their blood by sea and land for that truth and doctrine which is according to godlinesse that should be deare to us beyond and above our lives And shall not we offer them the assistance of our utmost intercessions What could we say to God Or how could we satisfy our own conscience in so cleare and crying an exigent if we should as nothing concerned in the quarrel or it's consequences forbeare to do this How will we make it appeare that we prefer Jerusalem to our chief joy and are lovers of righteousnesse on whose side soever it is found or are really desirous to do all that is in our power to prevent the bondage of the nation and preserve our selves and our posterity from being sold slaves to forraigne enemies and the exorbitant lust of our own Court if now when there is no other work for us to do we make it not our work to lift up our heart with our hands unto God in the heavens praying and pleading by all manner of prayer and supplication either to reclaime our rulers from these unrighteous and violent courses or to preserve our oppressed brethren and appeare their protector when deserted of all humane help We would take heed how we lay our selves aside from this innocent and Christian concurrence I doubt nothing but as the Lord will write in most legible Characters and witnesse either sooner or later high and hore displeasure against all the contrivers of this war and willing contributers of their assistance to it and reckon them vvho if it vvere but by their vvords and vvishes vvitnesse their concurrence and shevv themselves enemies to our oppressed protestant friends though they neither be guilty of that theiving basensse of caping or a more formal conjunction this abominable war adversaries to the reformed Religion through the World and enemies to all righteousnesse amongst men so I am equally perswaded they shall make themselves guilty of a detestable neutrality and incurre the curse of not helping the Lord against the mighty vvho do not implore his Aid for our oppressed brethren and stirre not up themselves to pray that he would appeare to plead a cause that is so much his own Let not the vain fancy of affection to the honour of the Nation when to the height of basenesse engaged in a vvar or lothnesse to see our countrey-men put to shame even vvhen it is impossible to appeare in this engagement and cover our shame de murre or foreslovv us in this duety It 's true our Nation ought to be deare unto us the lives and honour of our countrey-men precious in our sight but we should be so much Protestants so much Christians as to acquiesce rather that vve our posterity our name and Nation should be delete perish from under the heavens of the Lord before the reformed Religion that great interest of Christ in the World by our successe be destroyed or his declarative glory suffer an ecclipse Nay let us consult either reason or Religion and then the thing which seemeth to demurre or dissvvade will certainly drive us to the duety that is pressed Let us love our Lord Jesus Christ so well let us love the honour prosperity and welfare of our Nation so well let us love the reput and renown of our countrey-men so well as to pray that his Kingdome may come and that the designes of these who in this engagement are engaged against us and our precious interests may be defeat and that their hands may not be able to performe their enterprise and there is no more driven at or desired for if the sword that is now drawn against the Dutch return victorious and drunk with their blood it will not be put up till the yoke be wreathed about our neck and it have shed the blood of such who are not so much beasts as with a tamenesse to take it on and if we be deprived of and out-live the lose of our onely treasure Religion and liberty where then is the blessednesse we spoke of Where then is the glory of our nation whereof we boasted Happy is the man who knoweth the times and what Israel hath to do while it is the plague of many that they are as asses couching under the burden Once for all let us feare and stand aloof from yea in our place and station withstand all these sinful combinations with such as have turned aside unto their crooked vvayes and designe and endeavour vvith so much vigour the overturning of his vvork lest God lead us forth vvith the vvorkers of Iniquity It 's true he must have a Church and his interest must be preserved for the gates of hell cannot prevail against it yet if vve either join vvith these consederats against him or forbeare to witnesse our desire of his abiding with us by pleading with him for the preservation of his low his abandoned born down yea and betrayed interests deliverance shall come another way for he is the God of salvations against whom in this conjunction we have lifted up the head and stretched out the hand but we our interest and whatsoever is deare and desirable to men shall be destroyed and perish But my brethren as I hope for better things of you yea for all things vvhich may prove you to be lovers of our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity of the Churches abroad and of our Nation 's interest honour and liberty though I thus speak so I desire to beleeve that not onely that poor people against whom our Court with the French are engaged the second part of Herod and Pilat's History shall be preserved though they may be brought lovv but that the destruction of the poor remnant amongst our selves vvhich that the actors may at once take away Religion and liberty together with our lives is intended shall be prevented for strong is the Lord God who judgeth the enemies of his people and pleadeth the causes of their soul Let us therefore wait on him and continue with him in these tentations carrying in the duties of the present day and amidst all the dangers which accompany a faithful acquiting of our selves in our Masters service as knowing that the adversaries of the Lord shall be broken in pieces out of heaven shall he thunder upon them The Lord shall judge the ends of the earth he shall give strength unto his King the coming of whose Kingdome is now so much opposed by these Kings and destruction of whose subjects and people is so manifestly designed and furiously driven by them and exalt the horne of his anointed when he hath provided carpenters to fray the horns of these who rejoyce in a thing of nought and have taken unto them horns by their own strength to push the inheritance of the Lord Faxit Deus et festinet and then we have the desire of our hearts FINIS REader though thou mayest sometime finde in perusing this paper a Letter redundant as ane for an or it may be the same Letter twice or a letter wanting as of for off lest for least or one letter sometime for another as these for those which will not make thee misse the sense yet these few small following lapses thou mayest thus correct P. 13. l. 16. ingenuousnesse r. ingeniousnesse P. 16. l. 19. sea r. See P. 34. l. 7. do insist r. do I insist P. 67. l. 14. sujects r. subjects P. 69. l. 9. phohibit r. prohibit P. 70. l. ult bebate r. debate P. 77. l. 33. del of ibid. l 34. Alter r. Altar P. 84. l. 21. priciples r. principles P. 96. l. ult furbishing r. fourbishing P. 102. l. 2. remembring r. remembering P. 108. l. 1. conjunction this r. conjunction in this
while his precious interests and People are in such hasard shall the Lords voice be crying to the city to the countrey to the nation to all the Churches of Christ in the earth and shall not we be so wise to see his name and understand the language of this his terrible rod held over our head and the designe of him who appointeth it It 's high time to awake when we are liketo sleep the sleep of death if we sleep long Secondly it is not every inquiry into the emergents of the present day or observation of the sad posture of affairs that will prove us to be men of understanding who know the time If we could dive into the depth of all our enemies secreets and make a perfect discovery of all their desperat designes yet unlesse we consider the things which are like to overwhelme us in their procuring cause unlesse we set our selves to search out the accursed thing that is with us and what are the national yea personal provocations of his sons and his daughters for which he is like to give up the dearlie beloved of his soul into the hand of his enemies and into the hand of such as hate them with cruel hatred all is lost labour It would draw me to a length beyond my designe to reckon up in order our provocations or represent them with their high and hainous aggravations time would fail for such an undertaking who is sufficient for this thing we may with great certainty say upon a very overly search that our wickednesse is great and our trasgressions infinit it 's well for us they want this of simple infinitnesse that they can be swallovved up of infinit mercy But there seemeth to be some special provocation comprehensive of all the rest pointed at by these manifold and multiplied dreadful calamities under vvhich this poor nation hath been crushed and by all these more formidable things vvhereby utter destruction of our persons posterity and of all our interests both sacred and civil is further threatned this is the thing for which he is mainly contending and this is that dangerous enemy that domestick enemy the destroyer of the Church and Nation after which our inquiry should be and having discovered this enemy if we would have Peace with God even that Peace which passeth understanding peace in life and death Peace in our borders and on the Israel of God we are not to let him when found go in Peace a revenge here vvith the height of hatred and indignation is not onely lavvful but in order to the preservation of soul and body Church and Kingdome Religion and liberty simply necessar and indispensibly duety If vve do not search this out he vvill seek out our vvickednesse till he finde none and then vvoe unto us or having found it if vve make light of the matter then we engage him to let us know that it is a bitter and an evil thing that we have forsaken the Lord our God and that his feare hath not been before us if we would have his eye spare our's must not But what may this Provocation be I must professe my self helped in this inquiry by calling to minde what an eminently faithful Minister of Jesus Christ said preaching at a fast upon our anniversary day kept for the burning of London after he had insisted upon many sins which might be pointed at by such a remarkable stroak but said he the strangenesse and stupendiousnesse of this judgement seemeth to point at some one sin which is by the head and shoulders taler then all the rest ajudgement the like whereof was never in the nation seemeth to point at a provocation never before in all it's circumstances nationally committed what can this be Truely said he we need go no further to finde it out here it is God burnt or permitted in his anger this City to be burnt because in it by an order of King and Parliament horresco referens be astonished O heavens at this that solemne Covenant entered into with the most high God about things which had the most cleare connexion with his glory and direct tendency to the advancement of the Kingdome of his Son in the nation and in the souls of men wherein also the temporal aswel as the eternal welfare of each and all the persons contracting vvith the Lord God as his Maj. vvho ovveth his crovvn and establishment to it may say vvas provided for and secured even this Covenant vvas burnt in our city by the hand of the common Hangman this said he is a punishment in it's greatnesse and strangenesse some way proportioned to the sin pointed at whereby it vvas procured He spake like a Seer and one who had the minde of Christ that said it O that all ministers of the nation spake the same things at least on those dayes appointed for weeping between the porch and the alter and that all the professing people of the nation who have come under the bond of this Covenant might in order to a right mourning before the Lord be like minded However in this discovery I subsist It was fit it was an act of holy righteousnesse in the judge of all the World that the nations abroad who had heard of the burning of this Covenant and had observed how in this our rage against God his vvork way and People had reached unto heaven by which act also he being the great and glorious party contracted with we gave him with all imaginable fury and formality the defiance should also heare hovv this glorious Lord God thus dispightfully and dareingly provocked had burnt that City and sent as it vvere fire dovvn from heaven upon it to consume the place vvhere such a prodigious vvickednesse had been committed Truely my brethren it concerneth all of us in this day of his contendings with us and in this yeer of controversies to call to minde a broken Covenant and a burnt Covenant vvhereby vve our King our Parliament and the vvhole nation stood unalterably engaged to make our selves happy in holinesse in vvorshiping the living God according to his ovvn vvill and in walking before him in our particular stations and relations like the vvorshipers of the true God vvhose main designe in the World should be the adorning of his Doctrin and shewing forth his vertues in all things This Covenant I say which bound us to our own blessednesse in binding us to the good behaviour towards him was broken and these cords were cast away from us this pale whereby we were onely hedged up from falling into everlasting burnings was plucked up Now Brittain novv England lay it to thy heart for this the hand of the great God hath smitten for this thing it is still stretched out Will we not take warning will we harden our selves against him prosper May not the things which have overtaken us already make us know that it is a feareful thing to fall into the hands of the living God Oh inconsideration hath hardened
mervellous in their eyes Novv is our Court confounded and distracted because the Lord against vvhom they had sinned vvith so high a hand made bare his holy Arm in the sight of the nations by fighting against them novv is the nation in an universal consternation novv is London seised vvith a panick feare to that height as it had been easy for the enemy to have burnt the remainders of our City that had escaped the former fire And vvhereas vve vvould have a vvar on any terms vvith our peacable neighbours novv vve must post avvay our order to accept of a peace on any termes and vvhich is remarkable be forced to passe from those pretensions on vvhich vve had founded the equity of our vvar thus are vve stript of our glory and the crovvn vvhich vve had vvorn for many yeers in the sight of the Nations falleth from our head alas that vve should have forgotten to have said woe unto us that we have sinned England vvho had upheld these Provinces against the pride of the Spanish Tyrranny England vvho had conquered France and at the same time vvere victorious over the Scotch their confederats must novv finde the nation perfectly besieged by them vvhom in our pride vve thought not a people our ships burnt in the most secure harbours of England and vve necessitat when under the feet of these whom vve had despised to accept of a peace which they might have made us condescend unto upon lesse honourable termes Which things befell us that when the present generation shall consider and the succeeding ages inquire into the cause of this disaster and aske the question how vve vvere so vvonderfully brought down It may be answered because in stead of keeping the Covenant with their God they burnt it therefore that they might read their sin and rage in their judgement or if they would not others might as he had formerly burnt their City now he burnt their ships not in the sea but vvithin their harbours and thus he called the Nations to be vvitnesses to the heat of his displeasure in burying our glory As their was never such a sin before committed in the land we were never thus put to shame and spit upon in the sight of the nations our being made base contemptible in the eyes of them vvho honoured us and had us in estimation must be refounded upon our bold sining against the most high God and our trampling upon his honour and interest vvith such evidences of contempt hath made us be greatly despised amongst the Nations and caused him against whom we had lifted up our selves trample us under foot as the mire of the streets Well wee must now beare our shame and finde our selves sunk in the gulfe of ignominy whereby the Lord was in a manner trying us if vve would turn from the evil of our way But Alas that which was the observe of the Holy Ghost upon Ahaz was manifestly verified upon us so that it might have been with the same evidence and certainty said this is that Court this is that Kingdome who being rebuked so remarkably did in stead of accepting the punishment of their sin trespasse yet more and more against the Lord. In this interval wherein we seemed to have tranquillity from enemies without the plague upon our heart is more evident by the evil that was in our hand vve had some quiet it 's true vvherein he gave us space to repent and accept of the punishment of our sins but it vvas not so much a true peace as the dravving back of the hand of the great God that he might fetch the sorer blovv for in stead of humbling our selves under the mighty hand of God as if vve did meditat revenge against heaven vve not onely continued in our former unchristian practices but vvhat our imperial crown had lost of it's lustre vve think to make it up by appending the Mediator's crown to it and therefore though we fall before others yet we will as we began continue to fight against God and in this interval of peace from forraigne enemies as we had burnt the bond of our subjection to Jesus Christ so in prosecution of the same quarrel we advance our supremacy to the degrading and exautorating of him by whom Kings reigne and carry with that height of insolence as if we had not onely resolved to out-do all that ever led the way to us in this opposition to Christ as King in Zion but further to give the defiance to all that ever should come after us to make a law vvhich being considered in it's most plain and obvious meaning can without straining speak this more explicitly that this man this one Jesus who calleth himself a King shall not reigne over us we have no King but Caesar we stated the question de finibus Imperii mediatoris and decided in our ovvn favour once for all making a decree to take the house of God in possession to our selves yea and as if vve intended to eternize our enmity and opposition to the son of God vve together vvith the imperial crovvn of the Nation transmit a legal right to our successors to the crovvn and scepter of Jesus Christ as if it vvere a satisfaction for us to lie dovvn in the grave vvith an assurance that his crovvn should not floorish upon his ovvn head by vvhich one act all our former insolencies were reacted vvith this addition that vvhatever vve please to do in the house of the God of heaven hereafter must be legal And thus the Church hath got an exotick head and vve have filled up the measure of our iniquity O that it might please the father of mercies to give repentance to his Majesty the Nation and to preserve both from reaping that harvest of grief and desperat sorrow vvhich such a seed-time presageth In the mean time the consumption of the nation is visible in it's countenance it 's soul and substance is consumed as vvas excellently laid openin that first second discourse of my Lord Lucas before the house of Lords in whom alone the ancient gallant spirit of the English Nation did shew it self and shine forth who by that heroick act hath erected to himself a monument in the heart of all true English-men proposed himself as a worthy paterne of imitation to all who affect the glory of being true Patriots yet while the Nation is in this low and languishing condition vve are ploting and contriving a new war against the Dutch and therefore vve pick quarrels vvith them to give our own designes some colour of justice having resolved upon the vvar let them offer what rational satisfaction they can yet as if the Lord from heaven would openly rebuke these secret mischievous contriveances and works of darknesse he in a manner giveth a commission to that very element the stage on which we designe to act this wickednesse to fall upon us sink our ships at sea sweep away a considerable part of our