the ordering and disposing of all things here below And this did the wiser sort among them confess as the Satyrist tells us Nullum numen abest si sit prudentia sed te Nos facimus Fortuna Deam Others again as the Stoicks make Fate or Destiny the cause of all Alterations which they say is an Event that necessarily falls out from a certain inevitable order and connection of Natural Causes working without the will of God as the Supreme Orderer and Disposer of them he being subjected to them and not they to him whereby they take away the very Nature of the Godhead which is to be a most powerful and free Agent that works what and by what means it pleases all secondary causes depending upon that and that upon none But enough of these For I must remember my self that I am now speaking to Christians who acknowledge the Divine Providence in all things and therefore shall speak no more of these Negative and supposed Causes but shall now give you the true Efficicent Causes of them by way of Affirmation And here know that Logicians tell us of two Efficient Causes Principal and less Principal And this is twofold Impulsive and Instrumental First then the Principal Cause of all Changes and Alterations is God for so said the Heathen man Valet ima summit Mutare insignem attenuat Deus Obscura promens But why borrow I weapons from the Philistins forge when as there is enough for this that may be drawn out of Gods Armory of the Scriptures as Psal. 75.6 7. Promotion says the Prophet comes neither from the East nor from the West nor from the South but God is the Iudge he puts down one and sets up another So also Job 34.29 When he gives Quietness who can make Trouble and when he hides his face who can behold him whether it be done says Elihu against a Nation or against a particular man only Again Amos 5.8 He makes the Seven Stars and Orion and turns the shadow of Death into the morning The Lord is his Name The Oratour expresseth this well by comparing Gods Omnipotency to the power of the Soul over the Members of the Body which upon the least intimation of the Mind do turn and move about with all facility Now God says he is the sole Mind of the Universe and hath all parts and parcels thereof at his beck and pleasure to be turn'd into any shape or form at his disposal Nay it is no dishonour for God to cast the eye of his Providence upon the alteration even of the meanest things for who is like says the Psalmist to the Lord our God who hath his dwelling on high and yet humbles himself to behold the things in Heaven and Earth Not only to behold the things in Heaven which is a great condescention to him whom the Heaven and the Heaven of Heavens cannot contain but also the things in Earth Now how unworthy these are of his taking notice of you may see by those diminutive expressions of them compared with Gods greatness Isa. 40.15 where the Prophet says Behold the Nations are but as the drop of a Bucket and are counted as the small dust of the Ballance Behold he takes up the Isles as a very little thing And if this be not low enough for them he says further v. 17. That all Nations before him are as nothing and are counted to him as less than nothing Now look what a wide difference there is betwixt the Sea and a Bucket of water yea the drop of a Bucket or betwixt a heap of dust and the small dust of the ballance betwixt very great and very little betwixt all things and nothing at all yea less then nothing if less could be so vast is the disproportion betwixt God and all Nations which are the greatest among all earthly things And yet for all this is God pleased so far to extenuate his own greatness and to take off from it as to look after them and run them about in their several stages from one point unto another And if you would have this truth to be made out further unto you our Saviour doth it Mat. 10.29 by two several instances The one is of two Sparrows which are little birds and of small value but the Greek yet runs it more diminutively 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 two little sparrows and so they must needs be for they were sold both even for a farthing and this is price little enough Yet the Arabick makes it less and hath for it Phals which is the least piece of money that can be and accordingly expresses the two Mites spoken of Mark 12.42 which makes but one Farthing by Phalsain in the dual number as a late and learned Expositor notes The other is of the Hairs upon our Heads being a kind of Excrement belonging to our Bodies and no integral or necessitous part of them as the Heart Hands and Feet are and yet he tells us that God numbers these and takes such a particular account of them that not one of them falls to the ground without his disposal In the vision of the Wheels we read of a wheel within a wheel Now the wheel within is the wheel of Gods Providence that turns about the wheels of all outward things be they never so low and mean For as God doth not labour in doing the greatest things so neither doth he disdain either to do or undo the least but as he made the small and great says the book of Wisdom so also doth he care for both alike The Potter having power over his Clay either to make of it a vessel of honour or dishonour and being made either to preserve it in that form and being he hath bestowed upon it or else to deform and destroy it since it is equitable that every one should do with his own as he pleases Nay as he says of the gnat that Nusquam potentior natura quam in minimis So may we say that God doth no ways advance his Power and Wisdom more than in ordering of the least accidents to be disposed of to his Glory and the good of his Children And so much for the Principal Efficient cause The less Principal follows which as I said is either Impulsive or Instrumental Now the Impulsive cause of all Changes and Alterations is the sin of man This usher'd them in at the first and so it doth still For before Adam sinned he enjoyed a Paradise of constant and uninterrupted happiness but so soon as he sins against God then follows a great change presently For the Earth all fruitful before now becomes barren himself subject to labour his Wife to Travail and Sorrow and both to cares and troubles to weakness and dissolution And so it is also with Nations and Kingdoms If they be chang'd at any time sin is the cause of it and the greater their sin is the greater ususually is their change Great sinnings are the floud-gates to let in great
you That from Abraham's receiving of the promise unto the birth of Isaac were five and twenty years sixty from thence to Jacobs birth and to his death which fell out presently upon their entrance into Aegypt a hundred and thirty years After which unto the death of Levi who was Vltimus Patriarcharum the last of the Patriarchs that survived and in which space the Israelites were kindly entreated for Joseph's sake were ninety four years and a hundred and one and twenty more of cruel Bondage until Moses came to deliver them from it in the Reign of Pharaoh Cencres All which particulars being gathered up together do make up the compleat sum of four hundred and thirty years and may serve to justifie God in all his sayings and to clear his Truth in the least circumstance and punctilio of time when it shall come to be judged For when once Gods appointed time is come to introduce a change either for better or worse among any people then shall every breath of wind how cross soever it seems to blow at the present yet be so far from hindring Gods work in it as that one way or other you shall find it in the sequel to contribute its help and assistance to it 3. God advances also his Glory this way in the manifestation of his Wisdom and Goodness in that he makes a sweet harmony of so many different cords and changes and frames a most admirable Order out of a seeming Disorder and Confusion Many and divers are the qualities of Herbs yet if a skilful Simpler hath the mixing of them he knows how to make of them a well-relish'd and wholsome Sallade So many were the interchangeable passages that happen'd to Joseph and had we the same it may be we should think them very confused ones but yet let the Wisdom and Goodness of God but lay them together and we shall presently find as Joseph did the close of them all in a sweet Diapason For though all things as to us are floating up and down to and again by chance as it were and accident 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Gregory Nazianzen yet if we look to the order and appointment of Gods Providence which doth always most wisely contrive all events for the good of his Children they are fixt and stable howbeit they may seem to go contrary at the present And of Gods dealing in this kind we have Job an aminent example who is to day the greatest man for Wealth and Honour in all the East and a Tablet of this is Greatness you may see in his 29 Chapter which I desire you to read over at your leisure wherein you shall find a whole series of worldly prosperity to wait upon him yet tomorrow he is poor even to a by-word and proverb As poor as Job insomuch as he spends all the next Chapter in bemoaning his suddain change beginning it with a But which though a small Monosyllable yet as the Helm of a Ship turns about the Vessel any way so doth this But turn about Job and all his former Honour and Prosperity into the extremest contempt and adversity But now says he they that are younger than I have me in derision whose fathers I would have disdained to have set with the dogs of my Flock and ending it with this doleful accent verse last versa est cithara mea in luctum organum in vocem flentium My harp is turned into mourning and my organ into the voice of those that weep Yet all is well we say that ends well and so it was with Job which makes Saint James say by way of support unto Gods people in their afflictions Ye have heard of the patience of Job and have seen the end of the Lord i. e. what good end God gave him in it for the next day God brings a great deal of Light out of this Darkness by a wise and gracious disposing of all that evil to him for the best in giving him twice as much as he had at the first and blessing his later end more than his beginning So that although for a time all those sad Changes that befell Job seem'd even to cross the ordinary course of Gods care and Providence to him yet in the conclusion you see how his Wisdom and Goodness cut them all out and made them serve to his greater Honour and Abundance And so much for the Ends or Final Causes in respect of God They follow now in respect of our selves And these are two first to confirm our Faith secondly to reform our Lives and to work out by them good to his servants First to confirm our Faith And so God brings many times great Changes into the world to try if amidst those shakings of outward things among us we will be shaken in our Faith or not That as the Apostle speaks of Heresies 1 Cor. 11.19 Oportet esse Haereses There must be Heresies among you that they which are approved may be made manifest so say I Opertat esse mutationes There must be Changes and these not so much in respect of the things themselves which are in their own natures liable to alteration and dissolution as in respect of Gods end in it that they which are approved and sincere in the Faith may be manifested to be so by their constancy and perseverance in it That as there is a necessity of Fire to try Gold whether it be true or else counterfeit so also is there a necessity of Changes for by these it will appear whether we will measure our Religion by outward things and in the loss or enjoyment of them be lost in our Protestant Faith yea or no. There is nothing Beloved more discovers the Hypocrite than his Ingenium versatile as Livy said of Cato than his turning humour in Religion for which I do not say he shall be plagued in Hell by being wheel'd about there continually without any relaxation though that may seem a punishment somewhat suitable to his Weathercock-disposition here upon earth no Hoc nimis Ethnicum This is too heathenish but rather with the Prophet David That he shall turn into Hell with all those that forget God which is that portion of Hypocrites mentioned by our Saviour Matth. 24. last For if an Apple be rotten at the coare it will not hold long upon the Tree but upon the least Wind will fall from it And so it is with the rotten-hearted Hypocrite if a little cross wind do but blow upon him oh how soon doth he fall off from the Tree of Life and become a wind-fall in his Religion for the Devil that old Serpent to prey upon Every Cock-boat you know will bear up well enough in a calm sea but that is a stout Vessel that can live in the most troubled water And too too many there were in the Primitive times that like Dr. Pendleton in Queen Maries days boasted much of their Constancy in the Orthodox Faith during Constantines days so long as God hedg'd
about his Vineyard with Peace and Prosperity but so soon as that Hedge was broken down and erroneous yea Heretical Doctrines were let in like so many Beasts of prey to devour then how quickly did these prove Turncoats and Apostates from the Faith But as for the true Christian he is like a Rock Mediis immotus in undis That although the waves are always swelling against him yet is he the same man still in his Reformed Religion and wavers not or else like that House built upon the Rock against which the Floods came and the Winds blew but it fell not because it was built upon a Rock And such a well-built house was St. Basil who being threatned with death by Valens if he would not advise further and turn Arrian answer'd with this brave resolution I need not any further advice than I have taken already about this matter for to morrow I shall be the same man that I am to day therein and no other And here know that some things are of Necessity wherein we cannot but change as in natural civil and moral things and to change in there is only humane Others again are of Duty and these either prohibited or enjoyn'd 1. Prohibited as in evil and erroneous things and to change here is pious and divine and not to change either Weakness or Obstinacy 2. Enjoyn'd as in sacred and religious and to change here is impious and Diabolical and not to change true Christian Fortitude and Constancy Whatsoever things we see then wheeling about in the world as Governments Families and the like nay howsoever we may change our selves or be chang'd in some things of an indifferent nature by those that have dominion over our Bodies and Estates yet is there no man that hath dominion over our Faith But this is Gods peculiar and therefore in this we must not change It is not with saving Truths as it is with Clothes which alter every year as the fashion doth for the fashion of the world passes away says St. John but true Religion is ever in fashion with good men and alters not And herein we may justly take occasion to bewail the unsteadiness of some in these times who are mere Scepticks in Religion always conceiving some new Opinions in it and always in pain till they be deliver'd of their new conceptions though never so monstrous and deformed That which was truth with them yesterday is no such thing to day and what is so to day is otherwise to morrow such Changelings there be in this last Age who like the Moon do never appear the same two days together And I would to God says St. Ambrose that their change were no worse than that of the Moon for she returns again within a little time to her full light but these never And he is blind that sees not this among us namely how some turn every day to Popish Superstition but more to Anabaptistical Fancies some unto Socinian Blasphemies but most unto Atheistical Notions and all into Sensuality this being the common Sewer into which all the former run and are ultimately resolved But as St. Paul said to his Galathians so do I to such O foolish Galathians who hath bewithc'd you that you should not obey the Gospel And it is a metaphor says one from Sorcerers who use to cast a mist before the peoples eyes that so they may not take a right view of what is presented to them As if he had said Who hath cast a mist before the eyes of your understandings to make that appear unto you for truth which indeed is not What Are ye so foolish that having begun in the Spirit ye will be perfected in the Flesh So Are ye so foolish that having begun in truth ye will end in falshood or can ye be so simple as to exchange Gold for Dirt Wheat for Chaff and your pretious Faith as St. Peter calls it which is the substance of things hoped for for Errours of all sorts and mere shadows of Truth I trow not For if Errour as our Kingly Divine said well have any advantage it consists in Novelty or if Truth any it consists in Constancy Was the Doctrine then of the Reformed Churches and the Harmony of our Confessions grounded upon evident and pregnant Scriptures maintain'd by the Orthodox and Primitive Fathers and conveyed to us by the constant tradition of the Universal Church the Faith of Christ once deliver'd to the Saints and the Truth of God yesterday why so it is to day and will be to morrow also And therefore to day in our profession of it we must be as yesterday and to morrow as this day because as God is the same yesterday to day and for ever so also is the Truth of God That which was once so will be so always and cannot be otherwise Oh that we would then be exhorted in the Apostles words To stand fast in the Faith to quit our selves like men and be strong and not to be as children toss'd to and fro and carried about with every wind of Doctrine but to be as men in understanding stedfast and immoveable that so God may have cause to glory on our behalf as he did on Jobs Hast thou consider'd says God to Satan my servant Job So hast thou consider'd such a servant of mine Seest thou to how many changes I have subjected him to changes in his Children to changes in his Estate to changes in his Liberty to changes in his Friends and Acquaintance Nay seest thou how many of his Brethren are chang'd of late from a febrish distemper before now into a sleepy Lethargy Seest thou how indifferent they are for their Religion round about him and how many shaken reeds there are on every side of him And yet for all this as my servant Job did so doth he still hold his integrity But enough of this Secondly Gods end also in it is To reform our Lives and do us good by his so various dispensations towards us Hence we read Isa. 30.28 of a sieve of vanity wherein God says he will sift the Nations and shake them to and fro one after another that so he may winnow them from that chaff of sin that is within them For why was Moab at ease from his youth why setled he upon his lees and held still his corrupt tast but because he was never disquieted nor emptied from vessel to vessel Ier. 48.11 Thus a sedentary life we find very subject to Diseases and a long standing Prosperity to a Nation is like a standing Pool whose water doth soon puddle and putrifie And this is the reason of that speech of David Psal. 55.19 Because they have no Changes therefore they feare not God making by it the uncheckt prosperity of worldly men a great occasion of their continuance in sin and so an Index of Gods Wrath upon them rather than of his special Favour to them And therefore now we have seen the Angel of God moving the waters of