Selected quad for the lemma: mercy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
mercy_n	great_a	let_v	sinner_n	1,997	5	7.5506	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A31107	Mercy in the midst of judgment by a gracious discovery of a certain remedy for London's languishing trade : in a sermon preached before the right honourable, the lord mayor and the citizens of London, on September 12, 1669, at the new repaired chappel at Guild-Hall / by D. Barton ...	Barton, William, 1598?-1678.	1670 (1670)	Wing B989; ESTC R37078	21,906	62

though we want Apples and Plums Let God deny us the worldly toyes of earthly enjoyments if he continue his spiritual blessings we cannot be esteemed miserable A third Island of mercy appearing in this Sea of misery is the measure of it They had a little though not much God did not take away all but left them a pittance as we say enough to keep life and soul together I will correct thee in measure saith God to his people and not leave thee altogether unpunished If he should have been extreame to have marked what had been done amiss he might have utterly destroyd them as he did Sodome and Gomorrha and set them forth as perpetuall examples of divine vengeance but it was of the Lords mercies that they were not consumed because his mercies fail not There is yet a fourth ray of mercy shining in this judgment and that is the discovery of the cause which he doth not onely in respect of himself for the vindication of his justice but also in respect to them that they might provide for deliverance God by reason of that independent dominion which he hath over all his creatures which in their very being depend upon him hath no obligation lying on him to give any other reason of his acting than his Sic volo sic jubeo and therefore it must be an act of great mercy to come to debate and reason with his creature to be content to bring himself as it were before mans tribunal and to plead his cause and make even sinners his judges yet so he doth frequently Come now and let us reason together And now O Inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah judge I pray you between me and my Vineyard Should he have made short worke with them and dispatcht them in a moment yet he would have continued just and holy and he might have justified his proceedings but to stoop so low as to give an account of his doings and to render a reason of his sentence is a condescention of mercy that can be never expressed and never enough admired or praised And thus having run through the two Stages of my Text Judgment and Mercy I cannot dismiss you without making you partakers of some observations which you may improve to your advantage As First That all the industry and labour of man in his calling is in vain if God withhold his blessing he may sow and reap and bring in too he may export nay import too and little come of it if God do but blow upon it Not but that men may nay must take paines in their vocations Adam even in his innocency and integrity before his fall had his employment set out to him to dress and keep the Garden much more since the fall when all the Creatures are under the Curse for the sin of man and the earth is so farre from yeelding fruit without our labour that it is often fruitless and barren with it So that now it is not so much our curse as our duty that in the sweat of our brows we should eat our bread and he that will not labour as he doth not deserve so he hath no promise that he shall eat Labour then they must but in that they must depend upon God for the success whose blessing only can make rich Moses saith It is not bread that man liveth by only but by the word of God that is his blessing and therefore except the Lord build the House and watch the City mans labour and watching is to no purpose It is but lost labour that ye rise early and so late take rest and eat the bread of Carefulness if God doth not give sleep Joyne then to your honest labour trust in God and fear not a good success you have King Davids warrant for it Trust in the Lord and do good and verily thou shalt be sed Psa. 37. 3. Let your labours as well as the Creatures for which you labour be Sanctified by the word of God and Prayer Secondly The use or abuse the care or neglect of the Instruments of Gods worship is no indifferent thing no matter of slight consequence it procures a blessing or brings down a curse These Jewes neglect to build Gods House and God neglects to provide for their Families They no sooner go up to the Mountain and bring Wood and begin to build but from that very day God begins to bless them Take one instance more The Arke which before the building of the Temple was the dwelling place of Gods name was among the Philistins who profanely insult and triumph over it and are smitten with sore diseases and the hand of God is heavy upon them Afterwards it comes to the Bethshemites who are bold with it and pry into its secrets and fifty thousand of them are slain for it After this Vzzah toucheth it irreverently and is struck dead before it whereas Obed-Edom entertains it reverently and cheerfully and is blessed in all that he hath When God sends the instruments and means of Religion among a people it concerns them deeply to look about them God intends something towards them either of judgment or mercy and counts it an high indignity if men think he will do neither good or evil The Prophet Isaiah compares Gods Word to Rain which returns not voyd but accomplisheth what he pleaseth and prospers in the thing whereunto he sends it it either brings up wholsome Herbs or noysom Weeds it either furthers our Salvation or hastens our Destruction The Gospel of Christ is savour either of life unto life or of death unto death Gods Ordinances are all of the same nature with the Lords Supper they are either for the better or for the worse Christs coming to a Nation as to Capernaum is fatal it either lifts neerer to Heaven or throws lower into Hell Thirdly The neglect of Gods worship forfeits all our temporal estate as Tenants that refuse to do their homage to perform Suit and Service and to pay their Land-lords rent do make their Estates lyable to a seizure These outward blessings are the appurtenances of Gods worship And it is piety onely which hath the promises both of this life and that which is to come These provisions are properly for Gods Household and those that wait in the House of the Lord If a profane person that regards not Gods worship hath them it is but at adventures and they are so farre from beeing a blessing to him that they become a Snare making him fall into many foolish and hurtful lusts which drowne men in destruction and perdition search the Chronicles and Annals of the Kings of Israel and you shall still find those times wherein Religion was advanced as under David Solomon Asa Jehoshaphat and Hezekiah to be prosperous times whereas under Idolatrous Kings all things went contrary So that the best way to secure what men have is to employ part of it

MERCY In the midst of JUDGMENT By a gracious discovery of a certain Remedy for LONDON'S Languishing TRADE In a Sermon Preached before the Right Honourable the Lord Mayor and the Citizens of London on September 12. 1669. at the new repaired Chappel at Guild-Hall By D. BARTON M. A. and Rector of Saint Margarets New Fish-street London LONDON Printed for James Allestry at the Rose and Crown in S. Paul's Church-Yard 1670. To the Right Honourable Sir SAMVEL STARLING Knight Lord Mayor of the City of LONDON AND THE Court of ALDERMEN Right Honourable THIS Sermon savouring of the Countrey in which it was conceived and brought forth without the Midwifry of a Library my own perishing in the same Flames with your City and the place of my now residence not affording an assistant was intended onely for your religious ears in them to have both its birth and buriall but since it hath pleased you to reprieve it to a longer and more publick life where should it be more justly laid than at your doors who for your able parts and endowments have been fitted for the publick imployment and intrusted with the weightiest affairs of this City and who by your Favour and Countenance are able to cover the rawness and rudeness or what other defects in my weake and unworthy handling so necessary a subject I have in publishing it regarded more your Opinion than my own conceipt and I hope because you think so that the matter will not be altogether unprofitable or unseasonable although it be not handled so artificially and rhetorically as it ought my main study being to be plain and to apply the things delivered to the present times whatever it be and I wish it much better it is now no more mine but yours and if under the beames of your goodness it shall so thrive as to become an Instrument for the furthering that important Work mentioned in it next under God your Honour and your worshipful assessors are to have the Praise and I therein shall receive a sufficient reward of my labour accounting it my greatest happiness on earth to have been able to performe any acceptable service to that Royal City to which for many yeares past and my whole life for the future I have dedicated all my endeavours I will not detain your Honour c. any longer from your more publick and serious affaires but only beseech the Almighty and All-wise God that he would give you understanding and valiant hearts to manage them Couragiously and Prudently that you may be instruments in Gods hand for the making up the breaches in our Syon and Jerusalem which is and shall be the dayly Prayer of Your Honours and Worships unfainedly devoted in all Christian duty and Observance DAV BARTON Haggai I. 9. Ye looked for much and loe it came to little and when ye brought it home I did blow upon it Why saith the Lord of Hosts Because of mine House that is waste and ye run every Man unto his owne House SOme Geographers have observed that there is no Land so placed in the World but from that Land a man may veiw some other Land though between Land and Land you may see Seas enraged with stormes and tempests yet land is still within ken An observation perhaps of more curiosity than verity in the material Sea of this World yet most certain if it be applyed to the mistical Sea of Gods Judgments which the Royal Prophet compares to a great deep and the dry land of his mercy though between mercy and mercy God interposeth a raging Ocean of trouble and calamity raised by the storme of his indignation so that men seeme to be in the condition of the material world Gen. 7. When the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth and all the high hils that were under the whole Heaven were covered Omnia pontus erant deerant quoque littora Ponto All was a Sea and that Sea had no shores yet if they looke but onward they cannot miss of a prospect of dry land of Mercy The Almighty God hath so interwoven these two in the dispensation of his providence that the one is never discernable without the other When God landeth his people in the Haven of prosperity he would have them look back on the tempestuous Sea from which they are escaped and fear his Justice when he lancheth them forth into the depth of misery he carries them not out of sight of land that there may be hope of mercy Thus doth the most Gracious God in the midst of Judgment remember Mercy and giveth even the vally of Achor the vally of trouble for a door of hope and in the deepest Ocean of his Judgments discovers a little Island of Mercy to repaire to And thus did he of old deal with his People the Jewes He caused the King of Babylon to arise like waters out of the North and to become an overflowing flood and to overflow the land and all that was therein whereby they were swept away into Captivity yet then when these waters did so overflow their heads that they said they were cut off the all-merciful God lifted up their heads and shewed them a prospect of mercy by a faithful promise of deliverance after seventy years at which harbour they are no sooner arrived but their sins provoke God to bring them back into the Sea of his Judgments and he afflicts them with famine ye have sown much and bring in little ye eat but have not enough ye drinke but ye are not filled with drinke c. vers 6. of this Chapter Yet even here though the Sea roared and the Heaven was black with Clouds that God which gave to the Sea his decree saying Thus far shalt thou go and no farther and there thy proud waves shall be staied not only discovers a Cape of good Hope and makes a path in that mighty water for his ransomed to pass to it 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 vers 8 but also gives them a faithful representation of their present state and condition with the by-path that brought them into it that so they might be induced to consider their waies and leave them and return into the way of peace and this he doth in the words of my Text Ye looked for much and loe it comes to little c. So that my Text is made up of the two parts of Davids Song Psalm 101. 1. Mercy and Judgment which in God are alwayes twisted together Gracious and righteous is the Lord Psal. 25. 8. and all his pathes are mercy and truth v. 10 Not one path of mercy and another of truth but every path mercy and truth both The red Cross of his Justice as in your City Armes is born on the white Field of his mercy as these therefore were the burden of David's Ditty so they must be the support of my