Forty Sermons

Religion, Reputation would restrain them somewhat: Not to be thought fit Company for Christians would surely make them proud against their Vices. Shame, the designed Effect of these Censures, hath great pungencies, the fear of it does goad men into actions of the greatest hazard, and the most unacceptable; such as have nothing lovely in them, but are wholly distasteful. There is a Sin whose face is bloody dismal, and yet because tis countenanc'd by the Roysting Ruffian part of the World, men will defy Reason and Conscience, Man's and God's Law, venture the ruin of all that is beloved and dear to them in this World, and assault death, and charge and take Hell by violence; rather then be ashamed before those valiant sinners, Satan's Hectors: and, they must • ever come into such Company if they do not go boldly on upon the sin, is of more force with them than all the indearments of this World, than all their fear of God, and Death, and that which follows. Now if Religion could but get such Countenance by the Censures of the Church; and every open sinner had this certain fear, I should be turned out of all Christian company, shall be avoided as unfit for Conversation; would it not have in some degree the like effect? and if the motive beas much exactly, would not men be chaste or sober or obedient for that very reason for which they will now be killed and be damned? Without all question Saint Peter 's Censure on the intemperate, 1 Cor. 5. must needs be reformation to him: 'It is such a sentence to the drunkard, not to company with him, whose Vice is nothing but the sauce of Company; and who does sin against his Body and against his faculties and against his Conscience, is sick, and is a Sott, and goes to ▪ Hell merely for Societies sake. Now the infliction of these Censures is so much the work to which Church-governors are called by the Holy Ghost, that they are equally called by him to it and to Himself; both are alike bestowed upon them: Receive the Holy Ghost, whose sins ye retain they are retained, John 20. 22. And in the first derivations of this office, it was performed with severities, such as this Age I doubt will not believe, and when they had no temporal sword to be auxiliary to these Spiritual weapons.

And now to make reflections on this is not for me to undertake, in such a state of the Church as ours is; wherein the very faults of some do give them an Indemnity, who having drawn themselves out of the Church, from under its authority, are also got out of the power of its Censures: So Children that do run away from their Fathers house, they do escape the Rod; but they do not consider that withal they run away from the inheritance: And many times in those that do not do so, but stay within the family; long intermission of the Rod, and indulged license makes them too big and heady to be brought under discipline. And isit not so with us? Among many of those that stay within the Church, (I know not whether I do well to say so, when of these I mean there is little other Evidence of their doing so but this, that they will swear and drink of the Churches side; blessed Sons of a demolished Church, who think to raise their Mother a Temple by throwing stones at her: ) by reason of the late overthrow of Government and discipline, and the consequent licences, Vice hath been so nursed up, not only by an universal, barefac'd, uncorrected practice; but by principles of liberty, that can dispute down all Ecclesiastical restraints, and have set up the Religion of License: that now sin is grown so outrageous, as to be too strong for discipline; nay rather than it should be set up, 'tis to be feared they would endeavor to reverse all in the Church, and enterprise as much in their vices quarrel, as others have done for mistaken Religion. And indeed to what purpose were the Censures, whose first and medicinal effect is shame, amongst men, where 'tis in very many instances the only shameful thing not to be vicious; where men stand candidates for the reputation of glorious sinners, take to themselves sins they have not committed, that are not theirs, and usurp Vice; sins and damnations hypocrites? What work is here for discipline? But this state wants not precedents; the censures of the Church were not only laid aside in the Vastations of the Arian heresy and persecution; when the weapons of the Churches warfare were too weak to make defense against all their cruelties and impieties: and before that in Diocletian 's days against the Lapsi: But we find also that Saint Paul is forced to break out only in a passionate wish, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , I would they were even cut off that trouble you (cut off by excommunication he means) Gal. 5. 12. When he saw the ill humors were too spreading, and too tough also; Sedition and Sehisme, wide and obstinate; so that neither his authority could reach, nor his methods cure, but were more likely to exasperate them: Then he does excommunicate them only in desire▪ And again, 2 Cor. 10. 6. And having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled. It becomes therefore every one that hath good Will for Zion, to labor to fulfill his own obedience, that so the Church may be empower'd to use Christ's Method for reforming of the rest. And thet that will not do so, must know they shall not only answer for their sins, but for refusing to be saved from them, that they resist all medicine, as men resolved that nothing shall be done towards their Cure, as men that rather choose to perish, and prefer destruction. And for the seasons and degrees of putting this work into Execution, Wisdom must be implor'd from that Spirit of Wisdom that calls unto this work: The last Part; Whereunto I have called them.

The Nature of the calling of the Holy Ghost is a Subject that would bear a full discourse. But waving those pretensions which Necessity, and inward incitation do make to be the Calls of the Holy Ghost I shall positively set down that the call of God and of the Holy Ghost; to any Work or Office, (for I inquire not of his calling, to a privilege or state of favor, ) is his giving abilities and gifts qualifying for that Work or Office: The call immediate when the gifts were so, but mediate and ordinary, when the abilities are given in his blessing on our ordinary labors. 'It is so in every sort of things, Exod. 31. 2. See I have called Bezaleel, and I have filled him with the Spirit of God in Wisdom, and in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of Workmanship, to devise cunning works, and to work in all manner of Workmanship; and behold I have given him Aholiab, and in the hearts of all that are wise-hearted I have put Wisdom, that they may make all that I have commanded thee: And he repeats the same again, Chap. 35. 30. adding that he hath put in his heart that he may teach both he and Aholiab; so that giving this skill to work and teach is named God's calling. So in another case, the Lord does say of Cyrus, I have called him, Isaiah▪ 48. 15. which he explains in the 49. I have holden him by my right hand to subdue Nations before him, to loose the loins of Kings, I have girded him, So when Isaiah saith, the Lord hath called me from the Womb, or rather says that of our Savior, Isa. 49. 1. he tells you how, ver. 5. he formed me and prepared me from the Womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob to him. And throughout the New Testament, as his Call to a privilege is 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , his grace, in allowing such a state of favor; so his calls to a Work are his 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , his gifts enabling for it.

The Gifts of these Apostles by which they were enabled for their Office, and which made up their call, are set down: Those of Barnabas in the fore-cited 11 Act. He was a good man, full of faith, and of the Holy Ghost; and Paul 's call was a little Extraordinary. If we look into times, we shall find reason to believe those Revelations in 2 Cor. 12. were given to Paul a little before this consecration of him in the Text. That Epistle was writ, saith Baronius, in the second year of Nero, and this separation was in the second of Claudius, as may be gathered also in some measure from the famine mentioned in the 28th verse of the 11th chap. betwixt these two were fourteen years: now saith Saint Paul when he wrote that, he had his revelation somewhat above 14. years before; a little therefore before this solemnity. Here was a call indeed, called up to the third heaven to receive instructions for his Office, and for ought he did know, called out of his own body too, that he might be the fitter for it; whether in the body or out of the body, I cannot tell, God knows, v. 2. and that again, v. 3. They whom God's Spirit qualifies for Consecration to separate to these diviner Offices may be stilled Angels well, when they are called from all regards or notices of anybody that belongs to them; their gifts and graces set them above the consideration of flesh: In the entertainment of these qualifications the Soul is swallowed up so, that it cannot take cognizance whether it have a body of its own, and is not sensible of that deer partner of itself, it is so only sensible of this Employment. 'It is not for an Apostle (or for his Successor ) to think of things below with much complacency: When these have all their uses, all their glories on, they but make pomp to dress the body; which an Apostle does not design for, nor knows whether he be concerned at all in. He becomes something without a body, and above the Earth, who for a preparative must be taken up to Paradise, and called from all commerce and all intelligence with his own body. Saint Paul was called from Heaven to preach the Gospel; but he was called to Heaven to qualify him for this higher separation, to an Apostle and Church-Governor.

And now you see your calling, Holy Fathers: And to pass by such obvious unconcerning observations as at first sight follow, that those who are not qualified are not called; I shall only take notice hence of the counter-part of this call, the charge God takes upon him, when he calls to this charge; and that is, he owns and will protect whom himself calls. 'Twas that he promised to the Founder and God of your Order; I the Lord have called thee, and I will hold thine hand, and I will keep thee, Isai. 42. 6. And when he said of Cyrus, I have called him, he said also, be shall make his way prosperous, Isai. 48. 15. And so he shall be the way what it will; for thus he said to Jacob, I have called thee, when thou goest through the Water I am with thee, and through the rivers they shall not overflow thee, Isai. 43. 1, 2. There was Experience of all this in one of the chief Princes of your Order; when the Apostles were scarce safe within their Ship, they were so tossed with waves and fears, yet if our Lord will call him, Peter is confident he shall be safe even in the Sea; Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee on the Water, saith he; and the Lord did but call him, and he went down and walked on the water safely: As if the swelling billows did only lift themselves to meet his steps, and raise him up from sinking. And when his own doubts, which alone could, were near drowning him, and he but called the Lord; immediately he stretched out his hand and caught him: He answers his call, if we answer ours; if we obey when he says come, then will he come and save when we call to him. And so Peter received no hurt, but a rebuke; O thou of little faith, why didst thou doubt? couldst thou imagine I would not sustain thee in the doing what I bid thee do? In answering my call? But why seek we experience of so old a date? There is a more encouraging miracle in these late calls themselves. Had God sustain'd the Order in its Offices and dignities amidst those waves that racked the Church of late, it had been prodigy of undeserved Compassion to our Nation: But whenas all was sunk, to bid the Sea give up what it had swallowed and consumed; this is more than to catch a sinking Peter, or to save a falling Church. The work of Resurrection is emphatically called the working of God's mighty power, and does out-sound that of his ordinary conservation. And truly 'twas almost as easy to imagination, how the scattered Atoms of men's 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 wild confusion, and the Offices buried in the rubbish of the demolisht Churches, should rise again in so much order and beauty. Stantia non poterant tect a probare Deum. This calling of the Spirit is like that when the Spirit moved upon the face of the abyss; and called 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 Kingdom; and did with passion labor a succession in your Order, when he did not know how to lay designs for the Succession of himself or any of his Fathers house to his own Crown and Dignity. Nor is the secular arm 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 was never angry, but once at the rebellious; seems very passionate in calling Vengeance on those that stir against these holy Offices. Smite through the loins of all that rise against them, and of them that hate them, that they rise not again: The loins (we know) are the nest of posterity; so that, strike through the loins, is, stab the succession, destroy at once all the posterity of them that would cut off this Tribe, and hinder its Succession. Nor was this Legal Spirit; Gospel is as severe. Those in Saint Jude that despise these Governors, that do as Corah and his Complices did, (who 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? words these that we are well acquainted with, and which it seems St. Jude looks on as sins under the Gospel:) these perish in the gainsaying of Core; whom God would not prepare for punishment by death, but he and his accomplices went quick into it: He would not let them stay to die, but the Lord made a new thing, to show his detestation of this sin, and the Earth swallowed it in the Commission, and all that were alli'd and appertain'd to them that had an hand in it. And truly they may well expect strange recompenses, who do attempt so strange a Sacrilege, as to pull stars out of Christ's own right hand: From whence, we have his word, 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 which right hand He that brought again from the dead the Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd and Bishop of the Sheep, and set him there: He also bring you our Pastors, and us your flock with you; and set us with his sheep on his right hand. To whom with the same Jesus and the Holy Ghost, be ascribed all blessing, honor, glory, and power, from henceforth forever. Amen.

SERMON XVII. AT HAMPTON-COURT May 29. 1662.

HE has said in the words before, that the Children of Israel shall abide many days without a King and without a Prince, without a Sacrifice and without an Image or Altar, and without an Ephod and without Teraphim. Now when they shall have been for many years in such a state of helpless desolation, shall have no King under whose shadow they, their Laws and Rights, might hope for shelter; no Prince to guard them from the sad calamities of wild confusion or usurping violence; shall have no exercises of Religion to allay and soften those calamities, and give them comfort in the bearing of them; no Altar to lay hold on for security against them, or to stretch out their hands towards, for deprecation of them; no nor a God to put an end to this sad state; nor any means of direction what to do under it, no Ephod to ask Counsel at; nor yet the pageantry, the fallacy of these, no Teraphim for Ephods, nor Image for a God; the same destruction having seized these and their worshippers, the people and their Idols going into Captivity together, and the only true God having forsaken them: Now when the Prophet had denounced this state of Woe, which was to dwell with them so long as that their very expectations of deliverance should be dying, having continued threescore years and ten, a longer and more wearisome age of patience then life, he then proceeds to sweeten all by telling them of a return, and what things they shall do in it; and they are three.

First, Seek the Lord their God, apply themselves to his Worship and Obedience, and cleave to him; for so the word is rendered 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , Lev. 19. 23. and Jeremy repeating this c. 30. 9. words it, shall serve the Lord their God, and David their King.

Which is the second thing they were to do. As the Ecclesiastical state was to be settled, so the secular too upon its just foundations, Religion and Loyalty both running in their ancient current.

Thirdly, They shall fear the Lord and his goodness▪ Not only tremble before him, who is the Lord, that did exert his power in their destruction; but shall much more revere his goodness, that did flow out in such plentiful miraculous expresses of deliverance.

Now these being not only prophecy what in that juncture they would do, nor only duties what they were to do, but also counsels and directions immediately from God what they were best to do, the only prudent and safe course according to the policies of heaven; the direct view of these particulars in reference to that state of theirs is not an unconcerning prospect at this season, which is the Anniversary of an equal return; and therefore I shall lay them so before you, and the reflection on them in our practice shall make the application.

1. They shall seek the Lord their God is my first part, and the Lord's prime direction for the repairing of a broken Nation. Neither indeed can any other course be taken; for 'till we have found him, while he does hide his face, nothing but darkness dwells upon the land; or if any light do break out, 'tis but the kindlings of his anger: So he expresses, Deut. 31. 17. Th •• people will forsake me and break my Covenant, then my anger shall be kindled against them, and I will forsake them, and hide my face from them, and they shall be devoured, and many evils and troubles shall befall them, so that they will say in that day, Are not these evils come upon us because our God is not amongst us? This absence is only another word for desclation: Be thou instructed, O Jerusalem, saith God by Jeremy, c. 6. 8. lest my soul depart from thee, and I make thee desolate, a land not inhabited: As if without him there were nothing else but solitude in Cities and in Courts, and all were desert where he does not dwell. Yea there is something beyond desolation, Hos. 9. 11, 12. As for Ephraim, their glory shall flee away like a bird from the birth and from the womb, and from the Conception: though they bring up their Children, yet I will bereve them that there shall not be a man, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 yea woe also to them when I depart from them. And it must needs be so; for let our state be never so calamitous, if God be not departed, there is comfort in it, and a deliverer at hand: If we are in the place of Dragons, his presence will make heaven there; and although we be covered with the shadow of death, if the light of his Countenance break in, we are in glory; and the brightness of that will soon damp and shine out the fiery Trial. But if the Lord depart, then there is no redemption possible; God hath forsaken him, persecute him and take him, for there is none to deliver him, Psal. 71. 11. But if there were deliverance some other way, yet the want of God's presence is an evil, such as nothing in the whole world can make good: The presence of an Angel in his stead does not. When the Lord said to Israel, I will not go up in the midst of thee, but I will send an Angel with thee, and drive out the Amorite, the Hittite, &c. yet when the people heard these evil tidings, they mourn • d, and man did put on his Ornaments, Exod. 33. 4. Nay more, I shall not speak a contradiction if I shall say, that the most intimate presence of the Godhead does not supply God's absence; and such a small withdrawing of himself as may consist with being united hypostatically, was too much for him to bear, who was Immanuel when he complained God was not with him: I mean our Savior on the Cross. He, who although he did beseech against his cup with fervencies that did breath out in heats of bloody sweat, with agonies of prayer, yet when he fell down under it, did cheerfully submit to it, saying, Not my will, but thy will be done; yet when God hides himself, he does expostulate with him, crying out, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? His God could no more forsake him, than himself could be not himself: And yet the apprehension of that which could not be was even insufferable to him, to whom nothing could be insufferable.

He seems to feel a very contradiction while he but seems to feel the want of the Lord's presence.

Such is the sad importance of God's not being with us; and this same instant tells us what drives him away. 'Twas sin that he withdrew from them: Christ did but take on him our guilt, and upon that the Lord forsook him: God could no more endure to behold wickedness in him, than the Sun could to see God suffer; Iniquity eclipsed them both, and sin did separate betwixt him and himself, and made that person who was God cry out, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? And it will do the same betwixt God and a people. Isaiah. 59. 1, 2. Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened that it cannot save; nor his ear heavy that it cannot hear; but your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear. His face is clothed with light, we know; but when Wickedness over-spreads a people, those deeds of darkness put out the light of his Countenance. His hand although it be not shortened, yet it contracts and shuts itself, not only to grasp and withhold his mercies from them, but to smite: Iniquity builds such a wall of separation as does shut out omnipresence, and makes him who is every where, not be with such a people; not be in hearing of their needs; for when their sins do cry, no prayers can be hearkened to; he will not hear you, saith the Prophet. And that gives us the very 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 of the Lord's departure from a people, and the manner of it.

He is taking away his peace and mercies from a Nation when he will hear no prayers for it; and he declares that he will hear no prayers when he withdraws once from his house of prayer, and makes his Offices to cease. The place appointed for these Offices, the Sanctuary, he calls, we know the Tabernacle of meeting, that is, where he would meet his votaries, and hear and bless them; calls it his house; his dwelling place, his Court, presence, and his throne: And if so, when he is not to be found in these, when he no longer dwells nor meets in them, we may be sure that he hath left the land. The Psalmist, when he does complain men had done evil in the Sanctuary, the adversaries roared in the midst of the Congregations, and set up their banners there for trophies; they broke down all the carved work thereof with axes and hammers, and had defiled the dwelling places of God's name even to the ground, and burnt up all the houses of God in the land; he does suppose that God was then departed when they had left him no abiding place: And therefore cries out, O God wherefore art thou absent from us so long? Remember Zion where thou hast dwelt. But 'tis not only upon these Analogies I build; this method of departure we shall find exactly in Ezekiel 's Vision of that case to which my Text refers: It begins ch. 9. 3. And the glory of the God of Israel, (i. e. the shining cloud, the token of his presence in the Sanctuary,) went up from the Cherub whereupon he was, to the threshold of the house, as going out; and then verse. 8. he does refuse to be entreated for the land: After that ch. 10. 18. the glory went from off the threshold to the midst of the City; and ch. 11. 23. it went from thence to the mountain without the City, and so away: And then nothing but desolation dwelt upon the land, until the Counsel of my Text was followed, and they did seek the Lord their God: For then the glory did return into the Sanctuary just as it went away, as you may find it chap. 43.

And having seen when and how God forsakes a people, and for what, that does direct us how to seek him, and it is thus, When men forsake those paths in which they did not only err and go astray, but did walk contrary to God, so that they did forsake each other; and do return, walk in his ways, the ways of Commandments, and return also to his Church, and seek him in his house, fall low before his footstool, beg of him to meet in his tabernacle, renew his worship, and all invitations of him to return into his dwelling-place. For sure as it is in vain to seek him but in his own ways, nor can we hope to meet him but in his Tabernacle of meeting; so also Scripture calls both these to seek the Lord, and promises to both the finding him. To the first, Deut. 4. 29, 30. If from thy tribulation thou shalt seek the Lord thy God, thou shalt find him, if thou seek him with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, if thou turn to the Lord thy God, and shalt be obedient to his voice. And the second, Jer. 29. 12. speaking of this sad state to which my Text relates, then shall ye call upon me, and ye shall go and pray unto me; and I will hearken unto you, and I will be found of you, saith the Lord, and I will turn away your Captivity. I could produce you instances of Asa making all his people swear to seek the Lord: But because my Text speaks of David, he shall be the great explication, as he was the practice of this duty in both senses. In the former, 119. Psal. I have sought thy Commandments above Gold or precious stone; more than that which does make and does adorn my Crown, than that which furnishes all the necessities and all the pomps of Royalty. And for the other, Psal. 63. 1, 2. O God, thou art my God, early will I seek thee: My soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land where no water is: To see thy power and thy glory, as I have seen the in the Sanctuary. His very words do seem to labor too, and he does seek expressions to tell us how he seeks. The hot fits of a thirsty palate that call so oft and so impetuously are in his soul; it hath a pious fever, which cannot be allayed but by pouring out of his soul to God in the Temple, by breathing out its heats in his devotion Offices. Nay, more, he longs, hath that I know not whether appetite, or passion, which is not to be understood, but only suffered; to which all the unreasonable violences which passion can be heated into, all the defaillances nature can be oppressed into, are natural; it is the bodies Extasie. Now this he had towards the worship of the Sanctuary; his very flesh found rapture in those exercises, and when he was in a barren and dry land, was driven from the plenties of a Court, and from the glories of a throne into a desert solitude, he found no other wants but of God's house; did mind, pant, and long after nothing else, did neither thirst for his necessities, nor long for his own Crown, but for the Tabernacle only. And besides the Religion of this, he had reason of State too to be thus affected; this was the best means to engage his Subjects to him and secure his Throne. He knew, if by establishing God's worship, and by going with the multitude, as he did use, to the exercises of it; if by Royal Example and encouragements of virtue, and by discountenancing and chastising impiety, by doing as he did profess to do, Psal. 101. (that Directory for a Court) he could people his land with holy living, and his Temple with holy Worship; he knew he should then have good Subjects, Loyal to him and at peace with themselves. I they will seek their God, then they will seek their King. The Lord saw this dependence, and therefore counseled this course should be taken. The Master of our Politicks discerned it too, and therefore does advise that the first and chiefest public cares should be about things of Religion, that and the same profession of it being 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the cement of Communities, and the very foundation of all legislative, and indeed all power in the Magistrate: And in the people 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , 'tis a most efficacious philtre, a charm, a Gordian knot of kindness. And as a Jew observed of their own Nation, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , To have one and the same opinions of God, and not to differ in their rites from one another, breeds the best harmony in men's affections. When on the other side no obligations, though the most signal and divine, will hold them in obedience and peace, if their ambitions or interests look another way: And if at any time present advantage, or an expectation, or some passion do incline them to seek David their King; yet the appearance of a change of Interest, that expectation defeated, or a cross animosity will burst those bonds, unless Religion and Communion in Worship help to twist them. David had had experience of this.

Abner knew of God's Oath to David that after Saul he should be King over all Israel; but he was otherwise concerned, and therefore he made Ishbosheth King, maintained a long and sore War even against what he knew God was engaged to bring about, and made himself strong for the house of Saul, 2 Sam. 2, 3, ch. But when a quarrel happened betwixt Ishbosheth and him, then, So do God to Abner and more also, except as the Lord hath sworn to David, even so I do to him, to set up the throne of David over Israel and over Judah. And he sent Messengers to him saying, Whose is the land? Make but thy league with me, c. 3. 9, 10, 11, 12. Do but look forward, and you find when Abner was cut off, and Ishbosheth was slain, and Israel had no leader, then they came to David, saying, behold we are thy bone and thy flesh, and the Lord said to thee, Thou shalt feed my people Israel, c. 5. 1, 2. They knew all that before, yet would not let him do it, 'till they had no other leader. Nay, when they had done that, by Absalom 's insinuations (who in a way of treacherous pity did instill dislikes against the Government, and did remonstrate in good wishes, as some men do in prayers, c. 15. 3, 4.) they were all drawn into Rebellion against this David, and made him fly out of the land, and became Subjects to that Absalom. When he was dead indeed they speak of bringing back the King, c. 19. 10. and when his own Judah had done it, quarrel'd, ver. 43. because that their advice was not first had: And though Judah had nothing but their service, for, have we eaten at all of the Kings cost, or hath he given us any gift? say they, v. 42. yet Israel in angry, because he came not back upon their score, for they forsooth have ten parts in him, v. 43. and yet the next day every man of Israel went after him that said, we have no part in David, Sheba a man of Belial, ch. 20. 1. Thus no allegiance, no tie however sacred and divine will hold them who follow not upon God's score. Nay at the last, because that Re • oboam would not ease the Taxes, all Israel cry out, What portion have we in David? see to thine own house, David. And to make this secession perpetual (which all the former did not prove) Jeroboam did use no other policy, but to change the Worship and the Priests: He knew he should divide their hearts and Nations forever, when he had altered once the Service and the Officers; and if he could but keep them from seeking God at Jerusalem, he was secure they would not seek David their King. And so it proved. Now the Lord to prevent divisions had provided so far for Uniformity in his Worship, that he required a single Unity; and that it might be but in one manner, he let it be but in one place.

And truly, when men once depart from Uniformity, what measures can they set themselves of changing? What shall confine or put shores to them? what Principle can they proceed upon which shall engage them to stay anywhere? And why may not divisions be as infinite as men's fancies? And though, when those are but in circumstantial things, those who are strong, and know them to be such, are no otherwise concerned to contend for them than on Authorities behalf, (to which every change is a Convulsion fit. ) and on the account of decency, and of compliance with the universal Church: yet when others do dogmatize, and put conscience in the not doing them, and stand at such a distance from them as to choose Schism, Disobedience, and Sedition rather, and therefore must needs look upon damnation in them; these differences make as great a gulf and chasm as that which does divide Dives from Abraham 's bosom. It is one God, one Faith, one Worship makes hearts one. Hands lifted up together in the Temple they will join and clasp: And so Religion does fulfil its name à religando, binds Prince and Subjects all together; and they who thus do seek the Lord their God, will also seek David their King, God's next direction, and my second part.

2. And here three things offer themselves, a King, their King, and David their King.

I am not here to read a Lecture of State-policy upon a vie of Governments; why seek a King, not any other sort of Government; and why their King, one that already was so by the right of Succession, not whom addresses or election should make so. And though I think, 'twere easy to demonstrate only Monarchy had ever a divine or natural original, and that elective Monarchy is most unsafe and burthensome, full of dangerous and uneasy consequences; and this so much to sight, that choice for the most part bounds itself, proves but a ceremony of Succession: yet this I need not do, for I am dealing with the Jews, who had God's judgment in the case, and his appointment too; and to me that is argument enough. And when God hath declared, for the transgressions of a land many are the Princes thereof; many at once, as in a common-wealth, or many several families successively, (for so God reckons also one or many; 'tis still, we see, David their King, while 'tis in David 's line, and so the King does truly never die, while his race lives.) If either of these many be God's punishment, for the sins of a land; I will not say that they who love the many Princes love the transgressions which God plagues so; but I will say, they who do choose that which God call his plague, that quarrel for his vengeance, and with great strife and hazard take 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 myself with that which Calvin says upon the words; Nam aliter vere & ex animo Deum quaerere non potuit, quin se etiam subjiceret legitimo imperio cui 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 add that they who do forsake their King, will soon forsake their God. The Rabbin's say it more severely of Israel that they at once rejected three things, the Kingdom of the house of David, and the Kingdom of Heaven, and the Sanctuary. And truly, if we do consult that State from the beginning, we shall find that when they were without their King, they always were without their God.

Moses was the first King in Jeshurun, and he was only gone into the Mount for forty days, and they set up a Golden Calf; they make themselves a God if they want him whom the Lord makes so, as he does the Magistrate: If they have not a Prince, that 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , living Image of God, then they must have an Idol. When Moses his next successor was dead, we read that the man Micah had an house of God's, and consecrated one of his Sons to be his Priest: And truly he might make his Priest who made his Deities. And the account of this is given, in those days there was no King in Israel, Jud. 17. 5, 6. The very same is said, ch. 18. 1. to preface the Idolatry of the Tribe of Dan▪ There was no heir of restraint, as it is worded ver. 7. It seems, to curb impiety is the Princes Inheritance, which 'till it be suppressed, he hath not what he is heir to. But Vice will know no Boundaries if there be no King, whose Sword is the only mound and fence against it: for if we read on there, 19, 20, 21. ch. we shall find those dismal Tragedies of Lust and War, the one of which did sin to death the Levites wife; the other, besides 40000. slain of them who had a righteous cause, and whom God did bid fight, destroyed also a Tribe in Israel: These all sprang from the same occasion, for so the story closes it, In those days there was no king in Israel, ch. 21. 25.

Just upon this; when God in their necessities did raise them Judges, 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 evil again after the death of such an one, 'till he raised them another. Those 450. years being divided 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 Man that did make Israel to sin, at once against God and against their King. Yea upon this account they are reckoned by God to sin after both their Idolatry and State were ended, when their calves and their Kingdom were destroyed. Ezek. 4. 4, 5. the Lord does bid the Prophet lie on his left side 390 days, to bear the iniquity of Israel according to the number of the years of their iniquity. But this was more then the years of their State, which were only 255, 390 years indeed there were betwixt the falling off of the Ten Tribes, and the destruction of Jerusalem by the King of Babel; but those ten Tribes were gone, their Kingdom perfectly destroyed above 130 years before: But their iniquity was not, it seems, that does outlive their State, so long as that God's Temple, that King's house did stand from which they did divide. As if Seditious men and schismatics sin longer then they are, even while those are whom they do sin against in separating from.

'It is true, there was an Ahaz and Manasseh in the house of David, but Hezekiah and Josiah did succeed. Mischief did not appear entailed on Monarchy, as 'tis upon rebellion and having no King. It does appear their Kings were guards also to God and his Religion, the great defenders 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 were the same who sought the Lord their God, and David their King.

But why David their King? For could his Kingdom disappear and be to seek; of whom the Lord had said, I have sworn once by my Holiness, I will not fail David? Psal. 89. And his Throne therefore was 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 shelter to rapacity, oppression, or licences, or any crying wickedness; those prove Traitors to Majesty and themselves, strike at the root of that under which 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 in may be, think them slight; but their complexion is purple: Common blood is not deep enough to color them, they die themselves in that that's sacred. Nay these do seem to spread contagion to God, as if they would 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 swarest unto David? But sure some of God's Oaths will stand; if not those of his kindness, those will by which he swears the ruin of such sinners, and God that is holy will be sanctified in judgment upon them. Yea, upon more then the offenders, for the guilty themselves are not a sacrifice equal to such piacular ofences. Innocent Majesty must bleed for them too; If you do wickedly, you shall be destroyed both you and your King. Thus when God would 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, when 'twas Zerubbabel? For with Theodoret and others I conclude he must be meant the first literal importance of the words.

It was the custom 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 without doubt David was Heroe enough for this, and his valor alone sufficient to ground the like practice upon. And though we do not find that done, yet we do find his piety and his uprightness made the standard by which that of his Successors is meted. Of one 'tis said, he walked in the ways of David his Father, of another, he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, but not like unto David his Father. And because David went aside, and was upright with an Exceptation, once therefore it is said, The Lord was with Jehoshaphat, because he walked in the first ways of his Father David. But besides this, his very name is given to two, Zerubbabel, and the Messiah; both which were to be the restorers of their people: The one from Sin and Hell, to reestablish the Kingdom of heaven itself; the other to deliver his people from Babel, and to repair a broken Nation and demolished Temple. And for this work God bids them seek David their King.

The ways from Babel to Jerusalem, from the Confusion of a people to a City that is at unity in itself, the City of God where he appears in perfect beauty, and where the throne of the house of David is, must be the first ways of David: In those he walked to Zion, and did invest his people in God's promises, the whole land of Canaan. In those Zerubbabel brought them back to that land and Zion. And in these our Messiah leads us to Mount Zion that is above, to the celestial Jerusalem; does build an universal Church and Heaven itself. And all that have the like to do must walk in those first ways, fulfil that part of David, and must Copy Christ. Such the repairers of great breaches must be: These are the ways to settle Thrones, the only ways in which we may find the goodness of the Lord; which to fear is the third direction, and my last part.

3. That Israel who came but now out of the furnace should fear the Lord whose wrath did kindle it, whose justice they had found such a consuming fire as to make the Temple itself a Sacrifice, and the whole Nation a burnt-offering, is reasonable to expect: But when his goodness had repaired all this, to require them to fear that, does seem hard. That that goodness which when it is once apprehended does commit a rape upon our faculties, and being tasted melts the heart, and causes dissolution of soul through swoons of complacency, that this should be received with dread and trembling, is most strange. Indeed the Psalmist says, There is mercy with God that he may be feared; for where there not, we should grow desperate▪ But how to fear those mercies is not easy. 'It is true, when God made his goodness pass fore Moses, shown him the glory of it, as he says, in those mo •• comfortable Attributes, the sight of which is beatifick Vision, Exod. 34. 6, &c. The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, transgression and sin; if that which follows there be part of it, and that will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the Fathers upon the Children unto the third or fourth Generation; if this be one ray of the glory of goodness, if it dart out such beams, alas, 'tis as devouring as the lake of fire, his very goodness stabs whole successions at once, and the guilty may tremble at it for themselves and their posterity. But if those words do mean as we translate those very words, Jer. 46. 28. I will not leave thee altogether unpunished, yet will not utterly cut off, not make a full end of the guilty, when I visit Iniquities upon the Children, but will leave them a remnant still; then there is nothing dreadful in it, but those very visitations have kindness in them, and his rod comforts, and this issue of his goodness also is not terrible but lovely. To fear God's goodness therefore is to revere it, to entertain it with a pious astonishment, acknowledging themselves unworthy of the crumbs of it, especially not daring to provoke it by surfeiting, or by presuming on it, or by abusing it to serve ill ends, or any other than God sent it for, those of piety and obedience: Not to comply with which, is to defeat God's kindness, and the designs of it. If when they sought the Lord, he was found of them, and came to his dwelling place only to be forced thence again by their abominations; if when his goodness had restored all to them, they had David their King but to conspire against, an Altar only to pollute, and a Temple to separate from, as Manasseh the Priest, Sanballat 's son in-law, with his accomplices did do; this were both to affront and to renounce that goodness, which above all things they must dread the doing: For if this be offended too, ruin is irreversible; there is no other attribute in God a sinner can fly to with any hope. His Holiness cannot behold iniquity, his Justice speaks nothing but condemnation to guilt, his Power without kindness is but omnipotent destruction; but if we have his Goodness on our side, we have an Advocate in his own bosom that will bear up against the rest, for his mercy is over all his Attributes as well as Works: But if this also be exasperated, and kindness grow severe, there is no refuge in the Lord, no shadow of him to take Sanctuary under; for there is nothing to allay the anger of his Comp • ssion and Bounty. This sure is the extremist terror, we are to dread his kindness more than his severity and wrath; we have an antidote, a buckler against those, but none against the other if it be provoked; and if the heats of love take fire and rise into indignation, 'tis unquenchable flame and everlasting burning. Therefore when God hath done all things that he can do or they can wish, then most of all they must fear the Lord and his goodness.

My Text and I have spoke all this while to the Jews: Nor do I know whether I need to address any other way, all this did so directly point at us. The glories of this day need not the foil of those calamities from which this day redeemed, to set them off; or you may read them in my Prophet here, and our own guilts will make too sad a Comment on his Text, who were more barbarous Assyrians to ourselves. We also were without a Prince and without Sacrifice, had neither King, nor Church, nor Offices, because we ourselves had destroyed them, and that we might not have them had engaged or covenanted against them; tied to our miseries so, that without perjury we could neither be without them, nor yet have them. As we had broke through all our sacred Oaths to invade and usurp calamity and guilt, so neither could we repent without breach of Vows, if this were not enough to make us be without a God too, then to drive him away we had defiled his dwelling places to the ground, and by his ancient gifts of remove he was certainly gone. There was indeed exceeding much Religion among us, yet, God knows, almost none at all, while Christianity was crumbled into so many, so minute professions, that 'twas divided into little nothings, and even loft in a crowd of itself; while each man was a Church, every single professor was a whole multitude of Sects. And in this tumult, this riot of faiths, if the Son of man should have come, could he have found any Faith in the Land? Virtue was out of countenance and practice, while prosperous and happy Villany usurped its name; while Loyalty, and conscience of Oaths, and Duty were most unpardonable crimes, to which nothing but ruin was an equal punishment; and all those guilts that make the last times perilous, Blasphemy, Disobedience, Truce-breakings and Treasons, Schisms and Rebellions, with all their dismal consequences and appendages, (for these are not single, personal crimes, these have a politick capacity ) all these did not only walk in the dress of piety, and under holy Masks, but were themselves the very form of Godliness, by which 'twas constituted and distinguished, the Signature of a party of Saints, the Constellation of their graces: And on the other side, the detestation of such hypocrisy made others Libertines and Atheists; while seeing men such holy counterfeits, so violent in acting, and equally engaged for every false Religion, made them conclude there was none true, or in earnest. And all this was because we were without our King; for 'twas the only interest of all those usurpations that were, to contrive and preserve it thus. And when we had rolled thus through every form of Government, addrest to each, moved every stone, and raised each stone to the top of the Mount, but everyone still tumbled down again, and ours like Sisyphus 's labor was like to have no end, only restless and various Calamity; necessity then counsel'd us, and we applied to God's directions in the Text, I know not whether in his method, but it is plain we did seek David our King. And my heart is towards the Governors of Isral, that offered themselves willingly among the people: Bless ye the Lord: Yea, Thou O Lord, bless them. May all the blessings which this was the birth-day of, all that my Text encloses, all the goodness of the Lord, be the sure portion of them and their Families; may they see the King in his beauty, and peace upon Israel, and may their Names be blest in their Posterities for evermore. We sought him with the violent impatiencies of necessitous and furious desires, and our eyes, that had even failed with looking for him, did even fail with looking on him, as impotent and as unsatisfied in our fruitions as expectations; and he was entertained with as many tears as prayed for; as one whom not our Interests alone, but out guilts had endeared to us, and our tears: He was as necessary to us as repentance, as without whom it was impossible for us to repent and return from those impieties to him, of usurping his rights, of exiling, of murthering him by wants, because we could not do it by the Axe or Sword; without him 'twas impossible for us to give over the committing these; and the tears that did welcome him were one of our best lavers to wash off that blood that we had pulled upon ourselves. One endeared also to us by God's most miraculous preservations of him for us: We cannot look upon his life but as the issue of prodigious bounty, snatched by immediate Providence out of the gaping jaws of tyrannous, usurping, murderous malice, merely to keep him for our needs, and for this day: One whom God had trained up and managed for us, just as he did prepare David their King, at thirty years of age to take possession of that Crown which God had given him by Samuel about twelve years before; and in those years to prepare him for Canaan by a Wilderness, to harden him with discipline, that so the luxuries and the effeminacies of a Court might not emasculate and melt him; by constant Watches, cares and business to make him equal for, habituated to, careful of and affected with the business of a Kingdom; and by constraining him to dwell in Mesech, with Aliens to his Religion, to teach him to be constant to his own, and to love Zion. And hath he not prepared our David so for us? And we hope hath prepared for him too the first days of David, having no Sheba in the Field, not Achitophel in the Council, nor an Abiathar in the Temple, not in that Temple which himself hath raised, God having made him instrument of that which he would not let David do, building his house, and furnishing it with all its Offices, and making it fit for God to meet us in; when we do seek him also, which was the other perquisite of our Condition.

There never was so much pretence of seeking God as in those late days of his absence from us; and it should seem indeed we knew not where to find him, we took such several ways to seek him. But if God did not look down from heaven then as he did Psal. 14. to see if any did understand and seek after God, should he not then have found it here as there? They are altogether gone out of the way; their throat is an open sepulcher, with their tongues have they deceived, the poison of asps is under their lips, their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness, their feet are swift to shed blood: destruction and unhappiness is in their ways, and the way of peace have they not known; there is no fear of God before their eyes: They eat up my people as it were bread; and, which is worse in these then them, they even then call upon God; as if they craved a blessing from the Lord upon that meal that did devour his people, and when they did seek God, they meant to find a prey. Yet where were any others that did seek him? Or that do cleave to him now? The Schismatic does not seek God, who shuns the place where he appears, and meets, and dwells; nor does he cleave to God who tears himself off from the Lord's body. Mark such as cause divisions, saith S. Paul, and avoid them: and if all Christians must avoid them, then I am sure God is not with them. The other Schismatics that divide from the World by cutting off the World from them; do they seek God that are diverted by so many Saints and Angels? that terminte divinest Worship in a creature? Or do they cleave to God, when their devotion embraceth stocks and stones? Or did they seek God for the purpose of my Text, who did not seek David their King, but did apply themselves to several foreign Princes, and to others which they hoped would set up their Golden Calf? Incendiaries, that make fires and raise commotions, these are far from God; for the Lord was not in the fire, or in the Earth-quake, but in the still small voice, in the soft whispers of peace and love. The Atheist, he that says in his heart there is no God, will not seek God, you may be sure; nor does he care to seek David his King, who is equally well under all Governments that will allow his Licences, and who hath no Religion to tie him to any. If he at all disliked the former, it was upon reasons of Burthen, or of Pride, or Libertinism: So much Religion, though counterfeit, was a reproach to him, and the face of such strictness was uneasy to him. These are so far from seeking God, that God says these did drive him out of Israel, Ezek. 9. 9. And then when that hath so long been the Wit, that it is now the Complexion of the Age, and they who thought fit to show their not being Hypocrites by License, and (to give it an easy word) by droll • ry in sacred things, have now made nothing to be sacred to them; how shall the Lord dwell among such? They are enough to exercise God out of a Nation. The Hypocrite also, for all his Fasts and Prayers never did seek God, for he is but a whited Sepulcher, our Savior says. Now who would seek the Living God among the dead? the Lord of Life sure is not to be found in Graves. Golgotha was a place to crucify him in, not Worship him: He takes not in the Air of Funeral Vaults for Incense; it was a Demoniac that used to be among the Tombs. The subtle, false, and faithless men that walk in Mazes, never shall meet God: These are the windings and the tracts of the Old Serpent, and they lead only to his habitation. They that do climb as if they meant to find God on his own Throne, that follow Christ up to a pinnacle of the Temple, or to the top of that exceeding high Mount, whence they can overlook the glories of the World, and pick and choose, these do not go to seek Christ there: It is the Devil that does carry up thither, upon his own designs. Nor is it possible to seek the Lord in the ways that lead to the strange Woman's house, for her house is the way to hell, Solomon says, (and he did know; ) nay more, her steps take hold on hell, seise on those everlasting burnings which her foul heats kindle and begin. In a word, they that seek their own, that turn all merely to their advantage, they cannot seek God too, he will not be joint God with Mammon. And then where are the men that sought him? That did retrive him to us? Or with whom does he dwell? If he be not among us, we do in vain flatter ourselves in our prosperity and peace, gawd it in all our bright appearances. Have we not seen the Sun rise with a glory of day about him, and mounting in his strength chase away all the little receptacles and recesses of the night, not leave a cloud to shelter the least relics of her darkness, or any spot to chequer or to fleck the countenance of day? When strait a small handful of vapor raised by that Sun itself, did creep upon his face, and by little and little getting strength be-dashed his shine, and poured out as full streams of storm as he had done of light; 'till it even put out the day, and shed a night upon the Earth in spite of him? So may prosperity itself, if the Lord and his blessing be not in it, raise that which will soon overcast and benight the most glorious condition of a Nation. That Wine which now makes your hearts glad, may prove like that which did commit the Centa • res, and the Lapithae, first kindle Lusts, then Wars, and at last only fill a Cup of trembling and astonishment; and that Oil that does make you cheerful countenances, may make your paths slippery, and nourish flames that will devour and ruin all.

But God, who is found of them that seek him not, nay who himself sought the lost sheep and carried him, when with his straying he was wearied into impossibility of a return, as also sought, and found, and brought together us and our great Shepherd: For this is the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes. These ways of his also are so past finding out, that we may well conclude they are the mere foot-steps of his incomprehensible goodness, and we have only now to fear that goodness.

But give me leave to say, Those that despise his goodness, do not fear it; and they whom it does not lead to repentance, do despise it. S. Paul says, Rom. 2. 4. Despisest thou the riches of his goodness, and forbearance, and long-sufferance, not knowing that the goodness of the Lord leads thee to repentance?

And now, O Lord, what sort of men among us hath thy goodness wrought upon, and made repent? Those whom it was directed to convince, and came on purpose to, to prove by their own only argument they had of providential Miracles, they were not in the right, but that destruction and misery were in their ways; yet these choose rather to deny their own conclusions, and resist God's goodness, then to be convinced and repent: For we have seen them as bold Martyrs to their Sin as ever any to Religion, signalize their resolved impenitence with cheerful suffering, as if the fire they were condemned to were that Triumphal Chariot, in which the Prophet mounted up to Heaven. Others that did not go so far in condemnation nor guilt as they, and therefore think they have no reason to repent of that, do they repent of what they did contribute to it? Of those that lifted up their hands to swear and fight, how many are there that have made them fall, and smite their own thigh, saying, What have I done? Do not all rather justify as far as they themselves proceeded? And if all that were well, why do not we repent of our Allegiance and Loyalty? If all that were well, what hath thy goodness done, O Lord, that hath reversed it all? And for the rest, those that do not partake the plenties of thy goodness, murmur and repine at it; are discontent at having what they prayed for, what they would have died for. Those that have been partakers of it, have turned it into wantonness, have made it furnish them for base unworthy practices; such as have not the generosity of Vice, have not a noble, manly wickedness, are poltron sins; have made it raise a cry on the Faithfullest party, the best Cause, and the purest Church in the World. While we have debauched God's own best Attribute, made his goodness procure for our most wicked or self-ends; and the face of things is so vicious in every order and degree and sex, that—But the Confession is only fit for Litanies, and we have need to make the burden of ours be, Lord, give us some afflictions again, send out thy Indignation, for we do fear thy goodness, it hath almost undone us; and truly, where it does not better, it is the most fearful of God's Attributes or Plagues, for it does harden there. St. Paul says so in the forecited place; and Origen does prove this very thing did harden Pharaohs heart, indulgence was his induration. Now induration is the being put into Hell upon the Earth: There is the same impenitence in both, and judgment is pronounced already on the hardened, and the life they lead is, but the interval betwixt the Sentence and the Execution, and all their sunshine of Prosperity, is but kindled Brimstone, only without the stench. And then to make the treasures of God's bounty be treasures of wrath to us! to make his kindness, his longsuffering; that is St. Peter says, salvation, condemn us, his very goodness be Hell to us! But sure so great a goodness as this we have tasted, cannot have such deadly issues; and it was great indeed, so perfectly miraculous in such strange and continued successes, resisting our contrivances and our sins too, overcoming all opposition of our vices, and our own policies, that do not comport with it, and in despite of all still doing us good; it was fatality of goodness. Now sure that which is so victorious will not be worsted by us. But Oh! have we not reason so much more to fear the goodness? The greater and more undeserved it is, the more suspicious it is: As if it were the last blaze of the Candle of the Lord, when its light gasps; its flash of shine before it do go out, the dying struggles and extreme efforts of goodness, to see if at the last anything can be wrought by it. And if we did consider how some men manage the present goodness, make use of this time of it, and take, and catch, we would believe they did fear the departure of it: But yet it is in our power to fix it here. If we repent, God's gifts then are without repentance, but one of us must change: Bring Piety and Virtue into countenance and fashion, and God will dwell among us. Nay St. Paul says, Goodness to thee if thou continue in his goodness: If we ourselves do not forsake it, and renounce it, not fear it so as to fly from it, but with the fears of sinking men, that catch and grasp, lay fast dead hold upon it, if, as God promises, he so put his fear in our hearts, that we never depart from it, fear that hath love in it, and is as unitive as that, then it shall never depart from us; but we shall see the goodness of the Lord, in the Land of the Living, and shall be taken thence to the eternal fullness of it. This day shall be the Birth-day of Immortal Life, the entering on a Kingdom that cannot be moved. A Crown thus beautified, is a Crown of Glory here, and shall add weight and splendor to the Crown hereafter: A Church thus furnished, is a Church Triumphant in this World, and such a Government is the Kingdom of Heaven upon Earth; and then we shall all reign with him who is the King of Kings, and who washed us in his Blood, to make us Kings and Priests to God and his Father. To whom be glory and dominion for ever. Amen.

SERMON XVIII. AT CHRIST'S-CHURCH IN OXFORD ON S ^t STEVEN's Day.

I Need no Artifice to tie this Subject and this Day together. The Saint whose memory we celebrate was the Martyr of this Text: And 'tis impossible to keep the Feast but by a resolution of obeying these Commands, you being called together on this day to beseech God to grant that you by the Example of this first Martyr St. Stephen, who prayed for his Murderers, may learn to love your Enemies, and pray for them that despitefully use you, and persecute you.

A strange command in an Age, in which we scarcely can find men that love their Friends, nor anything but that which serves their interests or pleasures, that indeed love nothing but themselves; nor is it only injury that works their hate and enmity, but difference in opinion divides hearts, and men are never to be reconciled that have not the same mind in everything; as if one Heaven should not hold them that have not one judgment in all things, we see that one Church cannot hold them, and they that have but one same God, one Redeemer and Savior, one Holy Spirit of Suplication, cannot agree yet in one Prayer to him, though they have but one same thing to pray for to him: will not meet in their Worship because they do not in some Sentiments; and 'tis no wonder all Christ's reasonings and upbraidings, all the Advantages he does propose to them that love, the shames he casts on them that do not, by putting them out of his Train into the condemnation of Publicans; 'tis no wonder all this does not work with them whom their own sufferings and black Calamities will not convince. There is not one of us but knows that thus our miseries began but few years since, and yet we that have suffered for and by our Divisions, whose quarrels wounded the whole Nation and our selves, who have wept so much blood at once to vent and to bewail our differences, are still as full of the same animosities as ever, and want nothing but opportunity to confound all again, Religion and ourselves: And in the name of God what did Christ mean when he prescribed this Precept? when he disputed? pressed it thus? or what do Christians mean when they do break and tear this Precept and themselves? Though I be far from any hopes to reconcile our Parties, (as by God's help I shall ever be from making any,) yet I will offer an Expedient to make them not so noxious; namely, if they will keep the differences of their judgments from breaking out into their affections and actions. And though while meekness and obedience to Governors, and the whole constellation of Gospel-graces, do not seem to shine so fair as man's own reputation, or humor, or possibly some strict opinion which they have owned, and the show of holiness that glitters in it, while 'tis thus, I say, we cannot look any party will yield, all do or will believe themselves to be in the right; yet I will give them leave to think so, and my prescription shall concern them equally although they be; and by addressing my Discourse to them that are so really, I shall conclude more forcibly them that are not, who ere they be; for sure I am none can be more in the right than those whom Christ lays this injunction upon, than his Disciples and Apostles, as relating to those that would be their Enemies as such: Yet 'tis to them he speaks here; I say unto you, love your Enemies, &c.

The words contain a Duty prescribed, and the Authority prescribing it: The Prescription and the Authority in these words, I say unto you, the Duty in the rest: where it is set down 1. in general: Love your Enemies, and that to be considered under a double prospect: 1. As it is placit in opposition to something that was before indulged the Jews, or presumed so to be by them; signified here by the particle But; and then as it stands by itself, in its own positive importance: Love your Enemies. And Secondly, this Duty is particularized in several exercises of the Act commanded, Love, in relation to several sorts of the Objects of that Act, Enemies: As 1. Those that curse you, you must bless: 2. Those that hate you, you must do good to: 3. Those that use you despitefully and persecute you, you must pray for.

These I shall treat of in their given order, beginning with the general Duty, and viewing that at once in both the lights that it doth stand in, that one may clear and fortify the other. But I say unto you, love your Enemies.

Of all the Points of Christian Religion those which did most stagger the faith of some, and check their acceptation of it, or adherence to it, (saith Marcellinus writing to St. Austin ) were these 3; The incarnation of our Lord: The meanest of his Miracles, which they thought the works of Apollonius equal'd; and thirdly, the prescriptions in the Text, It seems they looked upon these Duties as the mysteries of Practice; that spoke as loud a contradiction to their active principles and inclinations, as the other appeared to do so, those of Speculation and Discourse, a God made flesh, and flesh and blood made so lame and passive, sweetened so, being alike impossible to their belief: As if no flesh could certainly be so, except that of which God was made, and the Word incarnate only could fulfill, these words here in my Text: They looked upon this as a much-more mighty work than any of his Miracles; as if 'twere easier to snatch one out of the arms of Fate from the embraces of the Grave, than to receive an enemy into ones own: As if Christ had done more when he prayed for his Crucifiers then when he prayed Lazarus out of his grave: For their Magicians, they say, vied Miracles with him, but none of their Religions or God's did ever aim at this Prescription, ut quae sit propria bonitas nostra; saith Tertullian; this being a sort of Piety peculiar to the Christians. Nor did they only think it unpracticable, but unreasonable; as carrying opposition to all Government, to the Prosperity and Peace of every Polity; for he that does require that I shall have no return of injuries, but for a wrong, makes me in debt a kindness, not only supersedes judiciary proceedings, but does secure Rapine by Law, and encourage it by reward; and truly if it were impossible for him that does affect a person to dislike his evil actions, and to desire he may have condign punishment, such as by Gospel-measures may be satisfaction equal to his fault, and warning to himself and others, these men had reason: But if a Father can at once love and correct his Child; if when I am with indignation displeased at my offenses against God, and by severities revenge them on myself, I do then love myself most passionately; and if I can pray with all the vigor of my soul for that false Traitor-bosom-enemy, my flesh, while it lies goading me to sin, and with temptation persecuting me to everlasting death, then no reason of State, or of my own requires I should not do all these acts of kindness to my Adversary. In that thou hast an exact pattern for thy enmity to them that wrong thee, and thou shalt hate thine enemy as thyself, is a most perfect Gospel-Rule: that being most cons ••• nt with and directive of this Duty, love your enemies. But yet there is so great a difference indeed betwixt this Act here and its object (Enemy being constituted such by enmity, that is aversion and hate) that love, and that seem strangely coupled, things that can be put together only for a contest, just as heat and cold, to weaken one another, that both the love and enmity, may be refracted into a luke-warmhess. Therefore I shall divide them, handling Love first by itself, viewing the import of that as it is sincere, lest the enemy appearing with it, make it shrink into a very slender Duty: and having done that, secondly, see whether an others enmity; and thirdly, whether enmity with that appropriation here, your enemies, can take off from the Obligation of that Duty, Love.

Now Love shows fairest to our purposes in those dresses which S. Paul presents her in, 1 Cor. 1. 13. and 1. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 v. 4. and 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ; v. 5. it suffers long, if not the damage, yet the malice of repeated injuries, as knowing it is bound to forgive 'till 70 times 7 times: And 'tis not easily provokit, not apt for sudden violent heats, instantly all one fire, quick as lightning. Such heats are from another passion; which though sometimes they do but flash and die, yet oft they have their Thunder-bolt, and most what do fore-run a storm: whereas the heats of Charity are calm as sun-shine, such as do not consume, but cherish: For 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , in the same verse, Love is kind and gracious, full of humanity: This Virtue is a kind of universal friendship, hath nothing of reserved, morose or sour an humor, that makes solitude in the midst of Society, and makes men only their own company, their Rule, and scope; and such a person Aristotle says must be either a God, who can enjoy nothing beside himself, is his own blessed and immortal entertainment, or a wild beast whose nature is unsociable because 'tis savage, whereas Love is a pious complaisance to all, 'tis condescension too; for 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 in the 5. v. does not think anything unseemly, how contemptible soever, nor unworthy of him; so he may do his Neighbor good; he will debase himself to meanest Offices to work a real kindness. Thus Christ, because he loved his own, knowing the Father had given all things into his hand, he took a Towel, and girded himself, and put water in a Basin and washed his Disciples feest, making the lowest act of servitude be his Expression, and our Example: That is but slender Charity that will keep state, Heaven could not unite Majesty and Love: But to exercise this, God did descend from Glory into the extremity of Meanness. 'It is Bowels that express compassion, and tender kindness; Now those we know of all parts of the Body are employed in the most low ignoble Offices; and to such Love condescends, where 'tis true. Again, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , it cover all; the naked with a garment, and the deformed, the leprous Sinner with a covering too; for Charity covers a multitude of sins, hides his own wrong from his own eyes; this Love too like that in the Poets, cannot see, yea covers all that is no fit for light, suffers only the graces to be naked near him, and not to name all, which you may find there, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , ver. 7 believeth all things, however incompatible to love, and to be wise have been accounted, yet this Love is S. James his Wisdom that came down from Heaven, Cap. 3. 17. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , 〈◊〉 interpret anything to the most favorable sense, and 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , easy to •• persuaded, still believes the best, and where it cannot, yet 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 hopes the best: Affection while it lives cannot despair, for then it must deposit its desires, which are only the warmth of Love, and 'till it die cool not, but if all do not answer hopes, yet 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , he does wait for it, is not discouraged with relapses and the repetitions of injuries, but still expects, and suffers all the contradictions of spite and wrong.

Now if all these acts and the many other there are essential to Love and all be under Obligation; and S. Paul says there, they are so much Duty that without these performances all Faith and all Graces profit nothing: the Preaching Rhetoric of Men and Angels would be nothing else but tinkling, and working Miracles, but showing tricks. It follows then these Acts must necessarily have a certain object, there must be somebody that we are bound to love thus: And if that Object be or Neighbor (as that is most sure) 'tis clear my Neighbors injury, or hate or enmity to me, cannot take off nor yet diminish in the least that Obligation I have to all those Acts, but I must love him though he be mine enemy in every of those instances. For it is plain, his having wronged me does not make him cease to be my Neighbor; nay more, that enmity does formally dispose and qualify my Neighbor for the Object of my love: And many of its Acts cannot relate but to a man that injures me; it must be in respect to provocations that love is said to cool into such a temper as is not easily provoked; For men are not provoked with kindnesses. I cannot suffer anything but wrong, nor suffer long except there be continuation and frequency of wrongs. Nor is it possible I should forgive unless it be offenses done against me. And so for divers of the rest: Now it were strange the enemy should supersede the obligation of the Duty, which cannot be a Duty but in order to an Enemy; that injury should give me a release, from doing that which I can neverr have cause or occasion to do but in the case of injury; that I should have leave not to obey the Command for that mere reason which alone makes it possible to obey it, and which alone makes the Command: Whereas indeed because I must needs love in these expresses, therefore he must needs be my enemy whom I must love.

But if he be without all provocation very unjustly so, if his hate be his sin, so that he hath offended God too in it, may I not then espouse God's quarrel thus far, not to love his Enemy if I must mine own, not to love the injurious, the sinner? Vice certainly is the most hateful thing that is, and therefore it must needs render the subject not to be beloved; accordingly 'tis said, that the ungodly and his ungodliness are both alike hateful unto God, Wis. 14. 9. and David does comply with God in this, Psalm 139. Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? yea I hate them with perfect hatred, I count them mine enemies. And when I reflect on mine under this Notion, or if mine be such as set themselves against Religion and the peace and quietness of the Church, am I bound to love them? If so, then I may be allowed to do it with a little regret sure. But yet if we consider how these in the Text are designated by that Appropriation, your enemies, which means those that hate you, my Disciples, those that in the last words of my Text, will persecute you even for your being mine; and yet those they are bid to love, we may conclude in the next place we may not hate our enemies as Sinners: Nor yet does enmity with God, his Church, or his Religion qualify a person for our aversation or mischiefs. I except here Apostasy and utter obduration in it; a state that incapacitates for mercy, and by consequence for love and kindness. There is a sin which S. John would not say that we should pray for, and the Church thought that there was such a sinner, I • dian, but as to less degrees, they that are supposed to persecute Disciples, and in doing so persecute Christ himself, may well be granted sinners, enemies to God and Christianity; but yet says he, I say unto you, love these your enemies. Tertullian understood this so, and writing to the Governor of Carthage, who threatened all the Christians of that Province with Excision, that he might persuade him from his purpose, thus began his Proposals: We do not write as fearing for ourselves, or dreading anything that we are like to suffer, for we did enter our Religion on the condition of suffering, we covenanted to endure, and staked our lives when we began our profession; but 'tis for you we fear, for you our enemies, whom our Religion does command us to love and to do good to. And though we must hate Vice, and do our best to root out Infidelity and Atheism, destroy Profaneness, Irreligion and Heresy and Schism: These are fit objects for the zeals of Hate, and for the fevers of our Passion, and if our enemies be such we may meetly endeavor they may have appropriate restraints, yet not to exercise the Acts of Charity and kindness to them we have no allowance: No sins can make it lawful for us to ruin, or not to do good to the Sinners. In fine the only persons that the Jews pretended to have ground to hate were Enemies, and Enemies, indeed to their Religion, the Idolatrous Gentile-world, therefore that being now forbid to us, there is not sort of men, nor any man whom it is lawful for a Christian not to love; and all the reasons urged here by our Savior, do prove, that all mankind whether good or bad is the object of a Christians love: Because God does good to all, his methods of Mercies are universal; he makes his Clouds drop fatness even upon them that consume the increase on their Lusts, and sacrifice it to their Riots, making their belly be their God: He gives abundance of his good things unto those that love them only as they advantage Vanity and Sin, and that turn God's-store into provision for Vice and for Destruction. He gives gold to them that make gold their Idol, and bestows large portions of Earth on them that are Children of Hell, and them who for the pleasures of that Earth despise his Heaven. Yea, the whole order of things does teach us this, the Creatures do service to the whole kind, they acknowledge the man, and not the Country-man and Friend; but alike the rich and poor, the good and grateful, the wicked and ungrateful too. The Sun does not Collect his Rays and shed more day to gild the gaudy and gay person whose Cloaths and Jewels will reflect his light, return him as much almost as he sends, and vie brightness with him, than he does to the poor dark, sordid rags that even damp his beams: He sheds the same unpall'd day even on those men that draw such streams of blood as with their mists endeavor to put out or stain his shine: The Air gives breath to them that putrefy it, as well as those that send it out a Perfume. Yea the Cretures of sense and, perception do not yet discriminate their Lord's, but with that same indifference serve all: The Ox knows his Owner, and the Ass his Master, not his Religion, not his Virtues; and then as there is something in man, as man which God is kind to; something in man, as man for which the Creatures serve; so there is something in man, as he is man which we must love, and consequently we must love every man. And 'till thou hast found one so much a Monster that no creature will fear or obey, and such a one as God will show no kindness to at all, will not let his Sun shine, or his Rain rain upon, but while as others are in Goshen, sets him in the storm and dark of Egypt, 'till then, I say, thou hast not found a person whom thou mayst not love, no though he be thine enemy in mind, and thought, indeed, for if he Curse thee, thou must bless, and must do good to him which hates thee, which are the particular expresses to the love in the Text, the first of which is,