Scripture written by the Prophets and Apostles be preserved free from Apocryphal additions Fabulous traditions Humane inventions and Phanatick inspirations That the Ministers of it by Bishops Presbyters and Deacons as to its Authority Order and supports be maintained agreeable to the primitive pattern instituted by Christ in the Twelve Apostles and the Seventy Disciples with their attendants in holy offices this is the cause of God as that of Embassadors and their followers in the cause of those Princes that send them so Commissionated and instructed they that receive them receive Christ and they that reject them reject him and they that defraud or rob divide and destroy the Church and Ministry of Christ are Robbers of God Sacrilegious Felons from the blessed Son of God who is Heir of all and to whom we owe all we have as redeemer of is and all blessings we enjoy The great Seals of the Church also the two Sacraments are the Cause of God not to be prophaned or neglected For which cause God sharply punished the Corinthians with sickness and death Much less may they be changed or diminished or added to in point of duty and necessity beyond the stamp and inscription of Divine institution and that Catholick practice or use of them which was ever owned by the Church whose veracity or fidelity is not to be questioned in things of universal observance such as were those of the Lords day for the Christian Sabbath of the books of Canonical Scriptures of the Baptizing of Christians Infants whose cause is the cause of God and of his Covenant with the faithful and their seed so of the giving of the cup as well as the consecrated bread to all Communicants as well Lay as Clergy and lastly as to the constant Order and Government of the Church in its several distributions by many Presbyters subordinate and assistant to some one paternal yet authoratative Bishop as sons to a presidential Father This Government by Episcopacy is Gods Cause as the God of order and the Apostles cause as settled and sealed by their wisdome and the Churches consent's as a primitive Catholick custom the veracity and antiquity of which is asserted by the Churches testimony both as to all Histories and in its practice not to be doubted desparaged denied or abolished without great in solency and peevishness either to gratifie Presbytery or Independency both which are novel ties of yesterday and so cannot be Gods Cause which is verissiâ—â—a antiquissima as old as it is true and good § The Cause of Gods Church as to its Honour Order Fidelity supportâ— rule and government is so far Gods Cause as he hath made his Church the Pillar and ground of truth and as himself is the God of Order and Polity yeaâ— and the Churches cause is Gods as to that prudential liberty and variety which his wisdome hath granted and indulged to it in the several parts or distributions of it under the Gospel as to the circumstantial or ceremonial rites of Religion incident or annexed to the outward decency of worship and profession in several ages and places so as may most conduce to the planting propagating preserving and reforming of true Religion among all Nations Lastly the unity of the Church belongs to Gods cause who is but one and his Son one and his Spouse one Such as cause Schism and divisions in the true Church by giving or taking unnecessary and so unjust scandals and thereby raising uncharitable separations these are injurious to the God of peace and the Prince of peace Nostrum laceratur in arbore corpus Christians tear God rend the body of Christ in their Schisms which divide them from the love of Christ and for his sake of one another which is the great Character of Christs Disciples Joh. 13. 35. § Therefore all the Methods of Ecclesiastical Polity which were used in primitive times by which to keep the Catholick Church in an holy unity and brotherly correspondency by Bishops Arch-Bishops Primates Metropolitans and Patriarchs yea and in latter ages when Christians were multiplied by Arch-Deacons Suffragans or Chorepiscopacy i. e. rural Deans and the like were so far from being Antichristian projects and evil policies that they were the Counsels and results of Christs spirit as helps in Government for the Order and Unity Polity and Authority meet to be observed in his Church § Nor is it of any weight which some urge odiously and enviously against these subordinations and degrees fitted for the unity of the Church which capacitated them to meet and correspond as by general and lesser Councils in several places so by Letters communicatory in all the world that hence the Papal arragancy and Pride did get footing and his prescripts became decrees For if all things of piety or prudence must be abolished with the policy or superstition if man lists to abuse them we shall leave very little to true Religion So far Popes and Bishops and Presbyters and People too have shewed themselves in many things to be but men subject to prejudices and passions yet are they no way capable to destroy or deprave the true principles or practices of Christian wisdom much less of Divine and Apostolick institution either binding and perpetual or prudential and occasional which lawfully may be used and are not rashly to be abolished 4. Next the Churches cause which is eminently contained in Gods comes that of all mankind as God is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the lover and preserver of men in the way of civil societies the Hings or Axis and popular points of which are Justice commutative and distributive private and publique the just God is concerned that justice be done to all and by all according to their place and station The rule and measure of all civil and Politique Justice for matter and manner for what is to be done and by whom for the equity of retribution and authority of dispensation is that custome and law which is prevalent by publique consent in every Nation not contrary to the Law of God what ever is done contrary to this is in Deiinjuriam and makes the actors reolaesae Majestatis divinae as well as humanae guilty of doing injury to the justice and Majesty not onely of men but of God whose are the laws and Polities the Princes Kings and lawful Magistrates of every state Kingdom and Common-wealth which are Gods Ordinances not to be resisted by tumult or armed force by sedition or Treason without an high sin which subjects men to damnation as Rebels to God as enemies to the good of their Country to the duty they owâ— to parents and indeed to the good of all mankind who would soon be as miserable as beasts and Devils if they were not restrained from private extravagancie preserved in their honest enjoyments by the publique laws and that Soveraigne power which is
ariseth terribly to judge the world and to ease him of his adversaries and to plead the cause of his oppressed Church are most worthy of the divine majesty For 1. They are most just in themselves 2. They are most pregnant and convictive in mens consciences as the pleas of God 3. They are unavoidable and irrisistible and potent 4. They carry the cause at last against all opposition the highest cedars are feld by it the greatest mountains levelled Gods Cause like Moses his serpent devours all those Enchanters and Magicians 5. They are impartial without respect of persons great or strong rich or noble wise or foolish few or many God sometimes so pleads it as to pour contempt even upon Princes to pull down the mighty from their seats to confound their counsels to break the arm of their strength to lop off all their branches yea to stub up their roots as to their posterity and renown which was done against Nebuchadnezzar Haman Balshazzar and Judas Sometimes God pleads his cause even by miraculous appearings in signs and wonders full of terror and destruction so against Pharoah and the Egyptians so against Senacherib and his hoast sending a destroying Angel to confute in one night his blâ—sphemous insolency by slaying the greatest part and flower of his Army sending him away with shame which was followed with the parricide of his two sons who slew him So in privater cases God pleads against Miriams murmuring by leprosie so against Nadab and Abihu by fire So against Korah and his mutinous complices God wrought a new way of burying them alive Numb 16. 33. So against the pride of Herod whose popular diety was confuted by worms Act. 12. 23. Sometimes God fills his enemies with Pannick terrors and makes them sheath their swords in their own bowels to become executioners of his vengeance yea and we read Achitophels or acular wisdom ended in a halter even so let all perfidious and impenitent Polititians perish O Lord that are enemies to thy Cause in true Religion and just Government Sometimes God stirs up unexpected and despicable enemies against them who kindle such fires of intestine or foraign wars as consume his proudest adversaries as in the Kings of Israel and Judah when they forsook and rebelled against God When God ariseth to plead his own Cause he fears the face of none he spares none not Families or Cities or Nations or a whole world as in Noahs days or the whole race and nature of mankind as in Adam and Eve who fell under the curse with their posterity when they beleived and obeyed the serpent more then God Against some he pleads vvith fire famine pestilence evil beasts War Deluges Nay he spared not the rebellious Angels but cast them out of heaven into hell fire from the light of his blessed presence to chains of eternal darkness Nay God spares not his ovvn servants People and Church he pleaded sorely against Davids sin vvhich argued his despising of God vvhen he preferred his lust and caused the enemies of God to blaspheme all religion and grace by the scandal of his extravagancy God shevvs us that as Saints may sin so he sees sin in them and vvill not let it go unpunished § So he pleads against Eli and his sons even to their untimely death and the extirpation of that family from the honor of Priesthood So against King Uzziah for his sacrilegious intruding on the Preists office So against King Saul for his rebellion which was us witchcraft So against King Solomon vvhen his wisdom left him or he left it and fell to so gross a folly and effeminacy as to countenance and tolerate Idolatry in an uxorious vanity and inconstancy So against King Hezekiah vvhen his pride made him forgetful of so great a mercy as his miraculous recovery and delivery Nay God pleaded oft against the vvhole Church of the Jews in their Apostasies the Cause of his Lavv Worship Service and Servants the Prophets whom they slew by cutting them short by pulling dovvn and abasing the crown of their glory by giving their adversaries dominion over them to destroy them to burn their Cities and Temple to desolate their Land to lead them into captivity and so to give the Land its rest and Sabboth which they had prophaned Thus did he oft plead the controversies he had with that Church and people that City and Sanctuary which was called by his own name with whom at last he reckoned for all the blood of the Prophets and that of the Messias too which filled up the cup of Gods wrath against them to an utter desolation which hath held now for near sixteen hundred years In like sort did the Spirit of God plead his Cause against the famous seven Churches in Asia and their Angels or Bishops of which we read in the second and third chapters of the Revelations reproving and threatning them sorely both Fathers and children Bishops and Presbyters Pastors and people except they did repent So against all the Greek and Eastern Christian Churches whose heresies luxuries schisms ambitions and hypocrisies have at this day put them under the Mahometan bondage and tyranny that they have scarce now a name to live as Christians or Churches § Nor was God wanting to plead his Cause by many terrible judgements against the depraved state of these Western Churches when overgrown with Image-Saints and Angels-worship with Tyranny and superstition with covetousness and ambition with sottery and debauchery even from the Popes or cheif Bishops chair to the Princes and Peers and Clergie and Gentry and people of all sorts how were they tossed too and fro in the sactions of Gnelphs and Gibelins wasted in the holy Wars as they called them terrified with excommunication and bans that there was no peace to him that came in or to him that went out Lastly God sometimes pleads his Cause and gives evident token it is his by an unexpected way even by suffering it to fall into fiery trials and many temptations not as offended with his Church but as giving the world experience of the mighty power of his grace and the eminent faith courage patience and constancy of his servants who love not their lives to the death but can set all the loss and dung of this world at stake for Christs sake So the primitive Martyrs and Confessors Apostles and others glorified God So many Bishops Presbyters Virgins young and old filled the world with admiration of that cause for which they were so resolved and undaunted that their pious perseverance as Justin Martyr and others tell us with their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pertinacy as Mar. Aurelius calls it was a most powerful way to commend the glorious Gospel of Christ to the world Thus the blessed company and holy Hoste after Christs example did assert the cause of God and his Christ not by armed forces
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Terrae filii gigantum fratreculi a company of Mushroom men and Christians sprung out of the earth but yesterday a nation in its infancy or minority which is now to learn its A. B. C. of Religion and civil government being set back by a most sad and horrible fate from Homers Iliads to our Primmer or Pueriles by I know nor what new Teachers and many Masters § So that it is high time seriously to meditate conscientiously to preach freely to write and fervently to pray upon this subject The Cause and the Cause of God since every party pretends a Cause and Gods Cause too which they are most eager and ambitious not only to plead fairly but to obtrude for oâ—bly on all others Thus from the great Pretenders â—â— the Cath 〈…〉 Cause of which the Romanisâ—â— would seem the chief Patrons to all other Sects and Subsectionâ— either in civil or religious factions All parties are divided by their Causes and the whole is destroyed by their divisions Ask any side why they thus shuffle and out why they thus divide and destroy why they do things so different from solid Reason and true Religion contrary to all Laws of God and man contrary to the duty they owe â—â— God their Country their King their Posterity the Church and the State as to Justice Veracity Peace and Charity Ask why like Ixicons wheel or Sysiphus his stone they overturn ouerturn overturn all things eivil and sacred by their end less verâ—igoes and rotations then answer is short as that of David to his brother Eliab Is there not â— Cause It will not be amiss therefore as St. John adviseth Christians to try the spirits whether they be of God or â—o of Christ or of Antichrist to examine the several pretended and pleaded Causes whether they be Gods Cause which is indeed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Causarum causa the Cause of Causes The Cause and interest of all the blessed Angels and all true Saints worthy of Princes and Peers of Gown-men and Sword-men of all honest and good men or whether they be not the Cause of the Devil and of mens own evil â—usts disguised with this larva or vizard on them which may not uncharitably be suspected of some of them Since it is most certain they cannot all be Gods Causes they are so many so multiform so mutable so divided so destructive to each other they must needs fail either of the main end and ground or matter and method of Godr pleading his own Cause § Of which I shall by Gods help endeavour to give this honorable and Christian Auditory such an account as may either inform or at least confirm your judgements in the true Cause of God that you may not be tossed too and frâ—â— with every wind of causeless Causes which blow as mens passions and secular interests do arise And further I hope to excite your judieâ—ous abilities and eloquent attentions who are persons of so great learning experience and publiâ—â— influence to be ever zealous in that good Cause which is Gods as bonâ— Causidici honest and able Lawyers to shew your skill and will in the great concerns of God his Church and your Country which are noâ— so eagerly pleaded and counter pleaded among us Appeals beinâ— as it were made to every one oâ— us to judge in our selves which â—â— the righteous Cause of God tp which we ought chearfully to give our suffrages and assistance as most undoubtedly conducing to our publick happiness both in Church and State in civil and religious concernments let not this be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a desolate and forsaken Cause in which no men of parts and estate will appear § And cartainly if I had less experience then I have of the favour of the Court I mean of this Christian Assembly which is met in Gods Courts and presence yet I may justly have great confidence as to the merit of that Cause which I shall seek to present to you and plead before you this day in Gods behalf As Jotham therefore said to his Countrymen Hearken to me that God may hearken to you Attend diligently to the pleading of his cause who alone can plead yours yea and hath given us an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the righteous whose blood speaks better things for us whose wounds are so many eloquent mouths whose cross was loaden with strong crys for us whose merits are undeniable mediators whose Spirit continually makes intercession in us and for us even then when we know not what to say or how to pray either unable to plead or ashamed to speak for our selves Gods Cause may sometimes seem to want our pleading for it before men but our cause doth really and ever need the pleadings of Gods mercy and Christs merits before the Tribunal of his Justice that there may be a prohibition granted at the humble motion of believing and penitent sinners to remove the suit or action from the Bar of Divine Justice to the Throne of the heavenly Grace where we may finde mercy to relieve us in all our distresses despairs and deaths § Before I set before you the main fruits with which I intend to entertain you out of the Text iâ— will not be amiss to gather an handful of those fair flowers which offer themselves at the first view of the words as so many short but sweet and excellent observations 1. We may observe That God hath his Cause too in this world his great design concern and interest as well as the wise Statists and great Polititians as well as the strong and the rich and the learned and the ambitious and the malicious and the voluptuous and the covetous men of the world who so eagerly plead and pursue their own projects and Causes that they not only many times forget Gods but generally cross contradict and oppose it as with their sin and folly so to their shame and ruine for as the counsel so the Cause of God shall stand Nor is it to be baffled by any either force or fraud strengtlâ— or sophistry It is as truth Magna praevalebat a great Cause and will prevail by the help of a wise and strong God though for a time it may be unjustly condemned and crucified by unjust men as Christ was yet it will at last be raised again in power and glory yea and justified before men and Angels It will as Aarons rod or serpent devour all those of the worlds Magicians and Polititians It is a Cause which will be as fire consumptive of all other and consummative of it self 2. Observ As God hath his Cause in this world so it becomes him to own it It is opus Dei the work of a God to plead his own Cause as Gideon speaks of Baal Idols were convicted to be no Gods because they could not plead for themselves by speaking or doing good or evil as the Prophet tells
Idolaters Therefore the Psalmist here so earnestly urgeth it upon God who he believed ever did and would own his own Cause so as to plead it himself in his own way and time Both as to the Majesty truth justice holiness and honor of it also as to the indignities which are by evil men cast upon it Summus Deus summas patitur injurias none is more a sufferer as to the malice and insolence of wicked men then the most blessed God who yet is as impassible as the suns light is uninfectible with the filthy exhalations of dunghils Plato puts this true saying into the mouth of Socrates dying under the malice of his persecutors Anytus and Melitus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. It is impossible for evil to make any impression of affliction upon that which is good and which can as a jewel so preserve its native goodness and firmness that sufferings shall make it not onely no way diminished but as in the wheel and file more illustrious and meritorious such were the sufferings of Christ properly and of all good men in an Evangelical sense being for a good Cause and on Gods account till God ceaseth to be just and good and true and faithful vigilant and zealous for his own glory his cause cannot utterly miscarry 3. Observ The Cause of God may be as to the eye of the world and to the sense of the best men in a most sad dejected deplored despised and desperate estate so sunck and oppressed that there is no outward sign of its being ever boyed up and recovered thus it was represented to Elias as if he onely were left to plead a lost Cause So the Disciples expressed their sorrow and despondency We verily trusted this had been he who should have redeemed Israel So Mary weeping to the Angels answers their questioning of her tears They have taken away my Lord and I know not where they have laid him many times the foundation of Church and State of Justice and Religion are so out of course that the righteous know not what to do or say all things so unhinged by violent wicked and unreasonable men that nothing moves by any order or written Law of God or Man but by the power and impulse of mens own lusts who from Gods silence permission and patience are prone foolishly to conclude his approbation and liking of their cause and ways yea and to say God is such an one as themselves the distress of Gods Cause may be such that the whole Church may be ready to cry out as the Psalmist Help Lord for vain is the help of man It is time for thee O Lord to put to thy hand for they have made thy Law of none effect § So did the Heathenish persecution and the latter Romish superstition tyrannically triumph a long time over the slain Witnesses the Law and Gospel the Scriptures and Catholick Traditions the Preachers and Professors of that true Religion which hath been testified both as to moralities and mysteries faith and manners not onely by the two Testaments but also by the confessions and conversations of all antient and modern Christians conform to Gods Word and the best Churches customs The vapor of numbers pomp prosperity and prevalency are no demonstrations either to approve the cause of Arius or Antichrist or to prejudice the cause of Christ and of Gods true Church But as Lucan speaks of the cause of Pompey and Cesae in which the justice of the first was overborn by the successes of the second Victrix causa Diis placuit sed victa Catoni the gods abetted Cesar by victories but Cato's constancy adhered to Pompey's and the Senates conquered cause because it was most just 4. Obser The Cause of the true Church is Gods cause most signally and peculiarly in this world his interests and concernments are so linked with its that they are insepâ—trable as Jacobs soul was bound up in Benjamins as the Husbands honor in the Wives as a friends happiness in a friends so is the relation between God and his Church if that be black God is eclipsed as to the most visible eradiations of his glory to this world if that be bright and conspicuous as a City on a hill in truth and holiness in charity and prosperity Gods great name praise and renown are most glorious and illustrious Then his Wisdom and Truth and Justice and Power and Mercy and Patience and Goodness and Faithfulness are in their meridian strength as the Sun at noon day If the Church be hidden it is as the moon turned into blood or the Sun of Righteousness into sackcloth as Joel speaks as Joshua astonished when Israel turned its back upon its enemies said to God And what wilt thou do O Lord to thy great Name So do holy men they are prone to despond and deplore Gods own condition and Cause when they see the Church of God or any part of it as to its veracity sanctity order peace prosperity and unity decline and decay under error prophaness persecution disorder distraction division or any uncomfortable condition Tunc periclitatur coelum Dei res agitur then Gods Cause is at stake then as in the Giants assault his heaven is in hazard as if he were in danger to be numen infelix a miserable God Then is Christ tossed in the storms then do true Beleevers cry out as the Disciples Lord save us we perish Help Lord and do it for thy own name sake which is called upon by us God hath no considerable design in the world but that of his Church when this is consummated the world as the scaffold or stage or shell or chaff is to be destroyed The Church cannot be undone until God is undone and bankrupt 5. Obser No Church hath ever been so famous and flourishing in outward piety plenty peace and prosperity but it may fall under persecution and great oppression sometimes indeed as God said to Satan in the case of Jobs trials without a cause that is as to any predominant and unrepented sin at present provoking God against him but only as Christ said of the man born blind That the work of Gods grace and Spirit might be manifest in the trials and tribulations of his Church So in the first ages of the Church when Religion was purest and love warmest yet was the fire and furnace of persecution hottest Sometimes indeed as a fruitful land is made barren for the wickedness of them that dwell therein so the lukewarmness and corruptions of a Church the Apostasies and falling of Christians from their first Faith loyalty patience love and good works may cause God to hide his face to withdraw his protection to remove his candlestick as he threatens and to give over his Turtle to the will of its adversaries who shall set up their banners and roar in the Sanctuaries and break down all her carved works and
an high hand and out-stretched arm confuting Pharaohs Pride and obstinacy with the Egyptian Gods in the red Sea when no other miracles in lesser drops would soften their hard hearts he soaked them in such great waters as quite drowned them After this how oft was the little flock of Gods Church as a speckled Bird in the Wilderness surrounded with Enemies as a Lilly among Thorns there was Gebal and Ammon and Ameleck the Philistines and they of Tyre the Assyrian Arabian Egyptian all were against them from not onely reason of State but of Religion where different principles make the most deadly antipathies and desperate fâ—wds Thus the wild Bore sometimes with power other while the subtil Foxes of Mungril Jews and half Idolaters with fly insinuations sought to pull down and waste the peace honour plenty safety and Religion of the Jews Thus the Heathens raged and their Princes set themselves against the Lord and his cause fulfilled that first prophecy of an irreconcileable enmity between the Serpent and the seed of the Woman All the gods and Demons all the Oracles and Priests all the Poets and Prophets all the Orators Historians all the great Princes and valiant Soldiers and subtil Polititians all the Wise men and Philosophers set themselves to despise to reproach to oppress and extirpate the name and Nation and Religion of the Jews which was that of the true God from under Heaven as a most pestilent people and of a most detestable superstition Afterwards when the blossoms of Judaick ceremonies fell off and in the fulness of time the ripe fruit of Messias came into the world in spirit and in truth that all Nations might worship the true God aright in every place without confinement I need not tell you who are not ignorant of Scriptural and Ecclesiastical Histories how from Herods malice and subtilty seeking to destroy Christ in his cradle and satiating his defeated malice like a worrying Wolf or raging Bear with the massacring of so many innocent children who were ever esteemed by the antient Church as Infant-Martyrs suffering in Christs stead and upon the first occasion of his cause pleaded in the world by the baptism of their own blood until Constantine the Great 's days of refreshing and rest for a season the true Church and cause of God was never out of the furnace of tribulation martyrdoms fears afflictions and dayly deaths true the bellows did not always blow up the fire and fury of men to the same flames but there wanted not those as Decius and others who envied Christians their numerous cheerful and speedy Martyrdoms of which they were so ambitious § Nothing was more wonted in the mouths of the people than what they clamored against Polycarp a primitive Bishop of Smyrna in S. Johns days Tolle Atheos away with these Atheists and Christiani ad Leones Christians were thought such beasts that they were onely fit to fight with and to feed Beast or to be baited in Beasts skins Yea nomen crimen as Tertullian observes men were so mad against them and gnashed on them as the Jews against S. Stephen that they would not examine their cause or crime thinking it accusation enough that they owned themselves Christians § Dioclesian makes such havock as Decumanus fluctus after others that he not onely cut up the harvest but raked the gleaning of Christians in all the Roman Empire even so far as here in England where S. Albanus and others were Martyred that he gloried and triumphed and set up Trophies for the extirpation of the Christian superstition At this dead lift was the Church of Christ and cause of God when the Bishops of the Churches were banished or Butchered the Presbyters starved destroyed and scattered The Oratories and Temples or Churches all demolished or put to prophane uses the Christian people condemned to the Mettals Islands Prisons Limekills Racks Gibbets and Fires Thus did the cause of God as to the Christian Church stand or rather fal for the first three hundred years under Heatheninsh Persecutors and the oppositions of Philosophy or science falsely so called which yet afterward came to naught as all power and polity will at last do which set themselves to oppose the cause the truth the Church and servants of the living God Thirdly After the Church had some rest in Constantines time by the suppression of Heathenish fury and Idolatrous folly yet was the cause of God not without its following conflicts by reason of Hypocrites Hereticks Schismaticks false Apostles Hucksters of religion deceitful workers Wolves in sheeps cloathing who delighted to divide and destroy to shake foundations and shipwrack consciences to lead Disciples after them by factions partialities and respect of persons either darkening the verity or dividing the unity or defacing the uniformity or destroying the authority or confounding that order and subordination which Christ and his Apostles left in the Church of Christ men full of lusts and pride daily spawned innovations in the doctrine or in the faith or in the customs and in the forms of Religion § Such were all those pristine Hereticks and Schismaticks whose names and deeds deserve to be buried with their damnable doctrines and uncharitable factions in eternal forgetfulness they are too many and too odious to repeat I would to God they were not digged up out of their graves in our days by some carrionly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who searching the graves and raking the kennels of old errors seek to fill the English world with such odious noysom and unsavory spectacles both of opinions and practices § Who that is learned can be ignorant of the prevalent numbers and powers of the Novatians Arrians and Donatists what petulancy and cruelty they used against the Orthodox Cause challenging the Cause and Church of God wholly and only to themselves what despite they had against St. Cyprian Athanasius St. Cyril St. Hilary St. Augustine Optatus and others that opposed routed and confounded their contumacious impudence Thus was the Cause of Christ one whole age or century like Noahs Ark floating in a deluge of Arrian perfidy and persecution to its own grief and astonishment till God took the matter into his own hand and pleading the Cause of Jesus Christ and his eternal Godhead against both people and Bishops and Emperors that were infected with that pestilence for the inundation of the Goths and Vandals the Huns and Heruls the Gauls and Daci seemed no other but the fountains of the great deep broke up to wash away with humane blood the blasphemies with which the Christian world was then polluted against the glory and honor of the Son and Spirit of the blessed God when times were such that men would not endure sound doctrine but heaped up teachers and clucked together Councils and conventicles according to their own lusts and interests without any regard to the primitive Faith and practice of the Church of Christ
which was so zealously tender for the Cause of Christ that they loved not their lives unto death but rather chose mille mortes a thousand deaths then once to crucifie again or deny the Lord that bought them Fourthly The Cause of God may need his special pleading by reason of the great corruption of manners which like weeds grow in the garden of God or as tares in the field of the Church which was first sown with good seed Thus as Eusebius Salvian Suspitius-Severus and othes observe Christian Religion suffered more by the evil lives of Christians then by the malice of persecutors or Hereticks men that had sound heads as to doctrine and Faith yet had foul hearts their brains good but their breath lungs and liver were naught This contagion sometimes seised Pastors and Flocks by idleness pride luxury vain pomps and superfluous ceremonies by secular policies uncharitable actions and scandalous practices so far as made the Cause of God and the name Christ to be blasphemed and abhorred by many while they could not reconcile the holiness of Christians faith and doctrine with the solecisms of their sordid actions and shameful lives Hence came over the Western Churches that thick Egyptian darkness for many hundred of years in which religion was made up for the most part with Images and Pictures with beads and latin prayers with repeated Pater nosters and Ave Maries which people understood not nor the Priests many times with Purgatory Masses and Indulgencies with infinite superstitious ceremonies and empty formalities besides idle fables and vain janglings which like heaps of chaff had buried the good wheat of Gods floor and the glory of divine institutions to make way for Monastick superstitions Idolatrous adorations and Papal usurpations which were built on the flatteries of some and the fedities of others who easily dispenced with the honor of marriage when they had so cheap pardons for those extravagancies and impurities in which many lived under the vail of celibacy but far enough from pure unspotted and unviolated virginity § To this Augean stable was the Church of Christ and Cause of God brought by the depravedness of Christian manners by the rust and moss of superstition before the Reformation began to dawn in this western World An hundred grievances were at once complained of many confessed some for very shame reformed by even those of the Roman party who with infinite blood-shed in former ages fought under the Notion of holy Wars not only against Turks Jews and Sarazens but against good at least tolerable Christians who might have their errors and fayling in some things but it is sure they kept nearer to the primitive piety purity and patience both in faith administrations and manners than did their proud and merciless destroyers who eat up those poor Christians as bread and turned their cruel Croisadoes to crucifie their brethren breaking their fast sometimes with 20000. of the poor Albigenses Lugdunenses Waldenses Berengarians VVicklesites Hussites Bohemians and others proportionably were their dinners and suppers when the Popes flatterers and vassals had a mind to fall upon them 5. Yea and at this day even among the reformed Churches the purity simplicity honesty charity modesty and equanimity of Reformers is so abated and wasted by the pride animosity bitterness sacriledge rapines cruelties ambitions and covetousness among Protestants besides their endless factions under pretentions of reformation immoderations novellizings and confusions That thiâ— Cause of God as to the true reforming of religion and just protesting against Romish errors and enormities is brought very low as in other places and Churches so in England which was the greatest beauty honour stability refuge and safety of the reformed Religion and that cause of Christ which hath been so learned and valiantly pleaded by the Clergy and Layty the Princes and Parliaments the Martyrs and professors reverend Bishops and learned Presbyters against the Roman Usurpation Superstition Sacriledg and Idolatry which are without doubt so far Antichristian as they are clearly against the Doctrine example and institution of Christ besides the judgment and practice of his primitive Churches § Even this cause I say is now â—ick and ashamed of it self so decayed disparaged and divided that it is next degree to being destroyed and despised by all unless God arise by some extraordinary way of his providence to plead and assert this his own cause of a just and due reformation against the factious policies and Fanatick fallacies of unreasonable men whose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 immoderations and transports have marred all by their King killing rapine and sacriledg unless God arise to judge the earth § Nor is this the first time that God hath helped this Church and the Reformed Religion at a dead lift for so it was in Queen Maries days when the reformed party made conscience not to rebel against their persecuting Soveraigne Princess when her persecution was according to her perswasion and conscience yea they pleaded and asserted her civil rights committing the cause of their Religion and Reformation to God with their loyal souls and consciences in well doing and patience There did God arise in his due time and do his own works in his own way to the great honour of the reformed Religion which had first the crowns of so many Martyrdoms on its head without the least spot of civil Tumults Wars Seditions or Rebellions on the hearts or hands of the reforming Clergy and reformed people § By which preposterous methods of latter years mightily cryed up and carryed on by some men in order to reformation of Religion not onely Religion is become retrograde many degrees if we look to the Dial of Gods word and the primitive Christians practice as it pretends to be reformed but even as it is Christian too that is the Doctrine and imitation of a crucified not a crucifying Saviour The lines which some men have drawn as the measures of their Doctrine and deeds are very excentrick and wide as to the wonted centre of Gods glory the circumference of Scripture truth and that strait rule of charity by which those two were wont to meet in the conscience and conversation of good Christians § Nor will either Christian Religion or just Reformation appear in their true beauty and honor while these are so far at distance and separated from each other that either verity and charity patience and subjection truth and peace are wanting in the ways of Christians In the close of this second general Question it is fit to answer that other branch of it also Why God so wise so potent so good s gracious so compassionate and so vigilant for his own Cause that is his Glory and great Name which is so much bound up in his Churches welfare yet suffers it many times so far to run to lapse seeming ruine and despair in the eyes of the world in the triumphs of his enemies and in the despondencies of his servants that
mens part in pleading Gods cause in this world therefore to make amends there is a third Court wherin God will unavoidably plead his cause against every evil doer and all nakedness in the world this will be in foro poli or coeli at the last day when the books of Omniscience conscience and Scripture shall be opened and mens sins with their wilful immoral and impenitent errors shall be set in order before them Then the great Accuser within and without shall be heard and sentence given secundum allegata probata according to the merit and evidence of mens works This is the last appeal of the oppressed righteous cause where it shall be heard and have right done it For then as St. Bernard tells Judges and Juries and Lawyers Omnia judicata rejudicabuntur All judgements and causes shall be reviewed and rejudged § But the consideration of such Instruments as God is pleased to 〈◊〉 up to plead his cause in this world Leads me to the last particular which is to shew the manner and method legitimi litigandi of mans pleading as becomes him this holy cause of God when he is called to it in an ordinary which all are or extraordinary way as some may be § It is not only the work of God to plead his own cause as Joash said of Baal If he be a God he can and will plead for himself But it is the duty of every good Christian that loves God to be a worker and pleader together with him in Gods cause and way we must be all willing to be retained on Gods side to be his Advocates and Attorneys when he calls us to this work to contest for God against an evil perverse and adulterous generation either by living or dying by doing or suffering by preaching or disputing by discoursing or writing It will be demanded why I add not by fighting which is now much cryed up and used by some as a most speedy and effectual way to plead Gods Cause and set up Christ◠Kingdom I answer The cause of God is sometimes to be pleaded by the way of fighting 1. In defence of any Church and State against unjust and foreign invasion or intestine rebellion and sedition 2. By way of a Princes relieving his oppressed Subjects and Confederates in other States and Dominions 3. By way of asserting the proceedings of Justice as to Law according to that power which is established in any Kingdom or Polity 4. As to the Cause of Religion it is no further to be asserted by the Sword then as it is established by the Law and under the protection of the Soveraign Power there to plead its cause by such a Sword as is the sword of God and of Gideon is lawful when it is done by lawful command and Supreme which is in England Regal Authority Otherwise no Cause of God as to Religion is to be either planted and propagated or reformed or vindicated by the sword of Subjects against any Princes or chief Magistrates will and power in whose hand the sword is True God by a special Prophet and a commission from Heaven confirmed by many miracles did once put a sword into the Jews hand to make their way against those Nations which were declared by Divine Justice worthy to be destroyed But the Evangelical spirit is not of that temper the Commission of the Gospel and Christs Spiritual Militia by which he conquers the World is not to fight and kill and slay but to preach to pray and to suffer They grosly mistake Christs Kingdom and Gods Cause now that fancy it is to be pleaded by the Arm of Flesh by popular furies and forces by tumults and violences by subverting and opposing Magistratick power and breaking over the boundaries of good Laws and Customs Civil and Ecclesiastical § Christ commanded Peters gladiatorum forwardness in his defence to put up his sword into his sheath Christ had two other swords of the Word and Spirit which were enough to do his work not by Souldiers but Ministers not by Colonels and Captains but hy Bishops and Presbyters There are other ways to exercise a Christians love zeal and courage for Gods cause which as it is most worthy of our pleading so we must take care to plead it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as becomes our Lord and Saviour It is a caution which Quintilian a great Orator gave to all Pleaders Cavendum ne bonam causam male litigando perdamus Many men are untowardly forward to plead Christs cause like hot mettal'd and heady horses neither well mouthed nor well wayed and managed They endanger more by their rashness then they advance by their capring activity The Cause then of God must in times places and points be pleaded so as becomes the Majestie Truth and Honor of the great God 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Wisely with understanding by the clear and potent demonstrations of it grounded on the Word of God not by humane fancies wilde notions and extravagant presumptions and fanatick fetches The Word of God is able to make us perfect pleaders of his Cause We must not adde to nor detract from that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 compleat armour offensive and defensive If any plead not according to that rule of Law and Gospel of Faith and Loyalty of patience and obedience it is because there is no light of truth or grace of humility in them Gods Cause needs no cavilings nor sophisms no wisdom or eloquence of mans invention which is to joyn humane fraud and force meer froth and folly to divine sufficiency As if one would muster up Frogs and Mice with their bulrushes to joyn with Angels in Gods battels to help the Lord against the mighty 2. Gods cause is to be pleaded by man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sincerely for Gods sake not for self-ends and interests for our glory gain or advantage as to our persons or parties our secular and civil interests of power and preferment which are many times the dead Flie cast into this precious Oyntment as Jehu did whose ambition was the belows and blazoner of his zeal So they that preached the Gospel out of Envy and ill will or for filthy lucres sake to serve their bellies and not the Lord Jesus to please men and not God seeking not the salvation of souls or the good of the Church and State but their own emoluments and preferments These are in all ages the greatest deformers of Christian Religion exposing it first to popular fury and after to the shame and contempt of all 3. Gods cause must be pleaded 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Integre 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 solidly and entirely not picking and chusing what parts or points or duties of it most suit with our fancies opinions parties designs desires and private interests We must not so plead for the first table in piety as to
neglect the second in equity and charity So to contend against superstition in Gods worship as to overthrow the order and decency which ought to be solemnly observed in it or that duty and obedience we owe to those which are in Church or State called Fathers and to whom we stand obliged by the first Commandment with promise We must not so plead or urge our duty to God as to skip over our duty to our neighbour nor so plead against Idolatry as to indulge Sacri ledge or against Adultery as to acquit Murther or so cry up Religion or Reformation as to encourage Rebellion and Sedition Noâ— may we so inculcate and insist on one duty as to omit and slight others to be meer Euchites for prayer or Acoits for hearing or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pragmaticks impertinently and irregularly busie in Church and State as to neglect the Sacraments or to be so eager in dispute for Truth even the minores veritates as to forget the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 great things of God in which the Kingdoms of the Gospel consists so magnifying faith that we omit good works and crying down ceremonies to the overthrow of all orderly and uniform Devotion to cast out Commandments Lords Prayer Creed and all settled Liturgy out of the Church 4. The Cause of God must be pleaded by us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 holily justly and lawfully according to our place and duty after a righteous manner also peaceably and orderly Nor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 violently rudely and injuriously This is the first thing God requires of us to do justice and then to shew mercy and walk humbly with him Extravagant motions mar the cause of God and rather prejudice it then any way plead it We must not commit Robbery to do Sacrifice nor lye or oppress upon Gods account We must not be so far partial to Gods Cause as to do evil that good may come thereby this is to turn the staff of Moses into a Serpent The great care of the Apostles was to have Mysteries of Religion made good by Moralities Cardinal Poole well expressed that those would best understand the eleven first Chapters of the Epistle to the Romans which are full of high mysteries and disputes who did most practice the five last which exhort to holy life teaching such as believed well to do all things well that the Cause and Name of God might not be evil spoken of We must not violate the good laws of civil Societies under pretence to exalt the Law of God nor run Church and State into confusion to set up Reformation of either in seditious ways Gods Cause needs not the Devils engines either plead it as becomes it or let it alone It will support it self without the rash hand of Uzzah to stay it If thou canst not plead it actively thou mayest do it passively and much more to purpose as primitive Christians did then by any inordinate activity No man saith the Apostle that striveth is crowned unless he strive lawfully Secundum leges Athleticas such as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Institutor and Umpire had appointed 5. Gods Cause must be pleaded 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with moderation discretion and calmness so as not to suffer any transports of passion and precipitancy to over sway us to an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 excess or indecency We must not so plead against superstition as to reproach or weaken true Religion or against humane corruptions as to vacate and voyd Divine institutions or against the abuse of things as to abolish the good use of them to have no Our Father because we would have no Ave Marys in our Prayers § Reformation must not run to the ruine of Church or the riot of State as if a Physitian should destroy the body with the disease purging away the spirits with ill humors such as their former methods seem to be who will have no Bishops according to the primitive and Catholique order of the Church because some Bishops in after times had their fauls and frailties or no Ministers because some of them have been too blame or no Sacraments because some may be unworthy receivers These as immoderations and madnesses become not those that undertake to plead Gods Cause It is like theirs who would starve themselves because some have been gluttons or destroy all Vines because of some mens drunkenness or have no singing because some may sing out of tune it is an ordinary error in men to suffer their pleas to pass from the cause to the persons and so from the persons to the cause which transports of envy and anger arise from the overboyling of mens passions which wasts their judgments and make them instead of snuffing dim candles to put them quite out an error that I fear hath been too prevalent in some mens spirits and practises among us whose meaning and intentions possibly might be good or at least not so bad as the event Sixthly Valiantly and couragiously 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the generosity and magnanimity of a true Christian spirit which is rather good then great or therefore great because good not by a military robusâ—ness and boysterous forwardness or childish pertinacy that resolves to maintain any cause they once ingage for but such a cool and sober valour as first hath made a just conquest of our selves as to all irregular passions inordinate lusts oblique designes that being listed in Christs spiritual Militia and having given our names to him we may put on that spiritual armour which becomes a Christian in truth faith love zeal patience justice sobriety sanctity and constancy for these are the solid grounds and sure guides of a Christians courage in Gods cause whose sacrifice might not be offered with strange fire or strange incense nor may his cause be pleaded by brutish valour or by turbulent passions For that were like baking the shewbread of the sanctuary with mans dung which the Prophet Ezekiel so much abhorred and deprecated Seventhly Gods cause must be pleaded by us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 becoming Christ and Christians who are persons under the severest restraints of any men with modesty gravity humility and due respects to our betters and superiors beâ—itting their place authority and dignity So the ancient Martyrs and other confessors in their Apologies petitions and Remonstrances as Iustin Martyr Tertullian and others presented to the Emperors or Senates owned them with due honour and payed that reverence to them which their dignity required and Gods word either commanded or permitted They never used rayling accusations against them nor spake evil of dignities to set a gloss and soyl on their good cause no not in their greatest agonies in their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when they were dying and suffering as well as disputing preaching or writing they blessed those that cursed them
such a people as we are whose iniquities have forfeited former blessings the sins of peace made way for war and war for domestick confusion and these for foraign invasions and this for Romish superstitions and Papal usurpations for there want not factors at home and abroad who are earnest sticklers for a Cause which they call the Catholick Cause what it means as to our civil and religious concern as to the honor of this Nation and the prosperity or peace or liberty of the Reformed Religion you cannot be such strangers in the Christian world as not to consider How long as Eliah said to the Israelites will you halt between two opinions between two Causes nay now they are multiplied to twenty if the Reformed Church and Religion which God so blessed with temporal and spiritual blessings with excellent gifts and graces to your forefathers in the last century of Englands honor and happiness if it be Gods Cause grounded on his word sealed by his Spirit and conform to the best of primitive Churches let us plead and assert this against all other for it will be our wisdom and our strength our honor our peace and our safety as it was to our forefathers for the greatest part of an hundred years while they joyned Loyalty to Religion and thought nothing further from Reformation then Rebellion against lawful Magistrates and their lawful power The Second Question you may make to me is What is this Cause of God which we are now to plead in England or what is there left for us to do I Answer as Joseph to his brethren this do and live First retain righteous principles as to civil Justice and true Religion in your own judgements and in the Court of your consciences that you be not warped in them so as by any events or successes to call evil good and good evil darkness light and light darkness Though you have not opportunity or power or courage at present to plead according to your principles yet turn not from them comply not with such as are false unjust irreligious though it be so evil a time that prudence adviseth and piety indulgeth you silence yet time may come when you may plead for Gods Cause according to your principles Mean time as by your speaking you do not strengthen the hands of an evill cause and evill doers so by your silence and reserve you do cast a just reproach and discountenance upon them there is yet hope of a good Cause if the Court and Judge be not corrupted Notwithstanding that some evil pleaders cry it down Secondly As you have power and opportunity given you dare to own and plead for Gods Cause 1. In your own brests and consciences every grace and vertue every good thought and motion is Gods plead them against thy own lusts and the Devils temptations 2. In thy Family and relations plead Gods Cause against lying swearing idleness prophaness c. Thirdly In civil affairs plead the cause of Justice against any injury and oppression the poorest mans cause if just is Gods yea and the cause of a wicked mans so far as it is just is Gods Specially in causes of publick Justice there thou must not be wanting to speak out by pleading when called to it by petitioning and praying for Justice yea and acting for it according to what is just and lawful but a just Cause must not be set as the Ark on the cart of injustice we must not so plead Gods cause as to injure Cesars nor Cesars as to injure Gods Fourthly Plead the cause of true Religion of our reformed Religion of the Church of England and its excellent constitutions against the Pseudo Catholick Church of Rome the cause of Christs merits and intercession against all mixtures humane or Angelick the cause of the Scriptures against all Apocryphal traditions and fanatick illuminations which are false illusions and not divine inspirations The cause of the Lords Supper in its compleatness against the subductions and seductions of the Mass which loseth the bread to all and steals away the wine from the Laity the cause of the worship of God in a known tongue to edification against Latin service which few understand so as to say Amen to what is prayed So the cause of chast and honorable mariage against scorched and affected coelebacy Further Plead as for the verity so for the unity of the Reformed Religion and this Church against those lice and locusts those noxious and noysom vermine of factions which have so gnawed and defaceâ— this Church the reformed religion and which seek to deprive your children of one and your selves of both the holy Sacraments Plead for the Churches patrimony for the support and honor of an able learned authoritative and worthy Ministry in due order and government of it against those sacrilegious spirits who with Judas grudge all as wast that is by a grateful charity and devout superfluity poured on Christ for the honor of his name and the encouragement of his Ministers according to the general tenor of Gods word not only permiting but commanding us by personal or national donations to honor God with our substance Plead for our due ordination subordination as Ministers that we may not by novel projects of levelling confusion plebeian Anarchy in the Church be driven from conformity with the ancient Fathers and the order and universal government of all Christian Churches as wel as our own from our first being Christian If you think us able or worthy to take care of your souls eternal welfare and to administer to you spiritual things Do not think us worthy to be condemned to live to dye and to be buried even yet alive with the meanest of the people since by what I have now discoursed to you it may appear that we are neither ignorant of nor enemies to the true cause of God Jesus Christ as our blind and bitter enemies do maliciously pretend Of which cause I have in all my discourse not spoken my own private sense only but the sense of my Fathers Brethren of all true Bishops and Presbyters and of the whole Church of England Lastly Since I hope you are as willing as able to plead Gods cause and since I know you pray that God would plead your and your posterities cause in Church and State that he would make yours his own cause Keep I beseech you always in your souls this holy resolution not to be wanting in your place to your power to assert Gods cause corde et ore consilio exemplo prece praxi atramento sanguine In which behalf you cannot form your thoughts to a better tune and words then Luther did when he undertook that great Cause of religious reformation Aut propugnemus causam Dei aut succumbamus cum causa Dei Either let us stand by the cause of God or let us fall with
were so diametrally contrary to the Word of God to the laws of this Land and to the example of Iesus Christ and all â—rue Saints and so no more capable to set up or promote Gods righteous cause except that of his punitive Iustice for our sins to which the Devils themselves may serve as Executioners then the sparks of hell can add to the light of heaven or the falling Stars and Meteors contribute to the lustre of the Sun or the crooked winding of the Dragons â—ail could give protection to the Woman and her childe against whom his mouth vomited those black floods and Stygian eructations which by Heretical or â—châ—â—matical or Heathenish or Atheistical persecutions seek to overwhelm them The great and blessed God hath taken the matter into his own hand what you then faithfully heard and devoutly prayed for with me as to Gods pleading of his own Cause you have lived to see fulfilled as it was then by me discoursed and foretold while the poor people of England were halting between manâ— opinions all eagerly pretending to be for Gods Cause one for Aristocracy the other for Democracy one for Presbyterâ—â— the other for Independency one for their Antiepiscopal Covenant another for their Anti-regal Engagement one for abâ—uration of Kings the other for extirpation of Bishops a third for setting up the Kingdom of Iesus Christ in which they might rule instead of both King and Bishops and all this forsooth in order to advance the Cause of God though in ways quite contrary to the eternal rules of charity justice and religion the Laws of God and this Nation amidst this confusion the Lord from heaven hath on the sudden convicted confuted and confounded all those specious but spurious pretenders to Gods Cause which is not to be begun or carried on as I after declare by any means but such as are pure peaceable just and â—oly either by an orderly doing good in our places or by a patient and humble suffering of evil inflicted on us though it be for well doing It is most evident that as in natural so in civil and Ecclesiastical motions all things magnetically move as they are moved by their chief cause or grand concern which by a circular kind of influence studies to unite the finall to the efficient cause that the power of the one may enjoy the good of the other This Cause is the first and last mover of every knowing agent it is the weight and spring of all rational activity it is a pulse ever importuning the spirit and beating upon the heart the one thing necessary to which men seek to make all other things subservient or at least subordinate the centre from which and to which all lines are drawn The better to compass their respective designs every Agitator for Faction did cunningly entitle God to their Cause as some that are cautious of the crackt titles of their estates resign the Fee to the Crown and take from them a Lease of a thousand years â—o did the counterfeit and contrariant Causes larely so scuâ—â—sing in England for place and power set themselves up under the name of Gods Cause while they were indeed the causeless corrupters of our Laws the Nations heavie curse the Churches moth and corrosive and confounders of all yet each of their pretended causes were impudently pleaded by â—ome men in Churches and Courts of Iustice as Gods Cause yâ—â— by â—ome suppositiâ—ious Parâ—â—aments they were voted for till they had run themselves and all of us like S. Pauls ship in the storm upon such rocks of Anarchy and confusion as were past humane hopes of recovery if God himself had not arose by a providence scarce ever paralleld in any age or instance of the world to plead by a still voyce after all our foregoing earthquakes fires tempests the Cause of his own great Name and the honor of our blessed Saviour with the sanctity of our Reformed Religion and the Loyalty of our English Nation the rights also of the Crown with the double honor of our Church and in sum the just restablishment of all our long shaken and overthrown foundations the cause of all which was pleaded more effectually in a few calm Months when the voyce of Law and Reason of Loyalty and true Religion came to be heard in our streets then they had been or ever could have been in many years by plunderings and sequestrings by killing and slaying by illegal covenanting and perjurious engaging by devouring and destroying both Church and Kingdom I am piously ambitious though my station be now removed from you made without my seeking much uneasier though somewhat higher then it was before to deposite thiâ— work with you O worthy and honourable Gentlemen among whom it had its first productions of whose love and favor as you know I never made any mercenary gain or pecuniary advantagâ— as that wretched Libeller 〈◊〉 Creticus Borborites enviously suggests my charge of attending your service being beyond any benefit I ever received so I musâ— own this as the greatest rewarâ— and only satisfaction which I ever had or expected for my pains among you that I had thereby an happy opportunity in so noble an Assembly and in so desperate paroxysms of our distempered times to set forth with my wonted freedom the great concern of all good men which is the true Cause of God which must be pleaded against our own and others lusts and to discover those potent epidemical cheats which under that name had so long abused these British Nations and Churches I well remember that some of my more touchy and guilty hearers men of name at that time were at once scared and scandalized to hear me preach so freely and smartly of that subject they feared their practice and craft would soon fail if once the true Cause of God were rightly stated and pleaded yea some men of the long robe and of large consciences protested after the hearing of the first Sermon they durst not hear me preach again on that subject least their silence should make them guilty of High-treason by their noâ— complaining of me to the Traytorâ— then tyrannizing over us Indeed they were justly jealouâ— that the true Cause of God like Moses Serpent would eat up alâ— those of the Magicians That the Cause of Christ of the truâ— heavenly Jerusalem would either batter down or undermine those bloody Babels of their Commonâ— wealths which were indeed the common woe though it made for some mens private wealth by the prices of blood and wages of iniquity which they greedily received I thank God I never feared the frowns nor affected the smiles of such servile Sycophants who durst plead any Cause but what was truly Gods the Kings and the Churches I had then sufficient encouragement from the love and approbation of the most and best of their Society without which yet I ought and should have done my duty upon the account of conscience and inward comfort Hence is this
my confidence of inviting you again to review the Cause of God which hath been now mightily pleaded beyond what we could ask or think God himself conquering the monsters of our sins and miseries by the miracles of his mercies My aim is to retain and engage as Counsellors Advocates and Servients to this righteous cause yet without any other Fee then that of a good conscience in this world not only men of my own profession as Divines and Ministers but you â—s o that are either the Sages and Iudges or the Students and Practisers in the Laws because I look upon you as Masters of great Reason and no less careful I hope of true Religion best acquainted with the constitutions of this Church and Kingdom persons generally adorned with ingenuous education and good literature yea and which is more in vulgar eies and esteem with good estates Gentlemen related by birth or alliance or clients or acquaintance to the best Families and greatest affairs of the Nation you either fill the one or attend the other house of Parliament while no Bishop or other Clergie-man never so worthy is admitted to come there unless as a Supplicant or Delinquent your counsels and examples are not onely influentiall in your country retirements but also efficacious in all the Cities and Courts of England It is your custom and no less your wisdom and honor to keep to and plead for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Magna Charta fundamental Laws and ancient and excellent constitutions of this Church and Kingdom not therefore good because ancient but therefore ancient because they were judged and experimentally found by our wise and pious Progenitors to be very good yea best for this Church and State It becomes the freedom of your spirits and estates as Lawyers and Gentlemen however the poor Clergie are oft compelled to popular dependancie yea and some of them like leeches thrive best when they hang most upon the skins of people I say it becomes you to be the furthest of any men living from flattering or abetting any factius novelties or Fanatick Novellers in Church or State which you cannot do without greater sin and shame then other men because you have more knowledge of good and evil of Law and Iustice of Reason and Religion the guilt and burthen of other mens sins which are lead and deluded by your counsel or example must needs lie heavie upon your souls as well as ours of the Clergie when being their guides lights and oracles you or we prove their deceivers and seaucers Certainly if the poyson of some Lawyers teeth had not venomed the wounds which some Preachers tongues first gave to the life and welfare of this Church and Kingdom we had not run to such horrid ulcers such in veterate and incurable gangreens of disloyalty and irreligion of faction and confusion nor endured so various ridiculous and superfluous Tragedies which then began when Pulpits rang Aarons bels backward as to the Cause of God and Courts of judicature meanly conformed to the vilest lusts of men such as have given horror and astonishment to the modest part of mankind and which threatned except the Lord had been merciful to us to have tormented Kings and Parliaments and people of all degrees in the hell fire or Tophet of everlasting fewds factions and confusions under the specious name but most putid fallacy of Gods Cause the good cause and at last the good old cause though nothing was more vile and novel less ancient or more arrantly wicked for perjury perfidy Sacriledge and Regicide void of all fear of God or reverence of man contrary to the Word of God and Laws of that Nation A Cause the zealous Martyrs for which are only fit to be put in the Devilâ— Diptych or Calendar or in God Black book not in the Book of lifâ— Against all which presumptuo 〈…〉 imposures in Church and State You O worthy professors of the La 〈…〉 and of our reformed Religion aâ— well as we Preachers of the Gospelâ— have now all honorable and safâ— encouragement to oppose ouâ— selves under the protection of God and the King that both you a 〈…〉 Iudges and Iustices by the civil sword and we as Bishops and Presbyters by the spiritual sword may be as valiant for the honour and order of the established Religion and Laws of England for the ancient and excellent Government Regal and Episcopall of this Church and Kingdom as others have been impudently pragmatick to broach those novel errors most illegal injuries and high indignities which they brought upon us more by our own cowardize perhaps then their courage Let us dare as much to be Loyal and religious honest and orderly as others have dared to be false and base insolent and irregular injurious and sacrilegious They wanted not many black mouths vile tongues and libellous pens to plead for the Baalims which they set up meer Idols and Teraphims in Church and State which are now blessed be God cast out to the moles and bats O let not us for I would have no difference between your learned Tribe and ours let none of us who are most versed in God or mans Laws be wanting to the true Cause of our God and Saviour of our rightful King of our reformed Religion and of our famous Church in its Doctrine devotion discipline and Government In the cause of which all your and your posterities happiness are included Since then by the goodness of God the monstrous and many-shapen Dagons of our late Philistins and oppressors are now faln to the ground and broken off head hands and feet a meer fanatick stump let us turn Israelites unanimously set our selves as we have done to the welcome reception of his Majesty so to bring home with truth and peace honor and order joy and jubilation the Ark of God the Church of England restoring it to its place and adorning it with all the beauties of holiness worthy of the wisdom and piety munificence courage and honor of our Ancestors who were famous both for their loyaltie and Religion the fruits of whose care and constancie we enjoyed heretofore as men and Christians in a wel-reformed united and setled National Church till some men lost their wits and hearts their credits and consciences their sense of duty to their God and their King yea and their first love of our reformed Church and Religion for which our famous Forefathers had so notably pleaded not only in the Pulpits at the Bars but in prison also and at stakes when they were able to say with truth and comfort as the royall Martyr of admired memory did now dying That they thanked God they had a good Cause and a gracious God Certainly t is better thus to suffer for God cause inpietie justice patience and charitie then to prosper in the Devils with sacrilegious usurpation and injury this as a fire of thorns may blaze for a time but it will soon be extinguished the other carries the lawrells and
God and his Church are as I said inseparable no man is affected with one who is neglective of the other this example we have here added to others of Noah Lot Moses Phineas Samuel Eliah Micaiah Jeremiah Nehemiah Daniel Mordecai and others whose vigilancy and pertinacy was such in the cause of God and his Church that they were resolved to give God no rest till he did arise and plead his own cause Nothing is more imitable nothing more commendable nothing more practicable nothing more comfortable provided we rightly understand what the Cause of God is and apply to it as becomes God his cause and our duties then t is heroick to say with Esther If I perish I perish This is Angelick with Moses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to put God to the blush and silence If not blo◠me out of thy book and t is super Angelical to say with St. Paul I would wish to be accursed from Christ for the Churches sake and Gods cause our duty in which we shall the◠best understand and perform when we have duly considered these four things 1. What the Cause of God is 2. What need we may have of his pleading it 3. How God doth plead it 1. Immediately by himself 2. Mediately by such instruments and means as he is pleased to use among men In the fourth place is to be shewed What is the true method or manner to be observed by all good men in pleading Gods cause with him and for him When these are finished and such Patheticks applied by way of use as may cast your wills in the mold of your judgements and make your affections to keep pace at least to follow your understandings I shall I hope not onely discharge in some tolerable measure my own duty and undertaking which is great but answer your favourable and Christian expectation which I see is not little for I abhor nothing more then the ostentation of so ample a text to so ample an Auditory in such exigents of times even agonies of Gods cause in Church and State in Justice and Religion and to do nothing worthy or proportionable to them which defect in me and neglect in you God forbid whose assistance as I humbly implore so I may not despair since it is in his own Cause which must needs be the best and may modestly hope for his gracious help in my pleading and preaching for it against all frivolous fallacious and impertinent pretenders to it the rather because it is not onely my particular cause as a Christian and a Minister but all yours together with your posterities as men as English-men as Christians and as Protestants We know that of the Orator In propriacausa unusquisque sibi videtur potens eloquens if in our own much more in Gods Cause which is our own too we ought to do our best on all hands First What this Cause of God is I take it for granted what I first observed That God hath his cause in this world who made all things by his wisdom and power for his glory and is as a wise Agent highly concerned as to do nothing in vain so not to fail of his main design It is no other then Atheistical blasphemy to deny that God hath any concern or causeon earth or that he regards them that doth and will ever plead for them God hath not left himself without witness in the world that he is and that he looks to the managery of all things specially of mankind and peculiarly of his own Cause It is not natura volvente vices lucis anni that all things are fatal and necessary confining God as well as man to inevitable events which is the fancy of those Qui nullo credunt mundum rectore moveri who have either no Faith in God or no thought worthy of a God Gods silence and patience are the prejudices which men have taken against his Providence and that special care of things which runs as spiritus intus agens in all permissions and events which are not as to God either contingent or by constraint but under the free and soveraign disposition which is every way worthy of a most wise disposer and almighty worker hence mockers as S. Peter observes are prone to ask Where is Gods cause where the promise of his coming Where are his prophesies what he would do for the good in mercy and against the wicked in justice even thus of old the Gnostick pride and presumption jested when vengeance was at the door and judgement overtook them to an utter desolation of the Jewish Polity They are such as live without God in the world that say he will do nor good nor evil Many are willingly ignorant that God hath any cause in this world and many are mistaken in the true Cause and in their pleadings for it without right understanding the heart cannot be good since the pregnant inventions of men in all times especially in ours have found out many Causes and every one is cryed up for Gods The first foundation-stone to be laid in this building is to know what the true Cause of God is of which every one boasts as his peculiar till another comes and finds out the fallacy This I shall shew first by giving general characters of Gods Cause such as are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 proper essential and intrinsick marks of it Secondly I shall by way of Induction shew you the particuliar parts or branches by which it spreads it self in the world First The Cause of God is known by these marks or essential properties 1 It is Causa optima not only a good cause but the very best yea the onely good one in the world the measure or standard of all others as the first and best of all Causes which are only so far good as they are conform to and concurrent with the cause of God whose internal rule is the moral will of God its end the glory of God It is good in its principles and in its practices every way vera pura justa divina 2. It is true according to Scriptural verity which is revealed in the holy Word of God fixed and infallible not depending on uncertainties which are sceptical conjectural and opinionative much less upon fantastical and enthusiastical notions according to the fancies dreams and inventions of men that are rather heady and giddy then hearty and godly § Gods Cause is never to be carried on by fictions or lyes by fables or legends which are but mans devises and the Devils stratagems as impertinent to advance Gods Cause as blackness is to augment light as with God so with his Cause no iniquity dwelleth 3. It is an holy pure and just Cause in all points as it regards 1. God in religious adoration inward reverence and outward veneration 2. Our selves in chastity and sobriety 3. Others in justice
little matters which administer much strife and little edification in truth or love Christians may and must 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 keep the truth in love Ephes 4. though they do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 differ in things indifferent the substance of Gods Cause should have more influence to unite hearts than the ceremonies to divide them 7. Yet the cause of God is Causa ordinata 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 very regular and orderly in all its motions full of harmony and beauty abhorring any ways that are preposterous desultory violent uncomely disorderly tumultuary confused It needs none of these devillish engines to carry on the Cause of him who is the God of order decency and peace not of division confusion and contention Extravagant and excentricâ— spirits easily lose the Cause of God while they follow it in a preposterous wrong way as men may easily miss the centre of the circle who lay their rule in the least degree awry from the diameter the passions of men and their popular po 〈…〉 es never work out the righteousness of Gods Cause but trouble foil blemish and blaspheme it Not fire and earthquakes and whirlwinds but the still voyce and calm spiriâ— do best bring forth and set up by meekness of wisdom the true Cause of God and Christ and the Church especially as to the concerns of Religion Nor may that cause of civil Justice which some pretend to be promoted by any unjust and illegal ways of tumult sedition and rebellion these mar all and instead of repairing or purging the Temple with Josiah Ezra Josedeck and the blessed Jesus they set both Church and State Temple and City on fire as did Nebuzaradan and his Master Nebuchadnezzar â— These 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or genuine characters are the surest and safest tokens by which to discern Gods Cause both in its own merits or temper and in the minds of those that undertake to manage it Other novel popular and politick pretensions as to outward providences prosperities successes multitudes prevalencies of brutal and irregular power vulgar flatteries and factious adherencies or as to the respect of mens parts learning eloquence seeming zeal and cryed up devotion they are all spurious partial and fallacious 1. The Sun-shine of ordinary providence and success of prosperity and power may fall upon Causes that are evil and unjust no less then on the just and good Mahomet hath had great and long successions of successive power to assert his cause and multitudes do follow even that Beast as well as the Lamb or the Messiah Outward prosperity is the idol of fools who care not how little the Cause of God prosper and prevail in their souls if it thrive as to their purses and estates Successes are pursued by silly and easie people as gay Butterflies are by children Gods Cause is seldom seen in crouds or rabbles and throngs of people which Christ abhorred and avoided As its course is strict so its path is narrow 2. As for the decoys of personal gifts and endowments of zeal and seeming or real severities in some things King Saul had as his height so his heats above other Jews against the Gibeonites and Witches so Jehu had his zeal against the house of Ahab and Baal Paul once breathed threatnings against the way of Christ with equal ignorance imperiousness and confidence Novatus wanted not his zelotry and preciser passions nor Manes and Montanus their spiritual and seraphick pretensions with rigid fastings Origen and Tertullian had their excellent abilities which Vincentius Liri â—ensis calls Magnae tentationes magnorum ingeniorum their temptations to extravagancies they were like fair flowers and fruit which are too big for themselves and so crack or break nor did Donatus want his devotion nor Pelagius wit and learning nor Faustus Socinus of late his severity and strictness with his sophistry nor any Heretick or Schismatick ever failed to have some lure either of sensual liberty or special sanctity to take people withal So the Anabaptists in Germany as Sleiden and others tells us cryed most vehemently for Justice Mercy and Repentance other Enthusiasts had their rare visions and the very Ideot Quakers boast of their inward illuminations so the most puâ—id Friars and politick Monks had their forged miracles and forced celibacies set off with great austerities to cover over their fedities Satan hath many masks and vizards of an Angel of light yet he is never further off from Gods Cause then when he most sets men awork to cry it up and carry it on in ways that are no less unjust violent and extravagant then perhaps for a time successful as was the Arrian perfidy which seemed so zealous for the unity of the Deity that they sought to overthrow the sacred Trinity and the grand foundation of the Christian Faith honor and comfort the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Word made flesh the Theanthropy and Philanthropy of God to mankind in the Incarnation of the Son of God Their disputes as St. Cyrill tells us were not more sophistical and perverse then specious and plausible insomuch that the pest infested in a few years the most part of the Christian world both in Court Cities and Countries which was as St. Jerom says amazed to see it self in a short time so be witched with the Arrian enchantments which set up a new Saviour and another Gospel then was primitively beleived in all Churches So the Novatians and Donatists or â—ntient Catharists which were the Christian Pharisees or Puritans pretended as Optatus and others tells us so to promote the Cause of the Churches purity that they destroyed its unity and charity And the Pelagians so stickled for the power and liberty of mans will that they derogated from Gods grace and glory as St. Augustine speaks 8. Causa crucisixi saepius crucisixa as Christ so his cause which is Gods is oft not onely circumcised but crucisied with him yea it may seem dead and buried too for a time to the judgement of sense we must not look for the true Church always cloathed with the sun but rather flying into the wilderness and covered with sackcloth The prosperities and crowns of Gods Cause are reserved for another world here the cross and thorns and buffettings and spittings and blood and spears and nails do not mis-become it but conform it to its head § T is certain the Cause of God was then purest as to faith and manners when it was like gold in the furnace and fiery trial under the first ten persecutions which lasted with some lucid intervals three hundred years In vain do those that seem high zealots for the Cause of God dream and speak big of houses and lands and liberties and victories and kingdoms and crowns and Judicatures and reigning with Christ after secular methods and policies of blood and fraud these are figs in this world The honor riches crowns and comforts of true
in Gods name and stead to enact and execute them Hence as the just cause of every man is Gods who may say with David and others Psal 35. 1. Plead my cause O Lord c. Though never so poor mean and helpless yet their cause must not be despised or wronged and oppressed God will avenge the meanest Subjects injuries against the greatest Princes or Potentates so the cause of even subordinate Magistrates is Gods cause But above all their cause is Gods whom God hath placed as Supreme above all in Empires and Kingdomes for the good of all Certainly that of I have said ye are Gods and Thou shall not curse the Gods or Rulers of thy people and that of Touch not mine annointed and do my Prophets no harm That of Davids tenderness to King Saul of all good mens subjection in all ages Jewish and Christian to their princes though evil persecutive and oppressive those orders of Christ to give to Cesar the things that are Cesars and so the Canons of the two great Apostles S. Peter and S. Paul to obey to be subject by all means in all things actively or passively to Kings and all in authority by whose safety the whole state is safe if they be resisted or injured and destroyed Iliades of miseries like torrents of blood usually break in on all sorts of people Those divine Oracles besides the Catholick constant and eminent practice of the primitive Christians the best commentary on Scripture when they wanted not numbers and armes as Tertullian and others tell us yet they never used other weapons then patience prayers and tears petitions and Apologies to the persecuting Princes all those put together do shrewdly evince that those men are no friends to or assertors of the true cause of God who are not so of settled laws and Government of Magistratick power and civil justice of which not the will and power of man but the Law of God in general and the particular Laws customs and constitution of every Nation and Polity are Arbitrators and Judges What ever ◠done or taught by Prince or People contrary to these under any splendid form and novel names of Arbitrary prerogative or popular liberty or high Justice is the highest Injustice and done with an high hand in Dei contumeliam in affront to Gods Ordinances and of Law Order Peace and Government for the good of mankind § Nor may any Subjects here fly by way of appeale to the common Dictates of reason and loose principles of natural liberty or I know not what necessity after once by publique consent they are limited and confined to the inclosures of laws and rules of obedience either active or passive To which God and mans Laws oblige all men otherwise there will be no quiet or setling in any State for there will never want some whose discontentments or ambition think the Laws themselves too strict and injurious as to the liberties which are necessary to attain their designs and fullfil their lusts § All true Christians will rest either content or patient being never so concerned in any worldly momentary business as to sin upon the account of either getting or preserving it They have enough while they can in Righteousness and peaceful ways possess their own soul in good consciences which enjoy God and Christ and the holy Spirit Christians must be very insatiable not to be content with such society and liberty which will not suffer them to want what is necessary for life and godliness After the cause of publique Justice and peace which are a branch of Gods cause every private mans cause as to sin and grace vice and virtue good or evil trouble or comfort is Gods so far as they are on Gods side and take his part against the evil of World Flesh and Devil his word and spirit will plead for them against Satan accusing and conscience condemning against their fear and jealousies of God or themselves against doubts dejections and despaires The cause also of the poor the fatherless and the Widows is peculiarly Gods cause which he is patrone to and promiseth to protect them if they trust in him as he threatens their oppressors and despisers that he will plead their cause against them Pro. 22. 23. Yea the cause not only of good men but of wicked men is so far Gods as they have reason and justice or right on their side they may not be wronged or robbed because they are wicked or Idolaters God pleads the cause of Nebuchadnezzer though an heathen a persecutor and oppressor against King Zedekiah because of the Oath and Covenant which was in Gods name passed between them So he did that of Amurath that great Turk against Ladislaus a Christian King of Hungary when he violated the accord sworn between them having from the Pope a dispensation for his perjury which God never gives in lawful Oaths as he never obligeth to or by unlawful ones § True Religion binds us to such as are irreligious to Hereticks to Mahometans hometans and to all it is a damnable divillish and Antichristian Doctrine that to them much more to Christians no faith is to be kept that they have no civil right to any thing That they are Egyptians and may be robbed or killed by such as fancy or call themselves Israelites Moses's or Saints God hath given the earth to the children of men as such in natural and civil successions not as to his Children and Saints by grace and Regeneration God hath better things in store for them in Heaven which who so believes will never by fraud or force and so by way of sin and in justice seek to shark and scramble for these earthly things which God gives as a portion and reward sometimes to wicked men and is indeed their all that they desire or expect from God Lastly every creature is so far included to the cause of God as it hath his Stamp and Character upon it The abusing of them to sin riot luxury cruelty is the Gods dishonour as if he made them for no better use and ends Veneranda est non erubescenda natura as Tertullian speaks God is to be reverenced in all his works and not reproached The not owning God in them not blessing him for them and not serving him by them makes the users of them impleadable at Gods Bar and Tribunal Redde ratioonem Redde deprosium Give an account of the Corn and Wine and Oyle the Silk and Flax and the Wool the beauty strength estate and honour time wit learning and all other enjoyments Non hos quaesitum munus in usus as they are not ours by merit or by making the least of them so Gods action lies against us for every one of them if abused or not used as lent us by him who is Lord Paramount in chief above all of whom we have and hold all things in Frank Almoinage as so many Almes
fighting but by sober preaching and patient suffering This Spirit of glory was a riddle indeed and a new way to advance the Evangelical cause against the powerful oppositions found on all hands yet it was Gods way and prevailed by the power of his Word and the testimony of his Spirit of patience and glory which rested on them § As the first foundation stone of the Gospel or Church of Christ was laid in John Baptists and Christs blood so it was after builded up by St. Stephens St. James and their followers Then Christians like Parthians fought flying and prevailed by not resisting and were more then conquerors when they were most conquered the blood of Martyrs being the seed of the Church and their ashes as the compost ormendment of the world Fourthly It remains that I shew how God pleads his and his Churches Cause not always by miraculous and immediate instances but by the mediate instruments of his ordinary providence whom he stirs up to protect to favour to speak comfortably to his Sion that his warfare is finished that the days of refreshing are come such were some good or tollerable Kings among the Jews Asa Uzziah Hezekiah and Iosiah such was Constantine the Great and some other following Emperors that were Christian and orthodox too So since the Reformation God hath given specally in these British Churches Kings and Queens to be Nursing Fathers and mothers to true Religion Defenders of the true Faith and the Professors of it who had long ere this been martyred and burned butchered or massacred blown up and extirpated as Hereticks if the Romish Sea had not had bounds of national Laws and soveraign power set to it which said Hitherto and no further thou shalt go here thy proud and threatning waves shall be stopped I pray God we have not sinned away our defence and glory making breaches upon the banks of our Laws Government and Religion so wide as will let in at last that over-flowing scourge again upon us under the names of Liberty Toleration and Super-reformation Again God pleads his own cause as to true Religion by furnishing his Church First of the Jews with extraordinary Prophets such as was Moses Samuel Eliah Micah Isaiah Ieremiah Ezekiel Daniel and others till the Messiah came After the Apostles who were Master-builders God gave to his Christian Church such Heroes of learning zeal and courage as in all ages undertook all those Goliahs and sons of Anak who deâ—ied the host of God such of old were Irenaeus Origen Tertullian Cyprian Clemens the Cyrils the Basils Chrysostom Epiphanius the Gregories the great Athanasius St. Augustine St. Jerom St. Hilary Optatus Prosper and others during the heat of heathenish and heretical or schismatical persecution And this not singly onely but socially junctis viribus in Councils or Synods which were Ecclesiastical Parliaments either greater or lesser in several Diocesses or Provinces or National or Oecumenical of all the Christian world by their Pastors and Representatives these did mightily plead the cause of Christ against heretical novelties and schismatical partialities these kept the faith and peace of the true Church intire these guided gathered and healed the erring scattered and worried of the flock these by many hands made walls against the seas and mighty floods which the devil cast out of his mouth against the Woman cloathed with the sun the Church professing Christ Thus the famous Council of Nice so pleaded the cause of Christs Divinity that they crushed the Arrian Serpent in the egg and gave that cockatrice its deadly wound which it never recovered though it made a foul strugling a long time So the Council of Constantinople pleaded the cause of the Holy Ghost against the cavils of Macedonius So the Council of Ephesus pleaded the unity of Christs Person God and Man against Nestorius And the Council of Chalcedon the distinction of his Natures against Eutyches his confoundiug of them so in other cases as the cause of God and his Church required Councils were soveraign Physitians and applied excellent cordials till they came to be servile to the private causes lusts power and interests of men and less intent to the Word and Spirit of Christ as the first Council of Jerusalem was which ought to be the pattern of all after Synods And afterwards in the eclipse decline superstition and darkness of times in the Western Churches yet there were not wanting some that did still plead the cause of God as his witnesses against the Apostacies extravagancies and luxuries of the Romish tyranny and pride So was St. Bernard Nicolaus Clemangis Alvarus-Pelaegius Wickliff John Hus and Jerom of Prague our Lincolniensis Baleus and others Yea when God arose mightily to shake this Western world and to rack us off from our Monastick and Roman lees who can sufficiently muster up the armies of Worthies both abroad and at home of reverend Bishops and other learned Divines who have either stood in the gap with their arms or at the bar with their strong arguments pleading Gods cause by Scripture and antiquity by learned writings and holy lives against all oppositions I will name none because I will not seem partially silent to the merit of any This only I may without envy say none have exceeded the worthy Bishops and others of the Reformed Church of England who were and ever will be in impartial judgements esteemed among the first therein and the headmost ranks of Martyrs Confessors Reformers Preachers Disputers Writers and Livers while we were happy to enjoy such Fathers and such Sons of this Church as were worthy to enjoy those favours and Honors which this Nation heretofore grudged not to confer upon them and abhorred to take from them and their Episcopal Order which was excellently martialled and imployed by worthy Bishops as Jewel Usher Andrews Davenant Morton Prideaux Hall White Bilson Babington and others Also by Hooker Willet Sutliff Rogers and others of the Presbyterian subordination § T is true they were all men and so might have their infirmities more or less but they were such men of might and weight and of valour and renown that with all the grains of allowance they far out-weighed all that popular stuff or pomp of either learning or vertue gifts or graces Scholarship or Saintship which hath swelled their adversaries rather then filled them with any real truth or ingenuom worth comparable to them And however now indeed the Reformed Church and Religion of England doth look like an Army that hath been so harrased and routed as it hath lost most of its gallant commanders which gave life and courage and skill to the whole Protestant party and the cause of the Reformed Religion yet we must not despair but that God will return in mercy to us if once our lives and manners be but as reformed as our doctrine was this needeth not though the other do reforming § And because there will be failers and infirmities on the best
and prayed for those that spitefully used them This gave repute to the Cause of God and shewed the spirit of God was in them of a truth they did not speak but act great things and if they could less dispute they would yet readily dye for that cause which was delivered to them by the Pillar and ground of Truth the Church of Christ Secondly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Charitative with charity to all sorts of people pittying their blindness and barbarity in meekness of wisdom instructing them as holy Polycarp did fervently and humbly praying for them yea osculando prodit orem even kissing our betrayers and destroyers as Crysologus observes of Christ not behaving themselves as vermin in a trap or wild Buls in a Net but as Lambs and Sheep of Christs Flock and Mark who opened not his mouth save onely to pray for his crucifiers as also did the first Martyr S. Stephen whose name imports the comfort and crown of his thus suffering for Christs Cause not as an evil doer or an evil speaker some mens stomacks are so full of Choler gall and virulency that they do not plead for Gods cause so much as spit and spue upon it when pretending high zeal and godliness they so foully disgorge themselves in ill language against their superiors and betters every way no Magistrate no Minister escape their dirt and mire All are Beasts and Antichrists and Satans and Enemys and fit to be destroyed that do not comply with the cause they look to set up together with themselves by pulling down all that stands in their way § What scurrilous and scandalous Libels have some men made like the wast and filthy papers of Martin Marprelate and others of that bran to wrap up their several causes in what undecencies what barbarities whatâ—edities whatfuries what menaces have their Sermons and Prayers abounded with and so their action s by a superfluity of self conceit passion pride arrogancy envy desire of revenge and the like enormous distempers so far beyond a Christian that they would make a modest and ingenuous heathen blush and abhor any cause that is pleaded or managed by such poy sonous pens such polluted lips and unwashed hands § I may truly say with St. Iames my brethren these things ought not to be so these are not the methods of Christians pleading their Gods and Saviourâ— cause either bitterly to rail like Rabsakeh or pompously to vapour and flatter like Tertullus crying up every cause as Gods that is uppermost either in power or in popular applause or vulgar pitty which are no true Touch-stones of Gods cause either as to civil Iustice or true Religion And thus O worthy and Christian Auditors have I finished the demonstrative or doctrinal part which shewed first the nature of Gods cause Secondly the manner of pleading it and Thirdly what method we must use in our pleading it so as to observe the holy laws and orders which become our respects to the cause of God and to our Superiors yea to all men whose rules are his written word rightly understood not wrested and depraved by sinister passions and presumptuous dispensations of what is our duty indeed to God and man I will not abuse your patience while I crave the use of a little time to feel how the pulse of your affections and resolutions do beat and whether your understandings have transmitted the cause of God to your heart that knowing your duty in so great a concern you may resolve to do it 1. Vse of instruction to shew us what is that cause which is most worthy our pleading with all the wisdom power and capacities we have it is Gods For this cause as Christ speaketh he came into the World and into the bosome of the true Church for this cause we are endowed with understanding memory eloquence conscience civil influences in Counsel and in authority publique and private for this cause we were baptised by the Blood of Christ and dedicated to him sutably educated and instructed also nourished and refreshed by his body and blood that we should plead for Gods glory for our Saviours truth Worship Ministry servants and institutions against our own iusts and Passions against the ignorance Atheâ—sme prophaneness licentiousness hypocrisie novelty extravagancy error superstition idolatry Flattery sacriledge and security of the world It is a shame for us to be so zealous industrious solicitous and importune in our own petty concerns for a little profit honour or pleasure and to neglect that cause which is worth all we are and have even our estates liberties and lives Nec propter vitam vivendi per dere causam if we expect God to plead ours we must plead his and with a vehemency as much above all other causes as heaven is above earth eternity above a moment and the excellency of Christ above the loss and dung the seraps and excrements of this world 2. Vse of Caution but as we must be careful to adhere to and assert Gods cause so it must be in Gods way with Iustice holiness order humility patience charity sincerity according to the bonds of Gods and mans laws not with tumult violence saction sedition sraud sury partiality injustice and hypocrisie Gods Ark though it â—otters must not be stayed or held up by such rash hands better it do honeste cadere then inhoneste stare These Midwives are not fit for the birth of Gods children Such as call in the assistance of these either mistake Gods cause or they make his cause but a stale and visard to their own private interests and designes or lastly they are ignorant of Gods methods and the way of his Saints in all ages or they greatly distrust his power and goodness as if he were not sufficient to vindicate himself and his cause by such means as are onely worthy of him of Christ and of us as his servants 3. Vse of trial and reproofe you may see clearly what cause they plead who observe not Gods course and method but think to justifie evil pleading by the goodness of the cause To such violent injurious perfidious and unreasonable men we may put that question which God doth Psalm 50. 16. What hast thou to do to take my cause into thy hand or my word into thy mouth since thou hatest to be reformed c. On which words they report that Origen after his lapse commented with his tears Those that plead Gods cause any way by fighting or writing speaking or doing must have written in their hearts and affections on their forehead and hands as the Horses in Zacharies vision had on their bels or bridles holiness to the Lord St. Chrisostome observes in the disorders and corruptions which distracted with exstatick convulsions and madness the heathen Sybils and Prophets in their Oracles and in the calmness or harmony which was in Gods Prophets how great a difference there is between Diabolical possession and divine inspiration