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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A48855	A sermon preached before Her Majesty, on May 29, being the anniversary of the restauration of the King and royal family by the Bishop of S. Asaph, Lord Almoner to Their Majesties.	Lloyd, William, 1627-1717.	1692 (1692)	Wing L2716; ESTC R6946	15,431	33

such works as seem to us to be of the greatest difficulty When all Humane help fails then it is worthy of God to shew himself to be the deliverer of his people And therefore God has chosen such times when his people have been at or near the very brink of destruction then to give them deliverance from it We may see this in many Instances in Scripture The most tamed Instance is that of God's bringing his people out of Egypt and through the Red Sea We read the like of Hezekiah's deliverance from Senacheribs's army The Book of Judges is full of such great works of God for the deliverance of his people Such things as God did then by Miracle he doth now in the course of his Ordinary Providence things which no man can do nor can think how they were done And when he thus delivers his people from such dangers as seemed to be inevitable and especially when at such a pinch of time when nothing but destruction is look'd for that then deliverance cometh in the stead such a work has so many marks of Gods hand upon it that whosoever sees and considers it cannot but say this is the Lords doing and it is marvellous in our Eyes Now for the Application of this I am to shew all those marks of Gods hand that they are in the work of this day I speak plainly in the Restauration of the Royal Family and therewith of our Church and Religion our Government and Laws the most valuable things in this Nation But though that which led in all the rest and that which giveth the title to the day the Restauration of the King that then was and of all the Royal Family tho that I say is and ought to be the chief subject as well of our Sermons as of our Prayers and praises on this day Yet I shall at this time crave leave to insist chiefly upon the restoring of our Church and Religion as being the great concernment of God in this Nation In order to which Kings and Queens are chiefly a blessing to a Nation As to Civil government this is the only promise that God has made to us in Gospel Times that Kings and Queens shall be nursing Fathers and nursing Mothers to his Church which he has now Graciously accomplish'd to us And therefore to return to the work of this day I am to prove that this was the Lords doing by shewing these three marks of his hand upon it First that the restoring of the Royal Family was for the benefit of the Church of God and of the true Christian Religion Secondly that it was in a most needful time when Gods true Church and true Religion were in the utmost danger of being extinguisht in this Nation Thirdly that then God was graciously pleased to preserve and restore it by such means as were to men unaccountable These three things being proved it will certainly appear that the work of this day was the Lords doing The same may be said of all our other deliverances since I cannot when I speak of such things I cannot without ingratitude to God but mention that mercy of the late Revolution and those of our deliverances since especially that of this present time All these being so visibly the effects of Gods continued care of us being all for the same Church and Nation all in times of great and near danger and all with the like Evidence of Gods hand in them so that whosoever considers them severally cannot but see reason enough to acknowledge that each of these was the Lords doing as well as the great work of the Kings restauration 1. But first I am to shew that This was the work of God It was certainly so If ours be a true Church of God If it be did I say I said it not as doubting but taking it for granted as we have Just reason to do We have reason to insist upon that which has been sufficiently proved in so many excellent Books as have been written in the Just vindication of our Church I need not say more particularly what has been done of this kind especially in the last reign when the Press was most open and free to all sorts of our Adversaries That more then Liberty that Power they had then gave the world occasion to see how little they had to say against us And therefore after such a tryal as this we ought to take it for granted that ours is a true Church of God as it stands establisht at this day To this we may add the Testimonies of all the Reform'd Churches abroad who not only agree with us in Doctrine but allow of our Orders and Worship and Sacraments and are so far from denying us to be a Reform'd Church that they own us to be the Bulwark of the Reformation They that will not allow of this proof and of these Testimonies that I have mentioned as they cannot expect to be heard in this place so if they have any thing to object against them they will not want an answer elsewhere Only in this place I cannot but mind them If they are Papists how they have used to reckon wordly prosperity among their notes of a true Church and if they are other Dissenters how they used when time was to value themselves by it that God own'd them by Acts of his Providence I hope neither of them will take it amiss if we tell them again that God has not left us altogether without witness of that kind What greater Testimonies could he give to any Church then he has done to ours in those wonderful deliverances he has given us Not to go to Old things such as that of Eighty Eight and at the time of the Gunpowder Treason tho these were as great as ever were given to any Nation yet we need not go so far back we have enough to name of later memory many and great deliverances and those fresh in memory even in the memory of you all that hear me this day 1. But first upon this day I must insist on that Deliverance that we had at the Kings Restauration How great a Deliverance that was they that were not then born can scarce conceive but I shall tell you what they that lived then saw and know We were then as to our Civil Government after many horrible things which I do not love to repeat after many vain Attempts to set up a Commonwealth which stood like a Castle of Cards pray pardon the Comparison we were at last come to be under no Government at all unless I may call that a Government which an Army sets up and pulls down as often as they please It was such a State of a Nation than which worse cannot well be spoke or conceived Not to give you a Detail of the many Mischiefs that are contained in it I will only give you two Examples of the wretchedness of this Estate I could name you many more but these two are the best known that

of the Kingdom of the ten Tribes of Israel and that of the Roman Empire after Commodus's time First of the Kingdom of Israel after the murder of Zechariah the last King of Jehu's Family After his Death there was no King for some years together Then the Army set up a King They kill'd him and set up another There were five such Kings one after another every one coming in by the killing of his Predecessor How the Nation flourisht the mean while you may guess or you may read in the Book of Hosea he Prophesied at that time and he tells us how this People having cast off God he cast off them to utter destruction and this way he brought it upon them In the Roman Empire after Commodus's Death who was the last of the Aelian Family after him the Army set up whom they pleased for above a hundred years together In this time they had about twenty Emperors I mean successively for of Competitors they had near thirty at one time but I do not reckon these Of those successive Emperors there were but two or three that succeeded their own Fathers all the rest came in by Violence and went out by violent Deaths For the People the mean while what Case they were in you may imagine At almost every Change there was Rapine and Oppression and Blood till Diocletian's time He indeed put a stop to these Evils but there was no end of them till Constantine the Great set up a kind of Hereditary Empire From these two Examples we may guess what we were to have expected if the Power had continued in the Army We had some trial of it in the last Year of their Reign when not to say what they had done before they changed the Government for us five or six times in the compass of that One year For Religion the mean while whosoever considers what it was that prevailed in the Army may easily judge to what a miserable pass we were brought There were of all Religions among them but ours and they granted a Liberty to all but ours Yes they joyn'd Popery with it in their Declarations Prelacy and Popery were always Excepted together But as for Popery as it was never more freely Profest so I will be bold to say it never had a greater Harvest then at that time But with Prelacy they were in earnest We found it so in being deprived of all those Rights the Law had given us Our Liturgy our Sacraments our Offices of Worship tho' they were Establisht then as much by Law as they are now yet Men were punisht without and against Law for using them But that which was worst our Body of a Church was dissolved our Discipline was trod under foot our Eyes could not see our Teachers and as for our Bishops the Order was near being extinct it subsisted but in five or six old Men that probably might have died all within one or two years Let others think as light of this as they please they that have a true sense of Religion will grant that these were Wounds in the Vitals of the Church of which our Church had certainly died at that time if he that raises Men from the Dead had not given our Church a new Life at the Kings Restauration But how was that brought about I am coming to shew that it was a most visible Work of God so visible that I know not whether any thing could be more perhaps we may except one thing that hath lately happened but certainly there was no greater in all the Examples of ancient Times The great Instance of old in the Christian Church was that which I mentioned of Constantine the Great It was indeed the Hand of God that brought him into the Government But I do not know whether his coming in was more wonderful then that of the Kings Restauration Here was certainly a greater Force to oppose then any that stood in Constantine's way to keep him out of the Government There were both in England and all over the three Kingdoms great numbers that would have done all they could to have hinder'd the Kings Restauration being engaged so to do not only by their Affections but even by their Judgment and Conscience and few of these but were engaged by their Interest too All these having Swords in their Hands or being backt by an Army that had such a numerous Army of Disciplin'd experienced Men as well paid as ever was Army in the world as absolute in their Power and as unwilling to part with it How was it possible that all those Armed Men should either lay down their Arms or wear them to bring in his Majesty that those others likewise should give up their Interests and smother their Prejudices and Disaffections that all the Kings Enemies should be so charmed that at his coming in not a Dog should stir his Tongue against him A Thing that was certainly done do I ask how it was possible The matter is plain that which is impossible with Men is possible with God It was God that did that which none other but God could do It was God that partly turned their Hearts and partly insatuated their Counsels Their dividing as they did among themselves was an absolute Insatuation And when they were thus divided God turn'd the Hearts of part of them to bring in his Majesty But especially it was God that so united the Hearts of the People not only in this but in all the three Kingdoms as they never were before nor since but upon one Occasion If ever there was an Agreement of the People we know when there was a thing falsly so called but if ever there was truly such it was at the Kings Restauration Other things I might instance wherein God shewed himself wonderfully at that time But if there were no more then these three that I have mentioned I think these are enough to shew it was the Lords doing He did great and unaccountable things he did them for the preservation of his Church he did them at that time when she was at the very brink of destruction Our Church was certainly then at the brink of destruction But was it never so since If we forget we are extreamly unthankful to God It is too true we are an unthankful People but yet none of us can easily forget so great a Dinger as we were in so lately as within these four years I know no Man of the Church of England except a few rotten Members that shewed what they were then and since none besides but what did acknowledge we were in extreme danger at that time It was a Melancholy thing to have our King whom our Religion binds us to obey for Conscience sake come to be of that Religion that obliges him to destroy us for Conscience sake All our hope was that our practising the Duty of our Religion would make him be dispensed with for the Obligation of His. For we know they have them that can dispense