Mountains of Spices upon the glory of his own Kingdom as the Anointed Certainly I say This cannot be far off let us compute Time how we can there is such Evidence that we must needs believe it And happy will it be for any One of us whom God continues in the present State in this World to see but the Dawns and the beginning of that Kingdom O how Comfortable would it be to Live or to Dye as God is pleased to Call us to it if we could but once see those Dawns If we could but hear those Loud Voices from Heaven resounding upon Earth The Kingdoms of this World are become the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ I shall now shut up what I have spoken in very brief Application APPLICATION The First Application offer'd to us is VSE I. A Wise and a Holy and a Prudent Christian Commemoration of the Graces and Vertues and Excellencies that God hath given to any Persons of our Times And so Particularly to this Eminent Personage that God hath lately removed from us It doth become the Serious and Holy Servants of God and of Christ to make a VVise and a Prudent Commemoration This is warranted to us by what I say we have in the 2 Sam. 1. David speaks thus The Beauty of Israel is slain upon thy high places How are the mighty fallen Tell it not in Gath publish it not in the Streets of Askelon They were Cities of the Philistines the Enemies of the People of God the Enemies of Israel O let there not be an occasion for them to Triumph and Rejoyce in it Let God do somthing Graciously for the Nation We should earnestly Pray that God would do some Gracious thing for the Nation That though they will be Triumphing and Rejoycing and making great Mirth upon it yet notwithstanding that God may Laugh at them with a far greater Scorn and have them in Derision that are Enemies of his Gospel and of his Kingdom And If any Person whom they thought and did look upon as a Friend and Servant to the Kingdom of Christ and an Enemy to their Interest that are of another kind of another Region of a Region below that God would snatch their Triumph and their Singing out of their Mouth which we should earnestly Beg and Desire and we should beg it of God that he would Interpose against it And therefore we may make a Wise and I say a Prudent Record of any Person of Eminency and Service And so we ought to do upon this occasion by this Example of David upon Saul and Jonathan Therefore according to all Freedoms of Apprehension and Expression we may do it As David sayes in 2 Sam. 1. 23. Saul and Jonathan they were lovely and pleasant in their lives and in their death they were not divided Jonathan undoubtedly was an excellent Person every way And Saul in regard of his Government and bearing a representation of the Kingdom of Christ he is thus spoken of by David Though otherwise Scripture hath set very black Characters upon him So we may say The King and the Quâ—en were Lovely and Pleasant in their Lives And it is the great Goodness of God that they have been Divided in their Death And that God hath been pleased to Reserve and Preserve the King and that he would still Preserve him our Earnest Prayer should be upon it and any thing of Mercy that God doth to the Nation by those that he hath set in so Eminent Place and Station and Soveraignty over it we should Adore Him in And you see here there may be a Covering of Imperfections You see that David covered the great Evils that were in Saul And the Spirit of God speaks of it and hath Enrolled it in the Book of Jasher That I say there may be a wise and a Prudent and a Holy Commemoration And much more when there was such an Eminency as in our Case for we may say So great a Person so Exemplarily Fearing God ought according to the Word of God to be praised Her Memory to be Blessed She ought to be had in Perpetual Remembrance We may say of Her Many Daughters have done Vertuously but thou excellest them all as was said before And so we find God oftentimes in his Word speaks of his Servants Moses my Servant is Dead saith God That was a kind of Solemn Memorial of Moses And so we find of Josiah Jeremiah spoke of him in his Lamentations to this Day to After Times Now therefore That God hath been pleased to take away one of the Pillars though as it were the Left-Hand-Pillar onely preserving the Life of the King We have Reason to speak of it with Apprehensions of His Goodness and also of His Stroke the Stroke that looked like a stroke of Displeasure In that Regard we ought to Consider as in a Day of Adversity VSE II. In the Second Place it teaches us to make a Holy and a Wise and Spiritual Use of this Providence in relation to our selves 1. To Consider the great Weakness and uncertainty of our Condition here 2. To take out any of the Exemplars God gives us the Exemplarit of good and gracious Persons and of the good we find in any of Eminency And in that Eminent Person that God hath Taken and Removed from the Nation We ought to Consider wherever there is any thing of Worth and Loveliness and Excellency in any of the Servants of God and any that have been Instruments of Publick Good and Advantage VSE III. In the Third Place it Teaches us to be Apprehensive lest God should have still in Reserve a Scourge and secret Stroke as it were upon the Nation You see we don't know what a Day and much less what a Week Moneth or Year may bring forth how God may Change the Publick State of Things within such a Time And therefore it should teach us to lye Low before God to Humble our selves and earnestly to seek him And then VSE IV. In the last Place It should teach us to hope in the Salvation of God both in Relation to Publick and Private and in relation to the Glory and Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ earnestly to pour out our Hearts in Prayer and Supplication to Him that he would be pleased to manifest himself in great Power and Glory for the Glory of his Kingdom especially and for the Glory of the Gospel for the Glory of the particular Nation and Community that we are of And also for great Grace and Infinite Mercy every one particularly to our Selves to Cry out O Lord Revive thy work in the midst of the years in the midst of the years make known in wrath remember mercy For we have heard thy speech and are afraid O Lord revive thy work in the midst of the years c. And therefore by way of Supplication and lifting up our Hearts Let us set before us that 64 of Isaiah O that thou wouldest rent the heavens that thou wouldest come down that the mountains might flow down at thy presence That there might be such great works of God As when the melting fire burneth the fire causeth the waters to boyl to make thy Name known to thine Adversaries that the Nations might tremble at thy presence To make known the wrath of God to his Enemies and by terrible things that we looked not for that he would be pleased to shew himself to us in Salvation A HYMN 1. O Lord in sunder Heavens part Them open Lord to thee That coming Down in Grace to us Thy Glory We may see 2. O let the World thy Power Know The Nations All perceive How great a God our Lord is when His Kingdom He 'll Receive 3. Let Mountains all Distill and Melt At thy Great Presence near But let our Hearts much more thy Grace Feel them Aright to Steer 4. Such Efficacies Let us feel In Answer when we Pray So far surmounting all our Thoughts In their most free Display 5. That in a Holy Wonder We May Fear and Praise and Joy In thy Great Righteousness and Live When Our Sins thou l't Destroy FINIS
A SOLEMN PERSWASION TO MOST Earnest PRAYER For the Revival of the WORK of GOD Bringing forth the Kingdom of CHRIST when ever it Appears Declining under his Indignation WHETHER In our own Souls In the Nation to which we belong In the Churches of Christ throughout Upon Occasion of the late STROKE of Divine Displeasure in the Death of the QUEEN of so Blessed Remembrance By T. BEVERLEY Amos 7.2 5. Oh Lord by whom shall Jacob Arise For He is small LONDON Printed for W. Marshall at the Bible in Newgate-Street MDCXCV The PREFACE to the READER IT is indeed a Most Vndoubted Duty as to behold in All Persons in the General Humane Nature Dying the Exemplification of our own Mortality It is a further Duty to consider in Christians the Patterns of a Holy and Religious Conversation God offers to us in any of them And This Duty is Rais'd by the Honour and Dignity of Station and such have been placed in by God On which Account the many Discourses on so Great a Person as our Religious and Gracious Queen are Justified But yet as in All Princes that can bear any Relation to the Church of God There is a Peculiar Attention and Regard Due on which Account It is Remarkable Scripture Takes the Names of Heathen Princes into its Records which had never else Appeared or been Heard of in it but as God made Them Instruments of his Grace or Displeasure to his own People how much more is both the Life and the Death of Princes who are by Profession joyn'd to such a People as the Kings of Israel and Judah though so many Bad But most of All when they were themselves Holy Personages because All Princes over the People of God have an Eminent Relation to the Mercy or Wrath of God upon such Nations and God Changes Times and Seasons as Daniel observes by setting up or Removing such Princes And yet beyond All this there is a Consideration due to that Figure Princes and Governments make in Order to the Kingdom of the Great Son of man Our Lord Jesus Christ On Account of which Daniel had so Great Visions of the four Monarchyes and especâ—ally of the Fourth or Roman so immediately in its Expiration Consining on that Kingdom And this is that Highest and most weighty Point of both Discourse as in Publick so of the Prayers and Meditations of Christians in Private on such a Publick Providence as the Death of a Christian Protestant Princess I having therefore through the Gracious Assistance of God set my self by the Books of Scripture wherein the Sure Word of Prophecy is for the Churches of Christ Deposited to find out the Time for the Accomplishing the Desolations of the Sanctuary could not but take Notice of that so Monumental Providence in its Season the late Revolution 1688. Vpon which I then made Publick my Observations to be found still I doubt not in many Hands I looked upon my self therefore under as great Obligation to make most Humble and Awful Remarks upon so Astonishing a Perez a Breach or Stroke upon us in the Death of the Queen 1694. when the Succession of the Kingdom of Christ is so much nearer according to my Computation as in 1697. within Little more than Two Years who sustain'd so Illustrious a Figure in it And though I Fram'd it onely into such a Discourse as was most suited to a Plain Christian Auditory yet because Wise and Good and Considering Persons are not so Confin'd to Curiousness of Words or Artifice of Connexion but are most intent upon Things and can take Short and even the most Free and Natural Intimations of them under more Ample and Accurate Reflections I have Expos'd it to General View mostly as it was at first spoken designing the Substance and Materiality of what I have herein offered to deepest Consideration and leaving the more Critical to Correct the Errors of Form that they to whose Minds the most Plain Discourses have easiest Access may not lose the Benefit And I am Encouraged in making such a Publication in regard of both the main Design which is to Consider How such a Breach upon us is Posited towards the Kingdom of Christ and that Great Revolution of its entring into Succession in 97. as also to Present it in such a Native Freedom and In-Artifice and upon one and the same Account in both That is I have Remarked That no Divine Dâ—spose in our Memory hath brought forth so Abundantly all Kinds of Celebrations of any Person as of our Excellent Princess both in Religious Improvements of so Severe a Chastisement As also Accumulating Highest Praises upon so Worthy and Meritorious a Subject speaking of her with Relation to Men but Abating whatever any may have spoken of Her like the Blasphemies of the Antichrist an Beast against them that dwell in Heaven For all such Praises are in Sacred Style no other than Blasphemies not only against God but Against Those so Celebrated There is therefore in my Esteem no Room for any more Publications on those first Topicks But I have also observed none have Pitched upon the Examination of so Remarkable a Dispose as dating the Review from the Introduction of this Government upon the removal of King James by so out-stretched a Hand nor carrying the Prospect to that much greater Change God is about to make nor giving direction what the Servants of God are so to direct their Faith and Prayers upon Now I having singled out these Points to Address my self unto the Servants of Christ therein to Excite their Meditation and Practise I have taken greater Considence in setting them in an open Light as not Treated upon by any before on this so notable Providence And yet I have not neglected on just occasions to make those Memorials of Praise that Scripture Allowes and hath even set apart to them that Fear the Lord and to Honour the Remembrance of the Queen by them I have also Pointed upon those Duties of Practice so necessary on so Sad and Solemn an Occasion in General And on this very same Account that others have so Abounded in all the Florid parts of such Kind of Discourses I have Hoped that a Sermon in so Ordinary and Vn-Adorned a Dress will be the more gladly Suffered I have therefore been only Intent on this main End that is that every one may earnestly seek of God the coming of the Kingdom of Christ in Power in his own Soul And that Powers and Nations may in General wait for it and wisely Place themselves in a just subordination to it being most Assured if we are not removed from this Earth under the immediate Views of it as we know we may soon be even as this Great Princess hath been it will yet make such Appearances from Heaven in coming upon us as will Amaze the World to behold even its Kingdoms becoming the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ And though the Lord makes use of what greater and more Honourable
not into the light as that Expression is in the Lamentations when he seems to shut out our prayer And though we shout and make a noise in Prayer yet that still he will not hear Then we should insist O Lord Revive thy mercy to us in the midst of judgement In wrath remember mercy Work a Salvation even in our outward Condition so far as is necessary to our Eternal Peace and Salvation And in all these things there ought to be a peculiar Eye to the Kingdom of Christ For the Kingdom of Christ and our Salvation are united and the Glory thereof shines out together even as now they are Reserved together in Heaven till they are so Revealed and there they are alwayes in a Readiness to be Revealed as the Apostle Peter Witnesses 1 Pet. 1. 5. c. And even so all outward Salvation and Deliverance are upon the Title of the Kingdom of Christ Pledges of and in Order to it even as the Restoration of the State of Judah and Jerusalem by Cyrus and the Kings of Persia that was more immediately in the Eye of the Prophet Habakkuk when he prayed for the Revival of the work of God in the midst of the years and was a very Great Type of the Kingdom of Christ according to the State of that time 2. In the Second Place Thus in regard of the Publick State of the Nation If there be an Appearance of things that God is taking away from us the Enjoyment of the Gospel at any time the Enjoyment of his Ordinances that he is taking away the Peace or the Freedom of the Nation that we seem to be in danger of a return of Evil upon us For so indeed is the State of things Till the Kingdom of Christ we are between Light and Darkness There are continual returns of Evil as I have often Observed Look over all the Histories of Scripture and the Histories of Times since the Scripture if there have been better Times at any time Darkness and Worser have come and followed upon them If you look upon this Nation Indeed It is very Remarkable since the time of the Dawns of the Reformation upon it You know First we had the Excellent Appearances of Government in that young Prince Edward the Sixth God took him off suddenly in the very rising of his Youth And the dark and dolesome time of the Marian-Dayes of the Burning so many of the Servants of God came on and Antichristianism returned and came back Now at such a time undoubtedly the Servants of God were earnest with God that he would Revive his work in the midst of the years And so it came forward again in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth And we have had somo Appearances of Hope of the glory of a greater glory of the Gospel and of Christianity at some times and then they have been vailed and clouded and darkned again I would not enter into Particulars But what shall we do at such a time as this How should we cry out O Lord thou hast appointed a Kingdom to thy self to thy Son thou hast resolved that the knowledge of the Glory of the Lord shall cover the Earth as the waters do the sea Some things have seemed to move towards it and they have gone back again and down again O therefore Revive thy work O Lord in the midst of the years make known in wrath remember mercy This ought to be a Pattern to the Servants of God in all times when any thing that God hath done for them hath seemed to go backward that God would revive his work in the midst of the years Blessed be that God that can do it He can revive it He can give Life after we seem to be in a Swoon and under Faintings yet God is able to do it And therefore our Souls should upon this very Account be continually powred out upon all occasions before him But then 3. The Third thing that I proposed And that is To mako a particular reveiw and remark upon this late Providence And that Briefly because I would give occasion to greater enlargedness and seriousness upon these things in the thoughts of Christians that as I have said we may not lose the use of so sad a Providence by letting it evaporate in onely an outward Formality and Commemoration and Commendation of the Honour of so great a Person God hath Removed VVe should not let it go off so but let it come to serious and deep Consideration I would therefore Propose these two things 1. First That which we may look upon as Dark and Sad in this Dispensation and Providence 2. In the Second Place How we may reap Benefit and Comfort and Encouragement to beg of God that He would revive his work in the midst of the years that he would yet carry on his work And though this was a stroke of VVrath and Displeasure yet that he would return in Mercy 1. The first thing that I would lay before you as a Sad and serious Consideration is That when God sees a People unreformed when he sees a Spirit of Profaneness of Atheism of VVretchedness Senselesness of things and of Ungodliness He takes away those Persons that are as the Chariots and Horsemen of a Nation as it was said of Elijah He removes those that are in themselves blessings to a Nation And so we should Consider this late Providence as a stroke upon the Irreligion upon the Atheism and upon the Prophaneness of the Nation God takes away those whom he makes Defences whom he makes as it were Buttresses and Props of the Nation Thus of that excellent Prince Josiah we read because it was a very wicked State of the People at that time It was a very senseless State And when God gave them such an Excellent Prince of so very great Hopes and of so great Zeal for Reformation In the 34th Chapter of the 2d Book of Chronicles you may read all along And in the 35th Chapter what an Excellent Person he was Yet God took him away in great VVrath and Displeasure upon the Nation Chap. 35. 25. And Jeremiah lamented for Josiah and all the singing-men and the singing-women spake of Josiah in their lamentations to this day and made it an Ordinance in Israel and behold they are written in the Lamentations Certainly many Expressions in that book of the Lamentations of Jeremiah have great respect to this very Josiah Of whom we said under his shadow we shall live among the Heathen Lam. 4. 20. The Crown is fallen from our head Wo unto us that we have sinned Chap. 5. 20. And why was it because God would not turn as it is said from the fierceness of his anger for all the Sins that Israel had joyned with Manasseh in So we find it expresly taken notice of that God would not turn from the fierceness of his Anger notwithstanding all the Reformation Josiah had made And therefore he took away Josiah That 's the First Sad Consideration that