and nations that are destroyed may have no Apology no excuse but may be speechlesse at the great day of account Ne dicant sibi non praedictum Cave There is no Christian nation shall be able to say That God destroyed them and yet never gave them warning Read the second and third Chapters of the Revelation observe Christs warning to the seven Churches This made them without excuse forewarned forearmed If this be Gods ordinary course Let us admire and adore the patience of God towards our Persons in particular and towards this Nation in generall in which we live A Nation not worthy to be beloved A Nation as ripe for destruction as any other Nation How many Tapers hath God set on fire How many white Flags of Mercy hath God hung out How often hath he shot off his warning peeces to forewarne this Nation that God would pluck it up pull it down and destroy it Ionathan shot three Arrowes not to hurt David but to help David by foretelling him of Sauls murderous intention against him But God hath shot not only three but eight Arrowes to forewarne and forearme us The Lord awaken our secure hearts to the consideration of these things God hath spoken eight wayes to this Nation by all which he hath intimated his intention to destroy us 1. He hath spoken unto us by the voice of his Ministers that with one mouth and lip have foretold us of desolation and destruction It hath beene the constant voice of Gods faithfull Servants from the Pulpit for these many yeares early and late Now this voice is not to be slighted For surely the Lord will do nothing but he revealeth his secret unto his Servants the Prophets Amos 3.7 2. He hath spoken to us by the voice of his lesser judgements For God hath two sorts of judgements Rods and Scorpions Footmen and Horsemen as it is expressed Ierem. 12.4 And he deales with a Nation as a Physitian with his Patient If a lesser potion will not worke the Physitian will prescribe a stronger God hath sent many lesser judgements The Small-pox unseasonable Weather the Plague in a moderate way but these judgements have beene slighted and contemned And lesser judgements contemned are Harbingers to usher in greater God threatneth Levit. 2.6 If his people will walk contrary to him he will punish them seven times more and afterwards he addes That if they will not be reformed he will punish them yet seven times more and yet seven times more Vers. 18.21 24 28. I even I will chastise you in fury seven times more for your sins As the ancient Consuls of Rome had Rods and Axes carried before them Rods as ensignes of their lenity to penitent offenders But Axes as tokens of their severity against incorrigible offenders So God hath his Rods and his Axes his puning Knife and his Axe If his pruning Knife will not amend us his Axe will hew us down and cast us into the fire 3. God hath spoken to us by the death of his godly Servants For the righteous perish and no man layeth it to heart and mercifull men are taken away none considering that the righteous is taken away from the evill to come Isa. 57.1 Thus Methusalem that godly Patriarch died the very yeere the flood came And his name signifieth A messenger of death His death did presage the flood Thus Austin was taken away by death immediately before the sacking of Hippo where he lived Paraeus before the taking of Heilderberg Luther a little before Warres came into Germany as he himselfe did fore-signifie at his death Thus the death of Saint Ambrose was a fore-runner of the ruine of Italy The many Reverend Preachers The Chariots and Horsemen of Israel that in these few yeares are gone to their graves in peace are as so many blazing Comets to portend our ruine 4. God hath spoken to us by the voice of other Protestant Nations beyond the Seas that have drunk deepe of the Cup of Gods wrath Herodotus tells us that in a certaine Egyptian Temple there was a Statue built for Sennacherib this was he that besieged Ierusalem and blasphemed the God of Israel and was afterwards slaine by his sonnes and upon this Statue was this Inscription {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Look upon me and learn to be righteous Me thinks I heare Rochell Bohemia the Palatinate and other parts of Germany saying Oh England look upon us and learn to be righteous God will not alwayes make you like Goshen when we are plagued as Egypt make you like Noah in the Ark when we are drowned with a flood of miseries make you like Gideons
little crevise of light let in by your means We have lien among the pots inter ollas fuliginosas sullied with filth and there is a crevise of hope in the Valley of Achor that we shall be as the wings of a Dove covered with silver and her feathers with yellow gold And though this childe of hope be but yet an Embrio We will not despise the day of little things When Ezra had laid the foundation of the Temple there was great joy and rejoycing We doubt not but there is a foundation laid of better times and such a foundation which shall never be taken away The Lord recompence all the pains you have taken upon you and yours And yet let me adde one word as a parenthesis that Nehemiah after all his good services he had done for the Church sub-joyns these words Remember me O my God concerning this and spare me he begs pardon for his noble work of Reformation Blessed be God here is hope of a faire building and of a most beautifull Paradise if things succeed as they have begun But now marke the Doctrine When God begins to build and plant if that Nation do evill God will un-build what he hath built pluck up what he hath planted He will repent of the good c. For you must know that God repents as well of his mercies as of his judgements When God had made Saul King and he proved stubborne and disobedient God repented that ever he made him King When God saw that the wickednesse of the old World was great upon earth He was grieved at the very heart and repented that ever he made man When David was bringing home the Arke with great pompe because it was not brought home in due order and because of Vzzah's sin God repented of what he was doing and the Arke stayed in the middle way When the people of Israel were come out of Egypt and very neere Canaan because they brought an evill report upon the Land of Canaan and murmured The Lord repents of what he had done and carries them backe againe forty years journey through the vast howling Wildernesse Reason 1. Because Gods Covenant with a nation is conditionall It is quamdiu se benè gesserit If that Nation obey my voice then wil I build it and plant it but if it disobey my voice then will I pluck it up pull it down and destroy it The Lord is with you while ye be with him and if ye seek him he will be found of you but if you forsake him he will forsake you If you do wickedly you shall perish both you and your King 2. Because that sinne is so pernicious to a that where sinne rules there God and his mercy will not abide Sinne takes away the favour of God by which all Nations subsist And if Gods favour be gone all is gone Sinne dissolves the very Joynts and Sinews of a Nation Religion maintains and upholds Kingdoms The Trojans had their Palladium as long as that was safe they were safe The Romans had their Ancile as long as that was kept they were secure The Israelites had their Ark as long as that was sure there was a defense upon Mount Zion Pure and undefiled Religion is the Palladium the Ancile the Ark to preserve Kingdoms But sinne betrayeth Religion into the hands of superstition and idolatry Sinne is a Serpent in the bosome a thief in the house poyson at the stomack a sword at the very heart of a Nation If the Serpent be in the bosome it will bite if a thief in the house he will steal if poyson in the stomack it will pain us if a sword at the heart it will kill us Use Hence we may learn what the reason is of the great delay in the Reformation of the Church why the childe of Reformation sticks in the Birth why the hand of mercy begins to be pulled in and why many observers of the times begin to fear that this is not as yet the appointed time wherein God will have mercy upon Sion I am very confident that the fault is not in you to whom I speak but it is laid down 2 Chron. 20. 33. Howbeit the high places were not taken away for as yet the people had not prepared their hearts unto the God of their Fathers The people of the Land would not bear a thorow Reformation I deny not but that the Land in which we live is a Land of uprightnesse As many amongst us truely religious as in any place in the world of the like bignesse But yet the Bulk of our people are wicked and their hearts are not as yet prepared to the yoke of the Lord Oderunt vincula pietatis They are unreformed themselves and it is no wonder they are so opposite to a thorow Reformation It may be said of many amongst us as Ieremy did once say of his people The Prophets prophesie falsly and the Priests bear rule by their means and my people love to have it so and what will ye do in the end thereof Now it is this sin of the Land that weakens your hands and divides you sometimes one from another and keeps you from perfecting this great work of Reformation And I conceive no way better to remedy this than by sending a faithfull and painfull Ministery thorowout the Kingdom For if you will be pleased to observe you will finde that those places which are rud'st and most ignorant most irregular and where the least Preaching hath been are the greatest enemies to Reformation This is a work worth of serious consideration The Lord stir up your hearts to consider it and open your eyes also clearly to perceive that there are more with you then against you and that when God reformes a Nation he doth not finde us prepared but he makes us prepared When God sheweth mercy to a Nation there goeth power with the mercy to heal the Nation Ezek. 36. 24 25 26 27 28. If when a Nation doth evill in Gods sight God will repent of the good he intended c. Let us repent of our evils committed against God that he may not repent of the good he intends to do unto us Chuse which you will If we repent God will repent of the evill c. If we repent not God will repent of the good c. And suffer me to tell you That when God begins to draw back his mercies from a Nation that Nation is in a wofull plight God repented that he made the old World And what followed The next news you hear is they were all drowned He repented that he had made Saul King and the next news we hear is That he was rejected from being King He repented that he had brought the Israelites out of Egypt and thereupon he carries them back again and swears that not one of them should enter into Canaan but that all their carkases should perish in the Wildernesse It is