fire without Metaphor So that desire alone without its satisfaction is so much of Hell and yet this is the worldly sensual mans estate exactly here on Earth for he hath nothing but desires and lusts and his condition is not easier at all for how is Tantalus more wretched than a Midas or than any covetous wretch who in the midst of affluence and heaps hungers as much as Midas did for meat and for Gold too and can touch neither for his uses so that the Worlds delights are very like the miserys of Hell and men with so much eager and impatient pursuit do but anticipate their torments and invade Damnation here And if the case be so sure there is no great self-denyal in our Psalmist here when he resolves to desire nothing upon Earth in comparison of his God 'T is no such glorious conquest of my Appetite to make it not pursue a present Hell and an eternal one annext to it before a Saviour Yet the world does so Some there are that desire Money rather and although when Judas did so this desire could not bear it self but cast all back again and though it did disgorge it burst him too the Sin it self supply'd the Law and his guilt was his Execution Yet this will not terrifie men will do the like betray a Master and a Saviour and a God onely not for so little money peradventure Others when the Lord paid his own Blood for their Redemption yet if their wrath thirsts for his Blood that does offend them their revenge makes their Enemies the sweeter blood though their own Soul bleed to death in his stream To others the deservings of the partner of an unclean moment are much greater than all that the Lord Jesus knew to merit at their hands or purchase for them And it is no wonder they are so ungrateful to their Saviour when they are so barbarous to themselves as to choose not to have present Divine Possessions rather than not suffer the vengeance of their own Appetites choose meerly to desire here though that be to do what they do in Hell rather than have in Heaven O thou my Soul if thou wilt needs desire propose at least some satisfaction to thy Appetite do not covet onely needs thirst for a feaver and desire meerly to inflame desire and Torments But seek there where all thy wants will find an infinite happy supply even in thy Saviour covet the riches of his Grace and Goodnesse thirst for the fountain opened for transgression for the waters of the well of Life desire him that is the desire of all Nations yet why should we desire even him when we have him in Heaven and we have nothing upon Earth left to desire but that God who hath exalted him unto his Kingdom in Heaven would in his due time exalt us also to the same place whither our Saviour Christ is gone before To whom c. SERMON VII VVHITE-HALL Third Wednesday in LENT 1663 4. MARK I. 3. Prepare ye the way of the Lord. I Shall not break this single short Command asunder into Parts but shall instead of doing that observe three Advents of our Saviour in this Life before that last to Judgment For each of which as it must concern us there must be preparation made by us In pressing which I do not mean to urge you to do that which none but God can do It is not in man to direct his own wayes much lesse the Lords The very preparations of the Heart are from Him Therefore supposing the preventings of his Graces I shall subjoyn that the Comporting with those graces the using of his strengths to the rooting out of our selves all aversation to Virtue and all love of Vice and planting other inclinations even Resolutions of good life is the onely thing that can make way for Christ and for his benefits Now of those Advents the First was when he came Commission'd by God to reveal his Will to propose the Gospel to our belief the coming of Christ as a Prophet which particularly is intended in the Text. The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ as it is written prepare ye the way of the Lord. The Second was that coming which the Prophet Isay did foresee and in the astonishment of Vision askt Who is this that comes from Edom with dy'd garments from Bozrah travelling in the greatness of his Strength Why is he red in his Apparrel and his garments like him that treadeth in the Wine-fat And it was the prospect of him when he came to tread the Wine press of the Wrath of God to Sacrifice himself for us upon the Crosse his coming as a Priest The Third is when he comes to visit for Iniquity coming coercively as a King with his Iron Rod to execute his threats on the rebellious those that will not have him reign over them This coming also was considered in my Text for in the parallel place of S. Matth. it is said Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand for this is he of whom it was spoken by the Prophet Esaias saying the Voyce of one crying in the Wilderness prepare ye the way of the Lord. For each of these in order I shall shew you what prepares his way beginning with the first His coming as a Prophet appearing in the World to reveal his Father's Will the Gospel Now the Preparative for this Appearance is discovered easily we find both in this Chapter and the parallel places that John came to make way for it by the Baptism and Preaching of Repentance and it was Prophecied of him that he should go before him in the Spirit and power of Elias to turn the hearts of the Fathers with the Children and the Disobedient to the Wisdom of the Just to the minding of just things so to make ready a people prepared for the Lord Luke 1. 17. And this is a preparative so necessary that the Nation of the Jewes affirm it is meerly for the want of this that he does yet deferr his coming And though the appointed time for it be past yet because of their sinfulnesse and impenitence he does not appear adding If Israel Repent but one day presently the Messias cometh And it is thus far true that though it hindred not his coming yet it hindred his receiving although it did not make him stay it made him be refus'd I may lay all down in this Proposition Where there is not the preparation of Repentance where there are not inclinations and desires for Virtue if Christ come with the glad tidings of the Gospel He is sure to be rejected his Religion disbeliev'd If the Word of the Son of God might be taken in his own case this would be soon evinc't for when He came unto his own they were so far from preparing his way that they received him not but did reject and would not entertain him as one sent from God of all this he onely
execution of the greatest and most Kingly Power and every Doctrine had the force of Proclamation every denunciation were Sentence as it will be certainly to them that do not give obedience to it Which obedience is Secondly and that most properly entitled the Kingdom of God Rom. 14. 17. for by that he Reigns without this our great universal Lord were a Prince of no Subjects had a Kingdom but of Rebells onely So that to receive the Kingdom of God is by the obedience of Faith to submit to the Gospel to receive the Doctrines of is by believing and the Precepts by obeying them The duty which our Saviour here directs and which with such severity he threatens non-performance of even with exclusion from that blessed Immortality of Joyes which the Kingdom of God imports which is that sense it bears in the last words of my Text. In which we must consider First the object both of the Duty and the Threat a Kingdom and that the Kingdom of God Secondly our concern and duty in relation to that Kingdom we have onely to receive it Whosoever shall not receive the Kingdom of God Whatever bustle men are well content to make to get possession of any Earthly Dignity or Power sometimes to wage war with their Conscience and all obligations violate all Rights both Humane and Divine and assault greatest difficulties and yet greater guilts to invade mens Crowns and other rights there 's no such need in this we have no more to do but let this Kingdom come and not resist the having it For therefore also Thirdly the manner we are by our Saviour here prescribed to receive this Kingdom in is as a little Child Whosoever shall not receive the Kingdom of God as a little Child as one that cannot stand against the power of a Kingdom when it comes that hath nor strength nor malice neither force nor will to oppose which they that do must needs keep themselves out of it Which is Fourthly the thing threatned they shall not enter therein there being neither reason nor indeed a possibility men should possesse that which they will not receive Lastly Christ's asseveration is added to all this Verily I say unto you whosoever shall not receive the Kingdom of God as a little Child he shall not enter therein But because the main thing Christ intended in the Text which he so oft repeated upon several occasions was by the significative embleme of a little Child visibly to informe us of some dispositions that are absolutely necessary to the entertaining Christianity either in our minds by Faith or in our lives by practise I shall therefore wholly attend that design of his in the words and handle them particularly as they seem here to be spoken in relation to the Doctrine of it This being most of use now in an age when men not only tear Religion with disputes but aime to baffle it with reproaches quite out of the world Now against such the text is positive Whosoever shall not receive the Kingdom of God the Doctrine of Christianity as a little Child he cannot enter therein neither into the possession of the Promises of Christianity nor indeed into the profession of it And here I need not labour much to finde that in a child which Christ requires of those that come to be disciples in Religion for it is plain that children being impotent unable to sustaine or to direct themselves they give themselves up to the aids and the directions of others those especially whom they are committed to and with whose cares of them they are acquainted to whose guidance they resign themselves entirely laying hold on them in any dangerous appearance and not trusting to themselves at all And when their age first makes them capable of having any thing infus'd into them being empty and unseason'd vessels they will easily receive all and sincerely without taint And being neither fill'd before hand with prejudicate opinions nor with windy vaine conceits of their own skill or knowledge they must needs take in without any let or hindrance what ever is infus'd and submit themselves to be directed wholly by their teachers without contradiction or dispute for they Judge not nor examine but receive Now such a resignation seems the proper disposition which our Saviour expects in a disciple It is plain that his pretended Vicar and that Church expect it that men shall submit their Faith entirely to the Church believe whatever shee proposeth as reveal'd by God meerly on that account as she proposeth it for otherwise it is not a right faith Yea she requires that men give their assent to the determinations of her head the Pope in matters of fact also where they are as competent to Judge as he And though with all their industry and using the same means they cannot finde the fact to be as he determines yet they are oblig'd in conscience to that superior to depart from their own Judgement and to yield and sign their assent to his determinations Witnesse the matter of Jansenius Yea their great Cardinal is positive that If the Pope could erre so far as to call evil good good evil to prohibit vertues or command vices the Church were bound in conscience to believe those vices good and honest and those vertues evil So far he Indeed if that Church be the Mother and Nurse of all Christians 't is from her breasts only they must seek the sinceremilk of the word Now that she is so they must take her word as Children do their Parents words that they are so And indeed this is properly to receive the Doctrine as a little Child not judge nor reason nor examine but believe it And such legendary doctrines as well as Histories which they deliver are most fit to be receiv'd by such as Children Yet as if this had been the proper method among Christians alwaies in S. Austin's time we finde the Manichees derided Christianity that discipline of Faith because by that men were commanded to believe and were not taught how to distinguish truth from falshood by clear reason and again that it requires us to assent before we have a reason for it And long before that Celsus did advise the Christians to receive no doctrines but on the account of reason credulity being the inlet to deceit saying they that without grounds believe are like those that admire and are satisfied with juglers and take appearances and sleight of hand for truth adding many of the Christians neither would receive nor give a reason of their faith but us'd to say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do not you examine but believe 't is your faith shall save you and as if from the beginning it were so we cannot but have heard the story of that man that reading Genesis where Moses says In the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth And he said let there be light and there was light c. Swore at him saying this Barbarian
his indignation by force I can but pity them in their own opinions and enjoyments but O my soul enter not thou into their counsels As for seeking their King I shall content my self vvith that vvhich Calvin saies upon the words Nam aliter verè ex animo Deum quaerere non potuit quin seetiam subjiceret legitimo â—mperio cuâ— subjectus erat For they could not otherwise truly and with all their heart seek God except they did subject themselves to his Government to whom they did of right belong as Subjects And I shall adde that they vvho do forsake their King vvill soon forsake their God The Rabbines say it more severely of Israel that they at once rejected three things the Kingdome of the house of David and the Kingdome of Heaven and the Sanctuary And truly if vve do consult that State from the beginning we shall find that vvhen they vvere vvithout their King they alvvaies vvere vvithout their God Moses vvas the first King in Jeshurun and he vvas only gone into the Mount for forty daies and they set up a golden Calf they make themselves a God if they vvant him vvhom the Lord makes so as he does the Magistrate if they have not a Prince that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 living Image of God then they must have an Idâ—l When Moses his next successor vvas dead vve read that the man Micah had an house of Gods and consecrated one of his sons to be his Priest and truly he might make his Priest vvho made his Deities And the account of this is given In those daies there vvas no King in Israel Iud. 17. 5 6. The very same is said ch 18. 1. to preface the Idolatry of the Tribe of Dan There vvas no heir of restraint as it is worded ver 7. It seems to curb impiety is the Princes Inheritance vvhich till it be supprest he hath not what he is heir to But Vice vvill know no boundaries if there be no King vvhose sword is the only mound and fence against it for if vve read on there 19 20 21. ch vve shall finde those dismal tragedies of Lust and VVarre the one of vvhich did sin to death the Levites wife the other besides 40000. slain of them vvho had a righteous cause and vvhom God did bid fight destroyed also a Tribe in Israel these all spraâ—g from the same occasion for so the story closes it In those daies there was no King in Israel ch 21. 25. Just upon this when God in their necessities did raise them Iudges that is Kings read all their story you will find to almost every several Judge there did succeed a several Idolatry God still complaining the children of Israel did evill again after the death of such an one till he raised them another Those 450. years being devided all betwixt their Princes and their Idols After them Jeroboam he that made the great secession of that people from their Prince hath got no other character from God but this the a Man that did make Israel to sin at once against God and against their King Yea upon this account they are reckon'd by God to sin after both their Idolatry and State vvere ended vvhen their calves and their Kingdome vvere destroyed Ezek. 4. 4 5. the Lord does bid the Prophet lie on his left side 390. daies to bear the iniquity of Israel according to the number of the years of their iniquity But this vvas more then the years of their State vvhich vvere only 255. 390. years indeed there vvere betwixt the falling off of the ten Tribes and the destruction of Ierusalem by the King of Babel but those ten Tribes vvere gone their Kingdome perfectly destroy'd above 130. years before but their iniquity vvas not it seems that does outlive their State so long as that God's Temple that King's house did stand from vvhich they did divide As if Seditious men and Schismaticks sin longer then they are even while those are vvhom they do sin against in separating from 'T is true there vvas an Ahaz and Manasseh in the house of David but Hezekiah and Iosiah did succeed Mischief did not appear entail'd on Monarchy as 't is upon rebellion and having no King It does appear their Kings vvere guards also to God and his Religion the great defendors of his faith and worship God and the Prince for the most part stood and fell together Therefore St. Paul did afterwards advise to pray for Kings that we might live in godliness and honesty and still they vvere the same vvho sought the Lord their God and David their King But vvhy David their King for could his Kingdome disappear and be to seek of vvhom the Lord had said I have sworn once by my Holiness I will not fail David Psal. 89. And his Throne therefore vvas as sure as God is holy But yet the Lord had said to the people of Israel If ye do wickedly ye shall be destroyed both you and your King There are other sins besides Rebellion and Treason that murder Kings and Governments Those that support their Ills by their dependencies and use great shadows for a sâ—elter to rapacity oppression or licences or any crying vvickedness these prove Traitors to Majesty and themselves strike at the root of that under vvhich they took covert fell that and crush themselves National vices have all Treason in them and every combination in such sins is a Conspiracy If universal practice palliate them we do not see their stain it may be think them slight but their complexion is purple Common blood is not deep enough to colour them they die themselves in that that 's sacred Nay these do seem to spread contagion to God as if they vvould not let the Lord be holy nor suffer that to be which he swore by his holiness should be for the Psalmist cries out Where are thy old loving kindnesses which thou swearest unto David But sure some of God's oaths will stand if not those of his kindness those vvill by vvhich he swears the râ—ine of such sinners and God that is holy will be sanctified in judgement upon them Yea upon more then the offenders for the guilty themselves are not a sacrifice equal to such piacular offences Innocent Majesty must bleed for them too If you do wickedly you shall be destroy'd both you and your King Thus when God vvould remove Judah out of his sight good Josiah must fall and the same makes them be to seek David their King But how David their King vvhen 't was Zorobabel for with Theodoret and others I conclude he must be meant in the first literal importance of the vvords It vvas the custome of most Nations from some great eminent prince to name all the Succession so at once to suggest his Excellencies to his followers and to make his glory live Now vvithout doubt David vvas Heroe enough for this and his â—lour alone sufficient to ground the like practice upon And
by early engagements tyed themselves to the observation of its duties if principles of probity in Nature fomented by others instil'd with Education have made impressions of duty on the mind and wrought a reverence and awe of God and of Religion which is a fence about them and does keep off Vice by making it seem strange uncouth and difficult while these fears and aversations are rooted in them why then the first thing that they do as soon as Youth and the Temptations do stir within them is to poyson these their own Principles by evil Conversation and from that and Example take infusions which shall impregnate them with humours of being in the fashion of the World Thus they labour to strangle the then troublesome modesties of Nature and of Virtuous breeding thus they look out ill Company to infect themselves And surely they that seek the Plague and run into infection we have cause to fear they have a Resolution to dye But Secondly If notwithstanding this in the first practises of Vice their former Principles stir and ferment within and fret the Conscience set that on working why then if the sin sting gently do but prick the heart and make an out-let for a little gush of Sorrow then in spight of Scripture they do teach themselves to think that grief Repentance and by the help of that conceit this sorrow cools and doth allay the swelling of the mind washes away the guilt and thought of the commission they have been sad and they believe repented as if those stings opened the fountain for transgression and those little wounds did flow with Balsom for themselves And by this means that sting of the old Serpent fin while it pretends to cure by hurting thus proves indeed the Tempter to go on For if this be all why should a man renounce all the Contents and satisfactions of his Inclinations and mortifie and break his nature to avoid a thing which is so easily repented for No if it be no worse they can receive this Serpent in their bosome dare meet his sting and run upon these wounds and they do so till the frequent pungencies and cicatrices have made the Conscience callous and insensible the heart hardned But if their first essays of sin were made unfortunate by Notoreitie or some unhappy circumstance and so the wound were deep and the Conscience troublesome and restlesse because this is very uneasie these inward groans make discord in their cheerful aires make their life harsh they therefore find it necessary to confront the shame with Courage of iniquity go boldly on that so they may outlook it sear their own Conscience that its wounds may not bleed And as those Fiends of Men who Sacrific'd their Children in the fire to Moloch that they might not hear their Infants shreek nor their own Bowels croke had noyses made with Timbrels to out-voice them So these to drown the cryes and howlings of their wounded mind put themselves in perpetual hurry of divertisement and vice make Tophet about themselves and with the noyse of Ryots overcome all other because they will not hearken to those groans that call for the Physician of Souls and then sure these resolve to dye Nay if this will not keep them quiet you may see them sometimes ruffle with their own Consciences defie present Convictions in the very instant of Commission men so set on Death that they Condemn themselves in that which they allow And though a man would think there should be little satisfaction in those pleasures which Condemnation thrusts it self into and which have an alloy of so sad apprehensions yet such are it seems the satisfactions of sin For while it stabs and gashes He brave Hero of Iniquity can charge the wounds and take the Vice Yea Thirdly though the Lord himself appear and take part in the Quarrel joyn with our Principles and Conscience against the fin and with importunate calls alarm us give us no rest ordain a Function of men by whom he does beseech us dresses their Messages with Promises of that which God is blessed in and arms them too with Terrors such as Devils tremble at and joyns his Holy Spirit too that Power of the Highest sends him in Tongues of Fire that he also may Preach this to our very Hearts and fright us with more flame And yet the sinner breaks these strengths and vanquishes the Arts and strivings of Divine Compassion If these Embassadors speak Charms it is but what God tells our Prophet in this Chapter v. 32. And lo thou art unto them as a very lovely Song of one that hath a pleasant voyce and can play well on an Instrument And it does dye like that as it there follows They hear thy words but they do them not And if they flash in Hell against their vices in torrents of threatning Scripture they concern themselves no more than they would in the story of a new Eruption of Mount AEtna or Vesuvius Yea they do quench the Spirit and his fires do not like the deaf Adder stop their ears against his whisperings and the charms of Heaven that were a weaker and less valiant guilt but are Religious in hearing them curious that they may be spoke with all advantages to make it harder not to yield and live that so they may expresse more resolution to perish and with more courage and solemnity may sin and dye Nay more when God hath found an Art to draw themselves into a League and Combination against their vices bound them in Sacraments to Virtue made them enter a Covenant of Piety and seal it in the Blood of God and by that foederall Rite with hands lift up and seizing on Christ's Body and with holy Vows oblige themselves to the performances or to the Threats of Gospel which they see executed in that Sacrament before their eyes see there death is the wages of iniquity they shew themselves its damned consequences while they behold it tear Christ's Body spill his Blood and Crucifie the Son of God yet neither will this frightful spectacle nor their own ties hold them from sin and ruine they break these bonds asunder to get at them The Wiseman sayes that wicked men seek death and make a Covenant with it and so it seems But sure they are strange wilful men that seek it at Gods Table in the Bread of Life that will wade through an Ocean of mercy to get at Perdition and find it in the Blood of Christ will drink Damnation in the Cup of Blessing men that poyson Salvation to themselves They that contract thus for Destruction and tye it to them at the Altar with such sacred Rites and Articles are sure resolv'd and love to dye Fourthly God had provided other Guards to secure men from sin and Death the Censures of the Church of which this Time was the great Season and the discipline of abstinence we now use is a piteous relique all that the world will bear it seems But as the
Lord appointed them they were so close a sence that our Saviour calls them Keyes of the Kingdom of Heaven as if they lockt us in the Path of Piety and Life and we must pick or break all that the Key of Heavin can make fast burst Locks as well as Vows before we can get out have liberty to sin God having bounded in the Christians race as that among the Grecians was which had a River on one side and Swords points all along the other so that Destruction dwelt about it on the borders And God hath mounded ours with the River of Hell the Lake of Fire and with these spiritual Swords as S. Cyprian and S. Hierome call the Censures But yet a Mound too weak alas to stand the Resolution and assaults of Vices now adayes which do not onely make great breaches in the Fence but have quite thrown it down and slighted it and the Church dares not set it up again should she attempt it they would scoff it down Men will endure no bar in the way to Perdition they will have liberty of Ruine will not be guarded from it so far from brooking Censures they will suffer no Reproof nor Admonition not suffer one word betwixt them and death eternal But Fiftly Though we will not let Almighty God restrain us with his Censures yet he will do it with his Rod and set the sharp stakes of Affliction in our walk to keep us in thus he makes sins sometimes inflict themselves and then we straight resolve to break off from them and while we suffer shame and feel destruction in the vice we shrink and uncling And now the sinner would not dye especially if his Precipitance have thrown him to the consines of the grave and while he took his full careers of Vice the fury of his course did drive him to the ports of Ruine and Death seemed to make close and most astonishing approaches when standing on the brink of the Abysse he takes a prospect of the dismal state that must receive him and his Vices then he trembles and flyes his apprehensions swoon his Soul hath dying qualins caused as much by the Nausea of sin as by the fear of Hell he is in agonies of passion and of prayer both against his former courses he never will come near them more and now sure God hath catch't him and his will is wholly bent another way now he will live the new life if God will grant him any But alas have we never seen when God hath done this for him stretch't out his Arm of Power hal'd him from the brow of the Pit and set him further off how he does turn and drive on furiously in the very same path that leads to the same Ruine and he recovers into death eternal And now this Will is grown too strong for the Almighty's powerful methods and frustrates the whole Counsell of God for his Salvation neglects his Calls and Importunacies whereby he warns him to consult his safety to make use of Grace in time not to harden his heart against his own mercies and perish in despight of mercy And when he can reject Gods Graces and his Judgments thus defie his Conscience and his own Experience too there is but one thing left wherein this Resolution can shew its courage and that is Sixthly His own present Interests All which the sinner can break through and despise to get at Death It is so usual to see any of the gross wasting Vices when it is once espoused murder the Reputation and all those great concerns that do depend upon a mans Esteem eat out his Wealth and Understanding make him pursue pernicious wayes and Counsells besot him and enslave him fill his life with disquiet shame and needinesse and the sad consequents of that Contempt and all that 's Miserable and unpittied in this Life and yet the sin with all these disadvantages is lovely not to be divorc't nor torn off from him that I were vain should I attempt to prove a thing so obvious I shall give but one instance of the power of the Will the violence and fury of its inclimations to ruine The man who for anothers inadvertency possibly such as their own rules of Honour will not judge affront yea sometimes without any shadow of a provocation meerly because he will be rude does that upon which they must call one another to account and to their last account indeed at Gods dread Judgment feat whither when he hath sacrific'd two Families it may be all their hopes and comforts in this Life two Souls which cost the Blood of God having assaulted Death when it was aâ—m'd and at his heart and charged Damnation to take Hell by Violence he comes with his own and his Brother's blood upon his Soul to seize his Sentence Go ye Cursed into everlasting Fire 'T is plain against all Interests of this World and the World to come this man will dye And yet this is one of the laudable and generous Customes of the Age. Neither doth this man stand alone the desperate Rebel would come into the Induction that without any hopes sets all on fire to consume all here and to begin his Flames hereafter But I have said enough to prove the Resoluteness of a Sinners Will which is so great indeed that it is this especially which does enhance the guilt of sin into the merit of an endlesse punishment this persevering obstinacy does deserve Hell and make it just For whatsoever inequality there is betwixt the short liv'd pleasures of a sin which dye while they are tasted and put out themselves and those eternal never dying retributions of Vengeance As sure there is also betwixt the life of Man and several of those petty felonies that forfeit it yet the Law does not murder when it Executes I might have instanc't in the gathering sticks upon the Sabbath day in Israel For since the preservation of publique safety and propriety is valuable with the lives of many men and to secure that and affright the Violation it was necessary to affix such punishments to such offences they that know the penalty and wilfully meerly to feed their other vices run upon it justly suffer it So that Man might not rob himself of that immortal Glory which God had ordain'd him when he did see it absolutely necessary thus to hedge Vice with Eternal Death And as he set Angels and Flaming Swords to keep him out of Paradise so to set Fiends and Flames to guard Hell from him and to entail those Torments on Man's sin which he had prepared for the Devil and sealed the Deed in the Blood of his Son If notwithstanding men renounce the blessedness and against all their Interests and Obligations in spight of all the arts and Powers of Heaven they will have the Torments and what they never would attempt for Paradise invade those flames to get to Hell 't is very just that God should let them have it should not break his
faith why didst thou doubt couldst thou imagine I vvould not sustein thee in the doing vvhat I bid thee do In answering my call But vvhy seek we experience of so old a date There is a more encouraging miracle in these late calls themselves Had God sustein'd the Order in its Offices and dignities amidst those vvaves that vvrack'd the Church of late it had been prodigy of undeserved Compassion to our Nation but vvhenas all was sunk to bid the sea give up what it had so allowed and consumed this is more than to catch a sinking Peter or to save a falling Church The vvork of Resurrection is emphatically call'd the working of God's mighty power and does out-sound that of his ordinary conservation And truly 't was almost as easie to imagination how the scattered Atomes of mens dust should order themselves and reunite and close into one flesh as that the parcels of our Discipline and Service that were lost in such a vvild confusion and the Offices buried in the rubbish of the demolisht Churches should rise again in so much order and beauty Stantia non poterant tecta probare Deum This calling of the Spirit is like that when the Spirit moved upon the face of the abyss and call'd all things out of their no-seeds there or like the call of the last Trump Thus by the miraculous mercies of these calls God hath provided for our hopes and warranted our faith of his protections yet he hath also sent us more security hath given us a Constantine if his own be not a greater Name and more deserving of the Church for which it is well known to some he did contrive and order when he could neither plot nor hope for his own Kingdome and did vvith passion labour a succession in your Order vvhen he did not know how to lay designes for the succession of himself or any of his Fathers house to his own Crown and dignity Nor is the secular arme all your security God himself hath set yet more guards about his consecrated ones he hath severe things for the violaters of them Moses the meekest man upon the Earth that in his life vvas never angry but once at the rebellious seems very passionate in calling Vengeance on those that stir against these holy Offices Smite through the loines of all that rise against them and of them that hate them that they rise not again the loines vve know are the nest of posterity so that strike through the loines is stab the succession destroy at once all the posterity of them that vvould cut off this Tribe and hinder its succession Nor vvas this Legal Spirit Gospel is as severe Those in Saint Judge that despise these Governours that do as Corah and his Complices did vvho gathered themselves against Moses and Aaron and said You take too much upon you ye sons of Levi since all the Congregation is holy every one of them and the Lord is among them wherefore then lift you up your selves above the Congregation of the Lord vvords these that vve are vvell acquainted with and vvhich it seems St. Iude looks on as sins under the Gospel these perish in the gainsaying of Core vvhom God vvould not prepare for punishment by death but he and his accomplices went quick into it He would not let them stay to dy but the Lord made a new thing to shew his detestation of this sin and the Earth swallow'd it in the Commission and all that were alli'd and appertain'd to them that had an hand in it And truely they may well expect strange recompences who do attempt so strange a Sacriledge as to pull stars out of Christ's own right hand from vvhence vve have his vvord that no man shall be able to pluck any but if they shine thence on their Orbs below and convert many to righteousness their light shall blaze out into glory and they shall ever dwell at his right hand To vvhich right hand He that brought again from the dead the Lord Iesus that great Shepheard and Bishop of the sheep and set him there He also bring you our Pastors and us your flock vvith you and set us vvith his sheep on his right hand To vvhom vvith the same Iesus and the Holy Ghost be ascribed all blessing honour glory and power from henceforth for ever Amen FINIS A SERMON PREACHED AT HAMPTON-COURT On the 29th of May 1662. Being the Anniversary of His Sacred Majesties Most happy Return BY RICHARD ALLESTRY D. D. and Chaplain to His MAjESTY LONDON Printed by Thomas Roycroft for Iames Allestry at the Rose and Crown in Saint Paul's Church-yard 1669. TO The Right Honourable EDWARD Earl of Clarendon Lord high Chancellour of England and Chancellour of the University of Oxford My LORD TO vouch your Lordships commands for the publishing this Discourse I might reasonably think would be to libel your judgment and the prefixing your Name to it and this mean address would look rather like revenge than homage or obedience if I did not know that low performances are due to the transcendency of such a subject as I then discours'd upon and such a Patron as I now dedicate to So I lie prostrate under my great Arguments here insufficiency is Art and Rhetorick And the truth is my Lord it was not this which made me so sollicitous to avoid your injunctions but apprehensions of the unusefulness of the Discourse itself When God's most signal methods of all sorts do not seem to have wrought much conviction vvhen neither our own dismal guilts nor miseries nor most express miracles of deliverance have made us sensible but after the equally stupendous 3 Oth of January and 29th of May and the black time that interven'd we are still the same perverse untractable people vvhen luxury is the retribution made for plenty license for liberty and Atheism for Religion vvhil'st miracles of mercy are acknowledged only by prodigies of ingrateful disobedience and on the other side vvhen factious humours swell against all Laws as they vvould either over-flow those mounds or make them yield and give way to them vvhen Declarations and Decrees which were infallible when they came only from a party of a part of a Parliament are neither of force nor esteem when they have all solemnity and obligation that just and full authority can give alas what hopes of doing any thing can a weak Harangue entertain But my Lord since you are pleas'd to command I give up both it and my understanding to your Lordship and the weaker the Discourse is so much the more pregnant testimony is it of the obsequiousness of My Lord Your Lordships most devoted and most humble Servant RICH. ALLESTRY SERMON XVII AT HAMPTON-COURT May 29. 1662. HOSEA III. 5. Afterward shall the children of Israel return and seek the Lord their God and David their King and shall fear the Lord and his goodness HE had said in the vvords before that the children