Government of the French mode rescued out of the hands of French and Irish a Church to stand in spight of Ecclesiastical Commissioners and a State preserved in spight of dispensing Judges we have seen the enemies of our Church and State falling I cannot say into the Pit that they dug for us for God knows they dig as deep as Hell and nothing on this side utter destruction can possibly satisfie their rage and fury but from the greatness of their expectations and I hope from all possibility of ever occasioning the like convulsions among us in a word we have seen the worst of Enemies baffled and the best Religion and Government in the World preserved and I had almost said which is the only Blessing we want to complete our happiness that we have seen a broken Church made whole and Protestants united but though this as yet is the matter of our Wishes and Prayers yet I hope we have seen at least I am sure we ought a very fair step towards it in the uniting of our hearts and affections and that whatever is wanting towards so great a Blessing is as much the desires of our Souls as the generous endeavours of our honourable Convention This this alone will fully complete our Deliverance for as there is nothing has given the Romish Party so great an advantage against us as our Divisions so nothing will give us a more assured conquest over them than our Union and how much soever we owe to that good and great Prince whose zeal for Religion and concern for the good of Christendom prompted him to hazard his Person through Winds and Waves into a foreign Countrey at a season when Navigation is most dangerous and Armies retire to warmer Quarters than the Field covered with Snow or soak'd with Rain yet 't is only then I shall begin to think we are fully delivered when like Brethren we dwell and assemble together in Unity And now what remains but we should consider 5. What reason we have to fear and glorifie God. As our danger was from Jesuites the worst of Enemies and our Deliverance from Popery and Slavery the greatest of evils that can threaten our Souls and Bodies these are such things as may well astonish us and teach us to fear and glorifie God. 1. To fear For as the Passions God has planted in our Nature were designed to be serviceable to the ends of Religion it is highly reasonable that we should fear the Lord of Hosts and at all times tremble at his Majesty but when he represents himself fearfull in praises and terrible in his doings it is very fit that a Creature that is apt to fear where no fear is and to dread the effects of a much less power should be struck with an awfull regard of his glorious Majesty and feel our Souls stirr'd within us to such apprehensions as are suitable to the greatness and glory of his Works Tremble thou earth at the presence of the Lord at the presence of the God of Jacob. Ps 114.7 Though God in respect of the immensity of his Being be always present with us so that if we should take the wings of the Morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the Sea yet there his hand leads us and his right hand holds us yet the greatness of his doings among the Children of Men are such glorious manifestations of his presence that we who at other times see very little of him cannot but behold it and when God does put on righteousness as a Breast-plate and a Helmet of Salvation on his Head it is a time that our fear should be as great as his Attributes are conspicuous and that the glory of his presence in dispensations so full of wonder should take down all hour high thoughts and abash us into the most humble frame I am troubled at his presence when I consider I am affraid of him saith holy Job Ch. 23. v. 15. And again I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear but now mine eye seeth thee wherefore I abhor my self and repent in dust and ashes Ch. 42. v. 5 6. to such a low and humble posture was this good man brought when he saw nay when he considered the presence of God. And it is not only that which God designed we should be wrought to by the consideration of his glorious Attributes when he gave us the affections of our Nature but what the astonishing Dispensations of of his stupendious Providence ought more effectually to cast us into 2. To glorifie God to ascribe to him the honour of his doings and with Souls full of gratitude to say This is the Lord 's doing and it is marvelous in our eyes this is the day which the Lord hath made we will rejoyce and be glad in it For as the divine purpose in such mighty and admirarable occurrences is to restore a decaving Piety to life and to renew the impressions of his Perfections in our Souls which Time and secular cares are apt to wear our so it highly becomes us to express our resentments in the efforts of the most livey and vigorous Piety O God my heart is fixed I will sing and give praise even with my glory i.e. with my tongue and all the faculties of my soul which are the glory of humane nature will I commemorate thy goodness and signal mercie Awake Psaltery and Harp I my self will awake right early I will praise thee among the people and I will sing Praises among the Nations For thy mercy is great above the Heavens and thy Truth reacheth unto the Clouds Be thou exalted O God above the Heavens and thy Glory above all the earth Psal 108.1 2 c. 'T is not enough indeed that we can ascribe to the great vertue of that Heroick Prince whom God in mercy raised to be our Deliverer It was not the glory of a Crown that tempted him to so hazardous an enterprize for besides that a little time would in all probability have given him a more easie possession thereof his Piety would never have permitted him to have invaded the right of so near a Relation as a Father if his Piety to God had not strongly prompted him to endeavour the preservation of those sacred Truths which he beheld to be miserably invaded and ready to be destroyed But it was the setling a tottering state and the supporting a sinking Church nay the securing the little tranquillity that was left to all the Reformed Churches in Christendom from the furious insults of those that threatned them with utter extirpation This was the thing that he declared for and so true has he been to his Declaration that he much rather deserves the Character of the Just and the Faithfull than any other Prince to whom with the greatest industry it has been given For when he might have taken the Crown as the fruit of his Labour and Conquest he waited till it was given him by the Honourable Representatives of the Kingdom with the Concurrence of the Peers as the Reward of his Merit But as it is not without the Lord that is come up to this Kingdom while we admire his Wisdom and Conduct his Courage and Success let us remember to give God the Glory of so mighty a Deliverance Let us in contemplation of so signal a Blessing say with the Psalmist The Lord is my light and my salvation whom shall I fear The Lord is the strength of my life of whom shall I be affraid Though an host of Men should encamp against me my heart shall not fear though War should rise against me in this will I be confident One thing have I desired of the Lord that will I seek after that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life to behold the beauty of the Lord and to enquire in his Temple For in the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion in the secret of his Tabernacle shall he hide me he shall set me up upon a Rock And now shall mine head be lifted up above mine Enemies round about me therefore will Loffer in his Tabernacle sacrifices of joy I will sing yea I will sing praises unto the Lord. Blessed be the Lord God of Israel who only does wondrous things And blessed be his glorious Name for ever and the let whole Earth be filled with his Glory Amen Amen FINIS Books sold by George Monke at the White Horse without Temple Bar and William Ewrey at the Golden Lyon and Lamb over against the Middle Temple Gate COllections of Travels Through Turkey into Persia and the East-Indies Giving an account of the Present State of those Countries As also a full Relation of the Five years Wars between Aureng-Zebe and his Brothers in their Father's Life time about the Succession And a Voyage made by the Great Mogul Aureng-Zebe with his Army from Dehli to Lahor from Lahor to Bemher and from thence to the Kingdom of Kachemire by the Mogols call'd The Paradise of the Indies Together with a Relation of the Kingdom of Japan and Tunkin and of their particular Manner and Trade To which is added a new Discription of the Grand Seignior's Sergalio And also of all the Kingdoms that encompass the Euxine and Caspian Seas Being the Travels of Monsieur Tavernierbernier and other great Men Adorned with many Copper Plates The Lively Oracles Given to us or the Christian's Birth-right and Duty in the Custody and Use of the Holy Scripture By the Author of whole Duty of Man.
A SERMON Preached before the Mayor Aldermen and Common-Council OF NOTTINGHAM IN St. PETER's CHURCH On the 14th of Febr. 1688 / 9. Being the Thanksgiving Day FOR Our Deliverance from Popery and Arbitrary Power By W. Wilson M.A. Rector of the said Church LONDON Printed for W. Ewrey at the Golden Lyon and Lamb over against the Middle Temple Gate in Fleetstreet 1689. To the Right Worshipfull the Mayor the Worshipfull the Aldermen and the Gentlemen that belong to the Common Council of the Town and County of the Town of Nottingham Gentlemen A Although when I preacht this Sermon I had no thoughts of making it more Publick than I did from the Pulpit yet since you are pleas'd to Command it to the Press for thus I always interpret what You Acquest I could not be long unresolved whom to Address it to That pious sense you have of that Mighty Deliverance which on this 14th day we did and I hope always shall Commemorate with unspeakable pleasure in our selves for the Blessing we have received with greatfull acknowledgments for his Extraordinary Generosity in putting himself in jeopardy for our Sakes to our Great Deliverer and with Songs of Praise and the most lively and transported Affections to our God who made this Excellent Prince the Man at his right hand for the re-establishing his Jerusalem did easily reconcile a Discourse that was intended to excite suitable Affections for so great a Blessing And it is the same Piety does not onely encourage me to present it to but does Entitle you to it For the suitableness of the matter to the Disposition of your minds will I can easily hope as well prevail with you to over-look the meanness of the performance when you read as when you heard it That which God aims at in all his wondrous Works was the design of my preaching this Sermon And if by being Publisht it does but contribute any thing toward the awakening that fear and awfull regard to the Divine Majesty in the minds of Men which he visibly calls for when his dispensations are as wonderfull as they are compasionate and gracious I shall then have great reason to thank you for your Importunities and place it to those other accounts whereby you have obliged me to be as indeed I am Your very faithfull and Humble Servant W. Wilson A SERMON Preached On the 14th of February 1688 / 9. BEING The Thanksgiving Day LVKE V. 26. And they were all amazed and they glorified God and were filled with fear saying we have seen strange things to day SO much do the divine Perfections transcend all that we behold in this lower world that it is not possible but the contemplations of an infinitely wise and powerfull Being should fill us with wonder and astonishment if we could but rid our minds of those sensible impressions that fill our imaginations and consider him either as he is in himself or according to those Idea's of his excellent nature that he has imprinted upon our Souls but to see him face to face and know as we are known is too great a thing for the condition of Mortals this is the work and privilege of Angels and perfect Spirits who dwell in that Glory that is unrevealed to us and are the glorious Inhabitants of the City of the Living God and honour'd with the privilege of standing about his Throne and being the ministering Spirits of his Providence and which will be the blessing of us mortal creatures when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption and we shall not onely be received to an immediate fruition of him but be rendered capable of seeing him as he is by having the powers and faculties of our Souls exalted to the utmost perfection they are capable of But while we have our habitation in the Dust and converse among sensible objects so much power have they over us that they darken our Minds and so much hamper and clog our Souls that they either look no higher than to the things that sense or imagination do present us with or if any time we by strong resolutions do rescue our thoughts from the objects of sense and break those chains wherewith they lead our Souls captive and lift up our Minds to contemplate the glory and excellency of the divine Nature we know but in part and see through a Glass darkly Hence it comes to pass that whenever God does in signal and remarkable effects display the wonder of his Power or any other Perfection we like creatures bereav'd of our senses are struck with admiration and amazement Thus it was with those Jews that beheld the miraculous cure of the Paralytick mentioned v. 18. they not onely considered our blessed Lord as a mere Man but as one of the meanest of his Brethren and therefore when the Faith of the sick man and that of those that brought him did so far excite his compassions that he not only granted him the cure that he came for but that which was much greater the Forgiveness of his sins the Scribes and Pharisees not knowing him to be God manifested in the flesh began to reason among themselves and to charge him with Blasphemy for assuming a power that does not belong to Man But how much soever they were mistaken concerning the excellence and dignity of his Person yet when they beheld the Paralytick to arise and take up that whereon he lay and to depart to his house they could not withstand so great an evidence of a divine Power The meaner their thoughts concerning him were the more surprizing was the miracle it broke in upon their minds with the more force and violence because it was but little they expected from one of his low character and quality They were all amazed and glorified God and were filled with fear saying we have seen strange things to day And if we consider the occasion of this day's solemnity we may discern so eminent an instance of the divine Power and Goodness as few Ages can parallel We have seen a Kingdom distracted with fears languishing under dismal apprehensions destined to slavery and which is worse threatened with Popery restored to its self and raised to life again in so miraculous a manner as may well give us reason to say We have seen strange things to day That great and wonderfull Person whom it has pleased God to make the instrument of our deliverance has by his heroick actions gain'd himself so great a Character in the world and so high a Reputation for his love of Religion and zeal for the true Interest of Christendom as might naturally prompt us to cast our eyes upon him as the only visible means to preserve us But yet when we either reflect upon his or our own circumstances so little methinks could be expected from him when his own Countrey was extremely apprehensive of the threatening Power of a potent Enemy and so much appeared to be requisite to our deliverance when the Enemies of our Religion and
strict charge not to let their Parents see them Such is the Spirit of Popery and such are the methods it makes use of for the propagating it self Methods that overturn the very foundations of Communities and make Society far more uncomfortable than a Desart And yet this is not the worst of it for it is a Religion 2. That when all other methods fail'd for the making you Papists endeavour'd to make you slaves And to a generous mind death is not so terrible as the insultings of a barbarous Army and the insupportable Miseries of an Arbitrary Power I speak not here my own sense of our lamentable condition but that which the Composers of the Prayers for this joyfull day and an august Assembly has given as the reason of their appointing this Festivity nay that which you and the whole Kingdom have complained of and groan'd under For to what other purpose was a dispencing Power vested in our Prince and stiffly maintained as the Diana of all his other Prerogatives but that if his interests did so require and his Soul could stoop to so base a thing he might exercise an uncontrol'd Authority over your Persons and Estates and leave you no other way to help your selves and ease your sad complaints but your Prayers and Patience To what purpose were you deprived of your privilege of petitioning a privilege which God the supreme Monarch not only allows but charges the neglect thereof as a great impiety to what purpose I say was this made a mark of Faction and exclaimed against as a crime tending to Rebellion but to teach you the tameness of the most sluggish Brute to take up your burthen and bear your stripes without any seeming sense of the weight and painfulness thereof To what purpose was the humour of addressing for such things as were the Kingdom 's Grievances promoted and encouraged but to inure you to like the hardest things that should be put upon you by the Court To what end was an Army kept up in a time of peace but to make it fatall almost to groan in private under your calamities and to give the Popish Faction an opportunity to advance their designs with more haste and fury than they could by the slow steps of the preceeding Reign To this end were our Laws dispensed with Judges displaced when their Consciences permitted them not to be the betrayers of their Countrey and to act according to the Directions and Councils of Father Peters and his party Persons disabled by our Laws put into Places of the greatest Trust and profit In a word for I need not set before you all the methods that have been taken for the destroying the fundamentals of our Constitution since they are too fresh before you not to be remembered by you with bleeding hearts to what purpose I say was the violent invasion of your Rights and the treachery of surrendering your Privileges but to give the Court a power to pack Parliaments at their pleasure and to undoe us by a Law What great advantage the Contrivers of our misery gained by this forward Treachery and what use when the posture of their affairs would have permitted they might at least make thereof the lamentable case of those of New-England is a very sad and lively instance For no sooner were they possessed of their Charters but their new Masters who were set over them told them that their Charter being gone their Title to their Lands and Estates were gone therewith and that all was the King's that they represented the King and that therefore all persons must take Patents from them and give what they saw meet to impose that so they might enjoy the Houses their own Hands had built and the Lands which at vast Charges in subduing a Wilderness they had for many years a rightfull possession of and accordingly the Governour ordered the Lands beloning to some in Charles Town to be measured out and given to his Creatures and Writs of Intrusion to be issued out against others And if there were any that were so hardy as to offer to maintain their Rights by a course at Law they were imprisoned and fined Such was the miserable state that People were reduced to and which the violent Counsels of the Romish Party filled the Minds of the whole Kingdom with frightfull apprehensions of But God who at sundry times and in divers manners saved our Forefathers from the hellish Conspiracies of these wretched Men has been pleased mightily to interpose in our favour and to deliver us from the dread of Romish zeal and bigottry Which brings me 2. To consider our Deliverance which is so conspicuous a demonstration of the amiableness of the divine Perfection and the goodness of his Providence that we have infinite reason to say We have seen strange things to day For we have seen the fairest prospect and the most assured hopes Popery ever had of settling among us since the Reformation defeated and disappointed not only the arguments of the Romish Missionaries baffled for if the Field was to be wone with no other weapons but these I dare say that they themselves have long ago seen reason sufficient to despair of a conquest but their Dragoons whose weapons of cruelty they much rather depend upon vanquish'd and scatter'd It is not my design to insult upon the misfortunes of an unhappy Prince whom the Counsels of that restless Party have undone But this I may say that since he was so unfortunate to espouse an Interest so contrary to that of his Kingdom which ought to have been his dearest and the Counsels of Jesuites influenced the publick authority as our Danger was the more threatening so our Deliverance is the more amazing Such are the Principles so black the Designs of that restless Party that as by their frequent endeavours to subvert our Religion and Goverment they have given us but too great reason to say It is impossible that State should ever continue long in peace and quiet which they have opportunities to creep into but when they find ways not only to corrupt a Court but to pervert a Prince and unhappily to engage him in their designs as his case is much to be lamented their attempts grow more bold and daring and the safety of a State must necessarily be put into the greatest extremity of hazard and this is that which does magnifie the Deliverance we now bless God for For we have not only seen the great Incendiaries of Kingdoms the spightfull Enemies of our Religion and Liberties chased from their private Cabals and ferreted out of their holes and dark retirements but from their Schools and Colleges from the places of of greatest Trust and publick Employments and above all from their Chairs of Confession and the King 's Privy Council we have seen a Church doom'd to ruine and violently shockt by the vigorous attacks of implacable foes to triumph over the infatuated Counsels of Priests and Jesuites and a State threatened with a