he said unto me Son of Man these Bones are the whole house of Israel And for the same Reason may we now say that they were the Loyal Captivated part of his Majesties Subjects whom God as it were Raised out of their Graves like Men that had been long dead The Prophecies are full of such ingenious Emblems as these and particularly in the 17th Chap. of the same Prophecy God represented to the Prophet the Ruin and Restauration of the King and Royal House of Judah under the Parable of the Cedar and great Eagle which is as fit a Symbol to represent what hath happened to our late and present Soveraign and the Princes of the Blood The great Eagle was the King of Babylon who came to Lebanon and cropt off the Branches of the highest Cedar upon which it withered and dyed But I saith God will preserve the young twigs of the highest Cedar and I will take the highest branch of it and plant it again in the mountain of Israel and it shall put forth boughs and bear fruit and become a goodly Cedar and all the trees of the Forest shall know so signal was his Providence in it that I the Lord brought down the high tree and dried up the green tree and made the dry tree to flourish again Was not this the condition of our late and present Soveraign Did not an Eagle a Many-headed Eagle full of Feathers of divers Colours crop the top Boughs of the Royal Prerogative and make the Cedar wither away and dye Nay did they not do unto him what was done to the Tree in the vision of Nebuchadnezzar hew him down cut off his branches Dan. 4 14. shake his leaves and scatter his fruit But did not God preserve his young Twigs and did he not plant his highest Branch again in the Brittish Mountains and is he not become a mighty Tree Yes there are so many things if not plainly miraculous yet so very admirable in the preservation and replanting of or Gracious Soveraign that in Justice we ought to ascribe it to the special over-ruling Providence of God For if we consider the Builders who refused the Stone which is now become the head of the Corner our Common-wealth-builders I mean who built with untempered Morter Confusion came upon them as upon the Builders of Babel none knows how unless it was sent from above Consternation suddenly fell upon some Repentance or Horror seized upon others and Jealousies and Discontents confounded the rest the People in the mean while as it were by Inspiration crying out in all places Hosannah to the King Then were strange things to be seen Republicans with Royalists Church-men with Church-robbers Rebels and Traytors with Loyal Subjects Papists with Protestants Episcopists with Anti-episcoparians all agreed to bring in the King or let him be brought in That Ethiopians should thus change their Colour and Leopards their Spots that the Lyon should associate with the Lamb and the Wolf with the Kid that things on a sudden should change their Natures or act against them are Miracles in the Moral as well as the Natural World and ought to be ascribed to his Power and special Providence who only doth wonderful things That Panick Fears should also seize on those Legions of whom the World was afraid and that they who were Veterans in Blood and Rebellion should bear the sight of the Royal Standard and pray for the King as he passed their Ranks must needs be imputed to his special Influence Zech. 12.10 who was able to pour out the spirit of grace and supplication upon them that they might look upon him whom they had pierced with Repentance and Remorse That so many different Elements should jumble into such an happy mixture and Causes so contrary conspire to one Effect that all the Enemies of the Government should be as it were Planet-struck and all the Interests against it invisibly subdued that scarce one Party or one Man among them should appear to oppose this Revolution nor one Dog among them move his Tongue but that it should be brought about without Mutiny without Murmur or without a drop of Blood was an admirable Scene of Affairs worthy the contrivance of infinite Wisdom and ought to be esteemed as his doing alone who can work by repugnant Causes bring Order out of Confusion and take from men their Hearts of Stone and give them Hearts of Flesh II. Another Character of Gods special Providence and Assistance in any Event is The strange seasonableness of it when it unexpectedly falls out in a time of despondency to prevent the destruction of a destitute Person and the utter ruine of a desperate Righteous Cause God could prevent the fall of good Men and the ruine of Righteous Causes but for just and wise reasons he sometimes lets them lye in the rubbish till they seem irreparable and then unexpectedly raises them again as our Saviour raised Lazarus from the Grave when every one thought it was impossible to be done This was the Condition of the Royal Family and Cause God could have prevented that stupendous Series of Calamities which fell like Wave after Wave upon them he could have prevented the Designs and have sooner blasted the Success of their Enemies but he let them prosper to that degree that the Spectators as well as the Actors of this sad Tragedy were ready to think that God had forgotten to be gracious to David and had utterly forsaken his Righteous Cause But then at the moment when the Wicked Blasphemed God and said Tush God careth not for him in that Critical moment of Despair when God seemed to stand afar off and hid as it were his face from him then he arose and scattered his enemies and broke the power of the ungodly but like the power of the Tyrant Antiochus in Daniel which was broke without hands When the Usurpers Will was a Law when his Greatness made him defy his Enemies and say in his Heart I shall never be cast down then came a Disease like an Angel sent from God to do the part of Brutus and smote the Tyrant to the Ground Even then when there were no Human means left to rend the Kingdom from him God rent him from the Kingdoms and snatched his direful Soul from him as from the Fool in the Gospel in the midst of his strength and security when he had taken the Houses of God and the Palaces of the King in possession and thought he had much Goods laid up for many years When he said in his Heart I will ascend into heaven I will exalt my throne above the Stars of God Isa XIV I will sit upon the mount of the Congregation in the sides of the North then I say when he thought to ascend above the clouds a Prophetical Symbol for Great Monarchy and be like the most high in Soveraign Power then fell he like Lucifer from Heaven and was brought down to Hell and then sang we for joy how art
thou fallen from Heaven O Lucifer Son of the morning how art thou cut down to the ground Thou who didst make the Earth to tremble and shake the Kingdoms thereof Lastly when he as brought to that prodigious Strength and Greatness as to be Courted by the greatest Monarchs and thought to fix the Succession in his tainted Blood when he had been set by his Flatterers in a Throne and the Crown and Scepter laid at the Idols Feet then came the hand writing suddenly out against him and the Stone which he and the Builders before him had rejected like the stone in the Vision cut out of the Mountain without hands smote the Image that Prophetical Symbol of many Governments and broke in pieces the Iron the Clay the Brass the Silver and the Gold and they became like Chaff and the wind carried them away but the Stone which smote the Image became a great mountain even like mount Sion which cannot be removed and is the joy of the whole Earth To conclude even then when the Royal Interest was desperate and in Human probability must have utterly perished had not the deliverance happened when it did when not the People only but the Princes of the Earth counted our Soveraign smitten and afflicted of God and shunned him as the Heard do an hunted or embossed Stag then sudden confusion came upon his Enemies as sorrow upon a Woman in Travel then God said of them as of Cyrus his Anointed He is my Shepherd and set him upon the Throne of his Father David and made his Enemies lick the Dust When he was ready to sink under the Waves of Affliction upon which he had walked not without a Miracle so many years then didst thou stretch forth thy Arm unto him O righteous Jesus when he was become like a broken Vessel and seemed cleam forgotten as a dead man out of sight then didst thou O Lord overtun overturn overturn till he came whose right it was III. Another Character of Gods special Providence and Assistance in any Event is The mighty good which thereby accrues to the publick state of things and the persons upon whose welfare the publick doth depend To ascribe every petty Accident to a special Providence would look like Lightness and Superstition and it would be Profaness to father upon God the mischiess which we bring upon our selves by our own Sin and Folly but that great and beneficial Events ought to be ascribed to his particular hand is the common Creed of all Mankind For it is demonstrable from the Nature and Attributes of God that he doth govern Human Affairs and that being admitted it must needs follow in the Second place that he takes special care in ordering those Events which are of publick moment and benefit to Mankind and peculiarly those which concern any People that are of his Houshold which is the Church of God There was never any thing which seemed more contingent than the selling of Joseph into Egypt yet God did order it by a special Providence that he might be an Instrument in the time of Dearth of saving his Fathers House It was not you saith he to his Brethren but God who sent me hither to preserve you a Posterity on the Earth Genâ— 45.5 7 8. God sent me before you to save your lives by this great deliverance and hath made me a father to Pharaoh and Lord of his hourse and Ruler throughout all the land of Egypt which was then more than ever the Granary of the World So likewise in the story of Esther that she should be chosen into the Seraglio of Ashuerus among a crowd of other Virgins seems a matter of Fortune or common Providence and yet it was contrived by God for the deliverance of his People and the Providential Scene which depended upon it was perhaps as miraculous as ever was acted upon the Stage of Human Affairs But of all the remarkable Events in Sacred or Profance History none hath been a greater Blessing to any Prince or People than the Revolution of this day hath been to us and our King As for us we were delivered by it from Egypt and Babylon at home from dome-stick Captivity from Servitude of all Servitudes the most intolerable under the Tyrannical Empire of our own Mamalukes and from that Evil under the Sun when Beggars and Servants were Lords and Princes and Princes and Lords Beggars and Slaves We were delivered by it from Military and Arbitrary Power indeed from the Tyranny and Insolence of Vsurping Sultans in several Forms and Successions of Government who broke the bonds of Law in sunder as Sampson did the green Wit hs like Threds of Tow and made their Will and Pleasure our Law In a word we were restored by it to our natural King and Government to the Father of our Country and in him to our Lives our Religion our Liberties and Estates As for his Majesty he was restored by it to the Inheritance of Three Kingdoms where his Dominion is from one Sea to the other and from the Flood unto the Worlds end Of Three Kingdoms where his Subjects are his Children and where even his Merchants as the Prophet Speaks are Princes Isai 23.8 and his Traffiquers the Honourable of the Earth Lastly of Three Kingdoms where he sits on his Throne like God holding the Ballance of the World and represents him above all other Monarchs in this that he is the Moderator of Peace and War among Princes and can Set up one and Pull another down These are the Temporal Blessings which he and we enjoy by it and the Spiritual are no less considerable than these For after our return from Captivity the Temple was soon Rebuilt the Altar speedily set up and the Lawful Priesthood restored again Wherefore since the revolution of this Day was such an unspeakable Blessing to the Three Nations and so highly beneficial both to Church and State common Reason and Religion will Award the Contrivance of it to Gods Wisdom and the Execution of it in all its parts to his Almighty Arm. IV. Another mark of Gods Special Providence and assistance in any Event is When it falls out very seasonably for the relief and Vindication of oppressed Innocence and brings along with it the just Execution of publick Vengeance upon the Nimrods of Humane Societies the Sons of violence who live by Oppression and Prey God is naturally the Protector of Innocent Men and Righteous Causes and tho' in Wisdom he cannot acquit and condemn reward and punish here as he means to do hereafter when the great Tragecomedy is done yet lest in the mean time the Spectators should have Sinister Thoughts of his Providence he is forced to come as it were from behind the Curtain and kill a Bloody Tyrant like Herod with Blasphemy perhaps in his Mouth and sitting in his Royal apparel upon his Throne Though it would be inconsistent with his Wisdom in the Present State of things to extirpate the Bears and Wolves
this still is our Duty to do on this auspicious Day We have offered up the Calves of our Lips the Sacrifices of Praises and Thanksgivings unto God with our Mouths and I hope our Hearts are Unisons with our Tongues We have sung unto the Lord as the Psalmist saith and heartily rejoiced in the strength of our Salvation we have sung Psalms and Anthems unto him because he hath done marvellous things and I hope in this solemnity our very Souls have magnified the Lord and our Spirits have rejoyced in God our Saviour and even hto te last moment of it let every Loyal Person say bless the Lord O my Soul Ps 103.1 and all that is within me bless his Holy Name Certainly it is our duty on this happy day to extol God and exult in the Salvation which he hath wrought for us and to acknowledge that this is the day which the Lord hath made the day of our going out of Egypt the day of our return from Captivity the day of the Dedication of our Temple and Altar nay the day of the Brittish Purim in which we ought to rejoyce as being the day wherein we rested from our Enemies and the month which was turned to us from Sorrow to Joy and from mourning into a good day that we should make it a day of Feasting and Joy Esth 9.22 and of sending Portions and guifts to the Poor For it is to the Mercy of this day that we owe our Lives our Religions our Liberties and Estates that every one of us can sit securely under his own Vine and call what he hath his own and therefore certainly we that ejoy so great a Deliverance by this day and such mighty Blessings consequent upon it as no other People in the World enjoy besides our selves if our hearts be not at discord with our Mouths in our present Devotions we cannot forbear to let the offerings of our Charity accompany our Sacrifices of Praise and do something considerable to exhilarate the Spirits of our poor brethren and make them partakers of our joy This day the sorrowful sighing of the Poor and of the Prisoners ought to come before us and more especially if we know any such who wereruined by the late Successful Rebellion them we ought to relieve They more especially ought to be the Objects of your Charity upon this Solemnity and therefore in the first place let us do good and distribute to those or the Poor Relations of those who were sufferers for their Loyalty and bore the greatest and bitterest part of that Captivity from which the Lord brought back his People upon this day I suppose there are such to be found among you the Monuments of your former Loyalty in the bloody Worcester-fight and I hope you will consider them as Martyrs and Confessors for our English Liberties and open your hand liberally towards them who yet bear in their Bodies or in their Distressed Families the Marks of their Loyalty for the King and of their Sufferings for the Church We cannot offer up unto God any Sacrifice more acceptable than the supplies which in gratitude to him for our Deliverance we shall give to them this day and if our Charity be such as becomes our present Devotion we need not fear but that God will accept our Alms and Oblations and that our Prayers and our Alms will go up for a Memorial before him who hath done so great things for us and by his Almighty Power and Allwise Providence turned our Captivity as the Rivers in the South These are the duties proper to this day but then we must further understand that if our Joy be pure and genuine and such as really proceeds from a grateful and Religious Sense of Gods Goodness it will shew itself in the Fruits of true Piety towards God and of True and conscientious Allegiance to the King whom God so miraculously restored unto us all the Days of our Life He that pretends Religion towards God and yet makes use of it as a Cloak of Maliciousness to Cover his Disaffection and Disloyalty to the King that Mans Religion let him shew never so much Zeal for preserving the Protestant Religion is Pharisaical and vain and utterly unacceptable in the sight of him who will have every Soul to be Subject to the Higher Powers And on the other hand he who pretends Loyalty to the King and expresses it in such a manner as must needs be offensive to God and sober Men that mans Loyalty subverts the Kings Throne and provokes God to let the Enemies of the Crown multiply and prosper to punish the Wickedness of such profane Royalists who in that Bacchanal manner by which they Testify their affection to the King disgrace his Majesty and dishonour God He that truly Fears God will Honour the King and not meddle with those that are given to Change and he that truly Honours the King in the Christian notion of a King as the Image and Lieutenant of God will be sure to Honour him by whom Kings Reign and express his Zeal for him and his Joy for his Restauration in such Ways and Measures as shall not pollute any Festival Solemnity or turn our indulgence into Riot or Excess God forbid that Loyalty more than any other Christian Virtue should be made a pretense for such unworthy Greek Practises and God forbid that any of the English Melchites or Loyal Subjects of the Church of England should find no other ways of declaring their Zeal and Affection for their Soveraign than such as will render them the Scorn and Reproach of theirs and the Kings Enemies and a Scandal to the Royal Cause Let us in God's Name rejoyce in the Kings Salvation but in such a manner as will consist with the strict Rules of Christian Sobriety Let the Fear of God temper our Mirth for the Deliverance of the King let us wish him Health and say with Daniel O King live for Ever but at the same time let us remember him who hath Cloathed him with Majesty and in whose Rule and Governance the Hearts of Kings and Princes are God indeed hath given Wine to chear the Heart of Man but then we must in our Mirth remember what he hath told us that Wine is a Mocker and that strong drink is rageing Prov. 20 1. and whosoever is deceived thereby is not Wise God indeed hath given us leave to Eat and Drink to kill Beasts to mingle our Wines and furnish our Tables upon Festivall Occasions but then as Christians it becomes us to remember at our Feasts that whether we eat or drink 1 Cor. 10.31 or whatsoever we doe we must do it to the Praise and glory of God who on this day brought back the Captivity of his People and therefore doth expect that Jacob should Rejoice and Israel should be Glad for the wonderful deliverance which by his Special Providence and Assistance he hath brought about Now to God our Mighty Deliverer and Saviour who giveth Victory unto Kings the God to whom alone our Gracious Soveraign is Subject and next under whom he is Supream within these Realms unto the Allwise and Almighty God of whose institution Kings and Kingdoms are unto the Allwise Almighty God and Creator King of Kings and Lord of Lords be ascribed as is most due Eternal Praise Honour Majesty and Glory by us and by the whole Church Militant and Triumphant now and Evermore FINIS Page 17 line penult for 60 read 70. Sermons written by the same Authour and Printed for Walter Kettilby at the Bishops-head in St. Pauls-Church-yard 1. A Discourse to prove the strongest Temptations are conquerable by Christians A Sermon Preached before the Right Honourable the Lord Mayor of London and Court of Aldermen Jan. 14th 1676 7 2. The Spirit of Enthusiasm Exorcised In a Sermon Preached before the Vniversity of Oxford On Act-Sunday 1680. 3. Peculium Dei A Sermon Preached before the Honourable the Aldermen and Citizens of London on February 6th 1688 8 0 1 4. The true Notion of Persecution in a Sermon preached at the time of the late Contribution for the French Protestants 5. A Sermon Preached before the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Citizens of London on Jan. 30th 1681 2 6. The Moral Shechinah or a Discourse of Gods Glory In a Sermon Preached at the York-shire Feast In Bow-Church June 11 1682. 7. A Sermon Preached at the Church of St. Bridget on Easter-Tuesday being the first of April 1684 before the Right Honourable Sir Henry Tulse Lord Mayor of London and the Honourable Court of Aldermen together with he Governours of the Hospitals upon the Subject of Almsgiving