take it to study the Law to study Conscience to study the Gospell to study mercies to study judgements to study Christ to study all that after all our hearts may bee broken for our sinnes that so God may not breake away from us but continue to be our God and that judgements which looke so blacke upon us may be broken off and plots contriv'd against us may breake asunder and all spirituall and earthly mercies may breake downe in mercy upon us And thus much bee spoken with a respect unto every one that heareth mee this day I have besides all this a particular errand from God to you who are publike persons and have summond me this day unto Vse 2. this publike worke me thinkes that the Lord speakes to you in some respect what once he spake to the Prophet Ieremiah Chap. 1. Verse 10. See I have this day set you over the Nations and over the Kingdomes to roote out and to pull downe and to destroy and to throw downe And blessed bee the Lord and blessed bee your soules and blessed be your endeavours that notwithstanding the infinite difficulty of the worke and the Malignant contrariety you meet with yet your hearts are undaunted and resolved to finish the work as Honourable as ever Parliament undertooke and as profitable to Church and State as ever Christians enterprised your armes shall bee made strong by the blessing of the everlasting God of Iacob let popish and malevolent and ignorant persons say or doe what they can Give me leave 1. To represent unto you The work of the Parliament some publike plots of fallow-ground which you blessed be God have begun to breake neverthelesse they need yet a more full breaking up Secondly to present in all humble fidelity unto you some few intimations and directions 1. The publike plots of Fallow ground which need a further breaking up are especially foure 4. Grounds to be broken up 1. The first lies directly in the valley of Hinnom and it is Idolatry a piece of ground which lies too much in every Shire of this Land what County is there where much Popery is not Sirs you must breake this ground up or it will breake our Land up There is not such a God-povoking sinne a God-removing sin a Church-dissolving sinne a kingdomebreaking sin as Idolatry the soule of God abhorres it down with it down with it even to the ground 2. The second lies neare to Beth-Aven and it is superstition which is but a bawd to grosse Idolatry As rife in practise even now notwithstanding all that you have said and done as if a Parliament had never opened a mouth against it If a due and carefull inquiry bee made I question not but you shall find in too many Churches and publike places as many Altars and as many Crucifixes hanging over them and as many Tapers on the Altars and as much bowing towards the East and Altar almost as many and as much as when you began this Parliament 3. The third lies just upon the coasts of Egypt that Land of darknesse And it is ignorance a very large circuit of ground this is many many places of this land there are which lie Fallow to this day never any husbandman nor Plow have entred in to breake up those grounds A most lamentable thing that since Iesus Christ came into the world and since the Gospell is come into this Land after severall scores of yeares yet how many Parishes in Wales and in the North and in other Counties which scarsely have enjoyed this much mercy as to heare one solid soule working Sermon concerning Christ and salvation by him O Sirs let your hearts bleed in pitty to these poore soules liberties I confesse are precious and so are our estates and so are bodies and lives ô then what are soules what are precious soules which did cost the most precious bloud of the Lord Iesus Christ The fourth ill plot of ground lies on Mizpah or if you please on Mount Taber for there the Priests 4. were a Net and a Snare Hosea 5. 1. And this is an idle and an evill ministry Sirs mistake me not I speake not of our Ministers indefinitely I know that wee have as godly as learned as painefull as profitable Ministers as any in all the Christian world but I speake onely of such whose speciall gifts consist in one of these two things either quietly to read out of a booke and discreetly to gather up their Tythes or malevolently to discountenance all godlinesse and raile against the Parliament Ah worthy Sirs It would amaze any ingenuous man to travaile such a Country as England and passing through many Parishes this after all is his Diurnall the Patron is Popish the Minister is an Idle Dunce or else a drunkard or else a swearer or else a scoffer preaching all holinesse out of his pulpit out of his Church out of his family out of his Parish and his people are like unto him and love to have it so And thus what betweene the Idle Minister and the evill Minister the poore people never come to knowledge or without which knowledge never comes to any thing they never come to the love and practise of any saving good These are the principall fallow grounds in this Land which need your care and paines 2. Now follow the Intimations and directions which I humbly present unto you 1. B Breake them up If ever you will quit your owne soules and the trust reposed in you and 4. Directions about the breaking up of ill grounds the whole land of Judgments spiritual and corporall If ever you desire to gaine ground in your publike intentions for good for the Lords sake breake up these Fallow grounds 2. But then in the next place goe very deepe with your Plow or else you will never breake up these grounds the deeper the better As all good is most strengthened so all evill is most crushed in its causes Take heed of shadow-worke and surface-plowing Gods eyes are upon you and so are the eyes of judicious men which can distinguish twixt scraping and breaking our misery will be but finely laid asleepe a while if your plow goes not deepe Doth a little cringing move you ô then let grosse Idolatry heate and burne your soules Doth boldnesse in a questioned Minister displease you ô then let his grosse wickednesse stirre you utterly to disburden poore peoples soules of him ô let sad complaints have quicke and full redresses 3. And goe over the Fallow grounds which you have broken goe them over againe Yea and againe Fallow grounds must be often broken up with the Plow Even the actions of the most judicious receave more ripenesse by review by often doing wee grow into a better acquaintance with what is to be done our first doings are rather trialls and enterprises the second doings ever prove the best worke besides that our affections also are oftimes too quicke for our eyes the desires of doing some
neglected the worke or would not bee perswaded throughly to act the duty of Repentance The Lord saw this dangerous obstinacy and pitties it and strives with them to save their soules that they might by this meanes save their Countrey The way he spreads before them is expressed Partly in verse 1. If thou wilt Returne O Israel saith the Lord Returne unto me and if thou wilt put away thine abominations out of my sight then thou shalt not Remove q. d. leave thy sinnes and save all Thou hast made many overtures and semblances thereof by Fastings by confessings by prayings Adde now one thing more Repent in good earnest This will bee life to your solemnities and safetie to your Nation Partly in ver 3. Break up your fallow ground and sow not among thornes q. d. If you do not Repent you are undone if you doe repent but not throughly you wil be undone too hypocrisie in good duties as well as profanenesse in bad wayes may ruine a person and Nation A man may as surely be drowned in a ship that hath a leake as when he hath no ship at all Therefore pretend Repentance no longer but act it and when you doe act it act it not slightly but exactly become good and do good to purpose If you regard and follow this Counsell Then as in ver 1. you shall not remove but if you will not hearken unto it then as in ver 4. My fury shall come forth like fire and burne that none can quench it because of the evill of your doings The words of my Text containe in them the principall works of this day which are two 1. A serious humiliation unto which the Iewes are exhorted in these words Break up your Fallow ground 2. A dextrous Reformation delivered unto them by way of caution And sow not among thornes There must bee not a little rasing but a breaking nor a meere breaking but a breaking up and when that is done there must bee a sowing too but every sowing must not serve the turne It must bee such a sowing as may come to something It must not be a sowing among thornes The field which I am at this time to worke upon and goe over you see is very large there is much more ground in it then I can conveniently breake up and sow I shall though by that Gods assistance who only is the Maker and breaker of hearts set upon the whole worke and Hee in tender mercy so accompany and water and prosper His truths this day that all our Fallow grounds may bee broken up and then so graciously sowne in righteousnesse that wee and all the land may shortly Reape in mercy I begin with the first part Breake up your Fallow ground That these words are to be understood not literally but metaphorically I make no question that any who heares me doth question Interpreters though do vary something in their conjectures Tertullian by fallow ground understands the old Law which hee Adversus Iudaeos c. 3. saith is to be broken up by the new Law he meanes the Gospel an exposition much impertinent and too wide Cassianus understands by it the Heathens and Pagans and other secular persons nor is this conjecture apt to the Text. Cyprian drawes nearer to the sense who by fallow ground understands Mores popusi the conversations of the Iewes and Cyril of Alexandria who by it understands Animum sylvescentem an heart like the wildernesse wilde and destitute of all pious culture and Chrysostome yet more exactly by fallow ground understands cordis profundum the very Core and depths of a sinfull heart So then to stop all quotations the fallow ground The Fallow ground is the sinfull heart is nothing else but the sinfull estate of a person or Nation And it is very aptly so described by reason of that consimilitude which the one hath with the other For First Fallow ground is a barren piece of earth a Tohu and Bohu as at the first voyd of all excellency and beauty There is not one graine of good seed So resembled in three re in it nor any one delightfull flower such a desart is mans sinfull heart It is a very Inane Nihilum vanity and vanity no divine excellency is to be found there Not any one effect nor any one seed of spirituall inclination For this It may answer as the depth did for wisedome It is not in me Iob 28. 14. Secondly Fallow ground is usually an indigested Thicket lumbred all over with weedes and Briars and Thornes and Thistles that originall curse which befell the Earth for mans transgression And such a piece also is mans sinfull heart Though it bee but a barren Wildernesse for any good yet it is an ample Ocean for all that is evill and hurtfull The upper part of his field hath in it an abundance of thornes unprofitable thoughts hurtfull cares wounding errors and the lower part of his field is as full of stinking weedes vile affections as the Apostle calls them the best fruits of him are but as a briar to scratch himselfe and to catch and intangle others with sin Lastly Fallow ground is an hardned part of earth extreamly compacted by the influences of the sun and windes and by its owne native inclination so that it is not an easie thing to sever it and dispose it for a better use just so is a naturall or sinfull heart It is so troden and seared obdurated partly by the frequent repetition of sinful acts and partly by the intension of sinfull delights that it is not only defective of good but also very active against it unyeelding resisting and fighting against all heavenly counsels and motions The man is evill and will be so he is not good nor will he be so unlesse God by an insuperable vertue of his own spirit makes him to be so We have found what the fallow ground is let us in the next place inquire what the breaking of it up The breaking up what is Then the Fallow ground is broken up when the Husbandman comes with his Plow and enters that plow into it deepely enters it even into the Bowels of the ground and then rents and teares it and turns it upside downe Not in one Furrow but in every Furrow once twice perhaps thrice if need so requires Even so the sinfull heart is broken up when the Almighty and gracious God whom Christ calls the Husbandman comes with his Word and Spirit and Alta voce as St. Austine speaks or virtute magnifica Iohn 15. 1. as Ber. speaks enters into the heart or soule of a sinner by irresistable convincings and by efficacious humblings which are as rentings and tearings to the ground and by rooting up the dominion and love of all sins The Scriptures sometimes call this worke a touching sometimes a pricking sometimes a troubling Acts 2. 37. 1 Sam. 1. 5. Psal 34. 18. Prov. 18. 14. Isa 42. 3. Ioel 2. 13. 2 King 22. 19.
sometimes a wounding sometimes a bruising sometimes a breaking sometimes a renting sometimes a killing and sometimes an humbling and melting of the heart And this is it which God calls for in the Text from the Iewes as a meanes to prevent their utter destruction by the sword of the Caldeans whence the proposition which I shall in the first place insist on is this Doctr. 1 That the breaking up of sinfull hearts Is a singular meanes to prevent the breaking downe of a sinfull Nation THere are three things unto which I shall speake for the explication of this assertion Namely 1. What the right breaking of a sinfull heart is which is so availeable to prevent the breaking downe of a sinfull Nation 2. Some demonstrations that it is a preventing meanes 3. The Reasons why it is so For the first quaere what the right breaking up of a Quest 1. a sinfull heart is Be pleased to know that there is a twofold Breaking of a sinners heart Sol. 1. One is specious only and formall supersicie tenus The heart broken for sin 2 Wayes 1. Formally as Saint Bernard speakes as Artificiall Juglars seem to wound themselves but do not or as Players seeme to thrust themselves through their bodies but the sword passeth only through their clothes There is something done about sins but nothing is done against sins peccata raduntur sed non eradicantur as the same Auhor speaketh which he truely calls a Fiction and vanity As when men onely lop the Trees which thereupon in time grow the faster and thicker Against this breaking the Prophet of old much complained They in Isaiah hung downe their heads and afflicted their soules for a day but for all that they Esa 58. 5 3 still afflicted their poore brethren And they in Hosea did howle but yet they did still rebell against the Hosea 7. 14. Lord And they in Malachy did cry out and cover Malach. 2. 13. 11. the Altar with Teares and yet for all their pretended contrition they did profane the holinesse of their God And though the Pharisees did assume unto themselves a most mortified garbe of humbling especially in their dayes of Fasting disfiguring their faces as Christ reports of them yet their hearts were as loose as full of pride and covetousnesse and envie Matth. 6. 16. and opposition of Christ as ever 2. Another is serious and Reall which is acted most in the hidden man and pierceth like the word Hebr. 4. 12. even to the dividing of soule and spirit of which likewise there are two kindes one is stiled Attrition and the other is styled Contrition by the Schoolemen the former by our Casuists is called a legall breaking and the latter an Evangelicall breaking They difference them thus partly 1. By their objects Penall evill is the object on which Attrition doth worke and sinfull evill is the object on which Contrition worketh the one is conversant about passive evill that is the evill which wee suffer but the other is conversant about Active evill that is the evill which wee have done For sinne hath in it two qualities one to make us unhappie and this Attrition lookes at another to make us unholy and at this doth contrition look 2. By their causes legall Attrition is onely the pinching of servile feare and despaire for it seeth nothing but Sea all that will teare and distract the Conscience but Evangelicall contrition is the melting and lamenting of filiall Love and Hope The frownes of a Revenging Judge causeth that but the smiles of a gracious Father raiseth this In the one the heart is shivered by the flashes of Hell In the other the heart is melted by the beames of Heaven A stroke from guilt brake Judas's heart into despaire but a looke from CHRIST brake Peters heart into teares 3. By their effects an Attrite heart may for that space of time whiles the Conscience burnes and flames with wrath become negatively penitent Non proponit peccare It doth not purpose to sin the sensible anguish for former sinnings may suspend delightfull intentions for future sins but the contrite heart out of a contrariety of nature becomes positively holy proponit non peccare It doth Cordially purpose not to sin any more All which if I mistake not is the same that Cajetan aimes at when hee saith that Attrition produceth velleitatem an imperfect motion of the will but contrition produceth voluntatem a compleat and direct will against sin But this discourse I feare is too speculative for this dayes worke give mee leave therefore to open the nature of this penitentiall heart breaking in a more practicall and profitable way There are severall workings which ordinarily concurre to the full constituting of this heart-breaking worke whereof some are Antecedent some are formally ingredient and some are inseparably consequent 1. The Antecedent workings are such as previously lead the way to the Evangelicall breaking as Antecedents to heart breaking three the Needle doth to the threed and the breaking by the hammer doth to the melting by the fire by way of order only and not by causality These are principally three 1. A Notionall Irradiation The Lord never breakes a sinners heart before hee hath opened a sinners 1. Irradiation eyes the day breakes before the heart breakes light breakes to elevate the soule thus far to discerne and distinguish of evill till then sin is no burden to the Conscience nor trouble to the affections As no good wrapt up in darkenesse excites desire so no evill swath'd up in Ignorance strikes any trouble or sorrow unknowne things have not motive faculty because they are as non entia no things at all And therefore God ever keepes this method to make sin appeare to be sin and afterwards to humble and break our hearts for it 2. A practicall conviction which is nothing else but a personall application of guilt wrath without 2. Conviction which the notion of sin would be no trouble let me open my minde thus unto you That drunkennesse or swearing or whoredome or murder or Sabbath breaking c. are sins And that such persons who are guilty of them without Repentance shall not inherit the kingdome of God All this the sinner knowes already and yet is not troubled for as long as light rests in a bare Notion it is only an addition to his understanding It is no burden at all to his heart But when this light slips downe and chargeth this sinne and this wrath upon this very person and shines so clearely in this charge that the person cannot for his life deny it thou art a drunkard thou art this swearer c. And hereupon in the name of God arrests him with that wrath which God hath threatned unto that sinne and sinner now the sinner begins to consider and tremble and breake When Peter closed with the Jewes and convinced Acts 2. 36 37. them that they in particular crucified Iesus
Christ Now their hâ—â—ts were pricked and when Nathan drawes his parable out of the cloud and unclothes his Message to David saying Thou art the man Now 2 Sam. 12. 7. Psalme 51. Davids's heart begins to breake and take on O see the subtile heart of man will endure and beare all the Historical Notions of sin as we can the names and natures of diseases and medicines without any aking and sicknesse But when the Lord brings downe sin from being a notion to be an obligation and enters an action against the soule within the soule now and not before the heart-workings and heart-breakings doe begin 3. A Conscience affliction which in respect of 3. Affliction degrees and quantity is in some more and in others lesse for Gods Spirit is an Arbitrary agent in the Graduall effects of bondage as well as in those gracious effects of Adoption Neverthelesse though the degrees of working be different yet the worke it selfe is certaine The heart will never bee rightly broken for sin till Conscience which Saint Bernard calls Accuser Witnesse Judge and Tormentor begins to be awakened and quickned And believe it if The terrible workings of conscience Conscience which hath been so much stirred begins to stirre if Conscience which hath beene so often wounded begins to wound the spirit of man will eftsoone faile and breake within him O saith Conscience What hast thou done thus and thus to provoke the Holy and Righteous and Great God I know the severall acts of thy sinnings and times and places and persons and circumstances and I have sad newes to tell thee that great God against whom thou hast so much and so often sinned hath commanded and deputed me not only to speake no peace but also to speake His wrath and displeasure unto thee and in His Name I charge upon thee all thy sins and all his just wrath revealed against them And now the proud and stout heart of a sinner begins to throb and feare and tremble He thinkes that every threatning which he reades is a Cloud of Tempests against him hee thinkes that every judgment hee heares of another is a Sword drawne to cut him off also He thinkes that all the hell and torments thereof mentioned in the Scriptures will ere long bee his portion whereupon his distracted soule cries out ô that I had never beene ô that I had never sinned ô that I might never bee If I should now dye good Lord what will become of mee If I should yet live will the Lord ever bee mercifull to me The sins which I see are many the wrath which I feele is great and that which I feare is infinite If I live I see I am an accursed creature and if I dye ô let me not yet dye I feare I shall bee for ever ô my soule breakes at that endlesse word of misery for ever a damned sinner But yet cries out this sinner Lord Lord Is there no mercy nor hope of any mercy for mee a most vile sinner With these minde racking-breaking thoughts away hastens this burdened broken sinner unto his Closet and shuts the doore and downe hee fals on his knees and with much confusion of thoughts and feares hee spreads all his sinnings before God confessing one and then another and then with fervent agonies begges of the Lord more than for his life Mercy Lord mercy mercy for a lost for an heinous for an undone sinner Canst thou pardon me Wilt thou pardon me O Lord pardon mee O Lord bee reconciled unto mee O that I might have any hopes the least hopes that thou wouldest be mercifull unto me And now up riseth this sinner with these or the like thoughts well I will reade the Bible I will heare such a Minister I will open my condition unto him and conferre and inquire whither there bee no balme in Gilead whither there be a mercy Seate a Citie of refuge to entertaine such a sinner as I am and after a while upon carefull search he findes that yet there is hope that there is an immeasurable sufficiencie in the bloud of Christ an Ocean of ful and free grace in God and that God notwithstanding all his former sinnings against him is most willing and ready to accept of him into mercy if so bee hee bee willing to forsake his sinnes and imbrace a Mediator 2. The formall Ingredients HEreupon followes the second principall working Ingredients of heart breaking two Ier. 31 19. which formally makes up Evangelicall Contrition and it is 1. Pudor 2. Dolor shame and griefe Such kindnesse from the mercy-seate makes him now as Ephraim confounded and ashamed and his heart to breake into most melting flouds of teares that ever he should bee so monstrously vile to offend such tender and gracious bowels of mercy which hee now apprehends yerning towards him in and through Christ As before the apprehensions of divine wrath did distract and shiver him so now the apprehensions of divine love doe totally dissolve and melt him though there were not Heaven hereafter to Crowne him yet he must grieve and though there were not Hell hereafter to burne him yet he must exceedingly mourn for sinning against such a God This is that right Evangelicall Contrition which I presse for at this time called in Scripture a softnesse of heart and a contrite Heart and a mourning and a bitter mourning and a great mourning like that of Hadadrimmon in the Valley of Megiddon which Zac. 12. 10 11. Saint Ambrose calls Cor liquescens an heart melting and dissolving and Saint Hierome magnum planctum an exceeding lamenting and St. Austin grave lamentum a very heavie griefe The Casuists and Schoolmen affirme it to bee the Sorrow for sin the greatest sorrow in 4. respects Adrianus Scotus Soto greatest of all sorrows 1. In conatu the whole soule seemes to send springs into it out of every faculty 2. In extensione It is a spring which in this life more or lesse is continually dropping 3. In appreciatione the changed soule doth ever judge that a good God offended should be the prime cause of greatest sorrow and Lastly In intensione For Intension of displicence in the will there being no oâ—her things with which or for which the will is more displeased with it selfe then for sinning against God And therefore some of the Schoolemen propounding this question Sot in 4. Sent. d. 17. q. 2. art 4. whether there should be more griefe for sin then for the pâ—ssion of Christ Resolve it Affirmatively that there is more cause of griefe for sinning then for the death of Christ and their reason is this because in the death of Christ there was Aliquid placens Something that did please God so farre as it was a Redemption but sin is simpliciter displicens there is nothing in it which is not altogether displeasing unto God consider it formally as sin 3. The consequent working WHich rather shewes and declares then makes a broken heart and it
is hatred of sin the Hatred of sin the consequent of heart breaking for sin A double hatred of sin heart which is rightly broken is not only broken for sin but also from sin by an hatred 1. Of abomination loathing it as the greatest evill Get thee hence say they in Esa 30. 22. And 2. Of enmiâ—y and irreconciliation what have I to doe any more with Idols saith Ephraim in Hosea 14. 8. Thus have you heard what the breaking up of the fallow ground or sinfull heart is now I proceed in few words to demonstrate That it is the meanes to prevent the breaking downe of a sinfull Nation this Quest 2. may evidently appeare 1. By the fingers of God in Scripture pointing a Sol. 4. Demonstrations of the proposition in its truth people to this worke that so they might not sinke into ruine but be preserved Read Ezekiel 18. 30 31. Ioel 2. 13 14. 2. By the pledges which God maketh in severall promises that if a sinfull Nation will take this course he will then spare them and continue them Read Ier. 18. 7 8. 2 Chron. 7. 14. 3. By the Records or Instances of Gods sparing a people and a revoking of his wrath and judgements when they have set upon this Heart-breaking course Read Ionah 3. 6 7 8 9 10. 2 Chronicles 34. 27. 4. By the executions of destruction because they would not hearken to this course See 2 Chro. 36. 15 16 17. But why should the breaking up of sinfull hearts bee a meanes to prevent the breaking downe of a sinfull Quest 3. Nation The Reasons are these because First where hearts are rightly broken for sinnes there sinnes are pardoned and where sinnes are pardoned Sol. 4. Confirmations of the proposition 2 Chro. 7. 14. Esay 1. 16. all breaking down is unquestionably prevented In Esaiah you reade of washing and cleansing they are the same with this heart-breaking and mourning and presently you reade of pardon Though your sinnes be as scarlet they shall bee as white as snow 18. c. and presently after that you reade of eating the 19. good of the Land a comfortable fruition of themselves and of their Country and of all meanes and blessings Beloved when sinnes are pardoned then 2. Effects of sins pardoned 1. All their guilty clamour is silenced pardoned sins are disabled sins they can bring no action against us debts forgiven shall never prejudice nor hurt us Sins unpardoned can raise posse comitatus all the Armies Remissa culpa remittitur paena of God in Heaven and Earth against sinners but once pardoned they are of no force or strength at all And secondly when sins are pardoned all good hath a free passage God is reconciled and mercies have their Commission to attend us Now saith the Lord I will heare the Heavens and they shall heare the earth and the earth shall heare the Corne and the Wine Hos 2. 21 22 and the Oyle and they shall heare Iezreel 2. Againe If sinfull hearts be broken God hath his end and then all quarrels cease twixt him and a 2. Nation the Lord doth not threaten destruction to a people for destructions sake but for Humiliations sake Not that they may be destroyed but that they should repent and not be destroyed 3. Thirdly Broken hearts are a wonderfull delight unto the Lord There are somethings in which 3. God hath no delight He hath no delight in sinnings Psalm 5. 4. Ezek. 18. 32. nor in punishments and there are two hearts in which God takes much delight namely in an upright heart and in a Contrite heart The broken heart hee will not despise nay hee will looke upon that heart to revive it If broken hearts be Gods delight and the objects of Psal 51. 17. Esa 57. 15. his reviving then without question they are a means to prevent destruction 4. Lastly when hearts are broken for sins then Gods heart if I may so phrase it is broken with compassions unto sinners Though sinners remaine obstinate yet divine compassions work strongly towards them How shall I give thee up Ephraim how shall I deliver thee O Israel c. Hosea 11. 8. what bowels then thinke you are working in God when sinners are broken and humbled and turning If God can so hardly finde the way to punish impenitent Ephraim will he not find the way to spare an humbling Ephraim See Ier. 31. 18. I have surely heard Ephraim lamenting himselfe c. 20. My bowels are troubled for him I will surely have mercy upon him saith the Lord. I have done with the explication of the point I now addresse my selfe to the Application of it 1. To all of us 2. To you of publike employment Is the breaking up of sinfull hearts the means to prevent the breaking downe of a sinning Nation Vse Then let every one of us here ô that the whole Land also would search and try the temper and frame of our hearts whither they be broken or unbroken Beloved I beseech you sadly to consider of a few things 1. That brokennesse of heart is the worke of this 6. Things considerable about brokennesse of heart day This is a day of Humiliation but what is an humbling day without an humbled heart to present your selves before the great God at such a time with all your sinnes and yet without hearts broken for those sins is not only an irreligious incongruity but also an high provocation of our God like Zimries act when all the Congregation were weeping before the doore of the Tabernacle Numb 25. 6. Come we not this day with all sorts of guilt upon our soules and with ropes about our neckes expecting if the Lord should render unto us our deserts the sentence of death and confesse as much and yet dare we to play the Hypocrites having hearts under all this utterly unbroken Secondly brokennesse of heart is the hope of this day I professe seriously unto you that were you as much in fasting as Iohns Disciples and in praying as Christs Disciples could you by Fasting make your knees to faint and your flesh to faile and resolve your bodies into a very Sceleton if yet your hearts were not broken for your sins Neither your selves nor your endaevours nor our owne Nation nor the distressed Church of Ireland nor any other would bee the better for it As one of the Fathers said of Learning All learning is suspected nay disrespected by me wherein is not the mention of Christ that I affirme of all solemne fastings whatsoever the Lord regards them not if the broken heart bee not found in them What Ioseph said to his brethren unlesse you bring your brother Benjamin with you you shall not see my face or as Isaac said to his Father Behold the Fire and the Wood but where is the Lambe for a burnt offering That the Lord saith unto us Fast as often as you please and pray too unlesse your hearts